“Angela Rivera welcomes all her CSULB peers back to school and anticipates long lines everywhere on campus.”
Less than 140 characters. Bingo.
Coming back to school signifies the onset of excessive homework assignments and even more excessive Facebook and Twitter usage. In an effort to network with peers, students have embraced the realm of social media. The ability to share what you are doing every second of the day has saved us from actually asking people how their days are in person. But how much is too much?
The abundance of social media sites has driven to the downfall of face-to-face conversations. And with cell phones like the iPhone or Blackberry, users can even utilize these sites while away from their home computers. In fact, Twitter claims 80 percent of its product usage is done on mobile devices.
A 140-character statement seems innocent enough, but its content, or lack thereof, can raise a slew of problems. Status updates on these sites have reached the point of sheer annoyance for some users. The constant reminder that X person is ten days away from going to Vegas or despises their job at Target gets old quickly, and can eventually affect one’s likeability.
However, Facebook and Twitter are not to blame for the plethora of absurd one-liners, rather, the person typing is.
Once someone begins to clutter your news-feed with meaningless status updates or tweets, one must “unfriend” or “unfollow” that individual, which leads to further problems once they find out they have been dumped. Your safest bet on Facebook would be to hide their status updates from your news-feed.
On the other hand, TwitterSnooze, an application that allows you to suspend tweets from someone you follow, notifies users of when you begin seeing their updates again, defeating the purpose of hiding altogether.
Facebook and Twitter enable users to create multiple accounts, some of which are greatly abused. Horror stories of cheating boyfriends and snooping girlfriends have erupted in recent years more than ever before. Social media has become a new form of cheating in that sense, leading to the very public Facebook breakup.
Once X person goes from “In a Relationship” to “It’s Complicated,” it is inevitable that a breakup will soon transpire. This triggers an onslaught of comments from friends you barely speak to. Which begs the question — are these friends actually concerned about your well being or getting ready to pounce on your newly single ex-boyfriend? I will let you use your judgment on this one.
According to Scott Brown of Wired Magazine, the inability to lose touch with past friends is a quandary in itself. Losing friends is a natural occurrence that allows us to grow and find ourselves. However, the online connection to your childhood friends will constantly remind you of your dirt-eating stage, or that one time at band camp.
Ultimately, there is no solution to social media drama, so in an attempt to provide you with a token of advice for the new school year I will say this — think before adding/following friends. If you already communicate via text and instant messenger, adding Facebook or Twitter might be a one-way trip to friendship hell. The last thing you want this semester is high tuition costs, cut classes and annoying social media friends.
Angela Rivera is a senior journalism and Chicano/Latino Studies major and a contributing writer for the Daily 49er.