Tuesday, July 12, 2011

I can't be your facebook friend if...

I've sort of blogged about general facebook etiquette here and here but this is a bit different...

This might be a plight of the homosexual facebook user, but adding complete strangers based on amounts of mutual friends, cuteness of profile picture, and amount of skin and/or muscles in said profile picture is still a concept that alludes me.


Perhaps it is because I link my facebook to this blog and post with insane frequency, but I can't bring myself to add complete strangers. It's uncomfortable, because I share a lot of personal stuff. I mean, not consistency, color, and frequency of my bowel movements personal.

But stuff that I don't want just anyone reading.

However, in my efforts at Internet domination, I have sort of starting bending the rules and accepting friend requests from people I don't know extremely well, but I still believe I can't be your facebook friend if...

...your profile picture looks like an advertisement for some sort of sex based trade.

...our only mutual friends are people I wish I had never met before.

...your profile picture looks like you have been photo-shopped within an inch of your life.

...you have 2,000+ friends.

...your profile picture was taken by you, with your cell phone, in a mirror. You clearly either have no friends or have forgotten you aren't a d-bag circa 2002 MySpace.

...your network is a high school. I really don't feel like being featured on To Catch A Predator.

...you have no profile picture. Seriously, what is up this? I am NOT accepting friend requests from Darth Vader's silhouette. Possibly, Chewbacca. But that's what fan pages are for.


...your profile picture has eleventy-thousand people in it. Why are you hiding in the shuffle, Creeper?

...you are a business. Again, this is what fan pages are for. I even have one. 'Like' it here.

...you are couple sharing ONE account. Words cannot explain how lame this is.

...your profile picture hasn't changed for the last 6 months facebook has been insisting you are 'People I May Know.'

I probably take facebook too seriously and there's nothing wrong with networking, but if Emily Post were alive today - wait, she's dead right? - I'm sure she would agree with some of my simple disqualifiers listed above.

And to my current and/or former facebook friends, you might have found yourself defriended for any of the reasons listed above or for idiotic statuses about politics, religion, etc. that contain more profanity than your actual views or post a Nickelback song.

Also, rest assured if you have poor grammar, spelling, or punctuation, you have been hidden from my mini-feed from the moment you abused they're/there/their and other rules most 4th graders should know. Same goes for people who use wall posts that should be text messages and overly aggressive Check-Ins/Four-Squaring. No one cares that you are home. Ok? Thanks. Bye!

Finally, with the exception of people with extremely cute children, this is your account, not your child's online baby book. Nine times out of ten, I couldn't care less what your offspring is doing, unless you are balloon boying your child, I definitely want to see that.

PS - It took almost all of my self control to not use screen shots from my friends' profiles to illustrate these offenses. Some of them are close friends, and I prefer not to have an alcoholic beverage thrown in my face at the next party I go to... 

8 comments:

Shaneiferd said...

Haha! Your list of qualifications to be a Facebook friend sounds a lot like mine. My biggest pet peeve involves the people who have thousands of friends. Seriously? At my peak I had 390, and I felt severely bloated - trimmed the list down to 150. Since then some of the deletes have readded me so I'm back to 205, but that's okay - they cared enough to readd me, so they're worth it.

Also, love the line you dropped about Darth Vader's silhouette. I never noticed this before, and now I can't unnotice it. Nooooooo!

~SP

http://www.500daysofshaneiferd.net

TaurMe said...

Great post! I love your list. I haven't linked my FB page to my blog, so I do't really have any random people story, but my pet peeve is when I add a friend and I get requests from her boyfriend, mum, dad, sister, therapist etc etc.

What's worse? My mum's doing the same thing :{

Noss said...

Where is the happy medium? You don't want glamor shots but DIY is out too?


It was pretty funny though. Even if I do wish you were mean enough to post images....it isn't like we have any trouble picking those people out as examples from our own lists.

Note to self...have extremely adorable offspring..

Justin said...

You eliminated the potential for us to be Facebook friends in at least thirteen ways. Bummer.

The list was great though! Well done, John!

The Chaser said...

I just started reading you blog. I saw you post a comment at the Blogess and your facebook title caught my eye. I love that you said, I will not add you if the only friends we have in common are people I wish I didn't know! CLASSIC! I'm now putting you in my favorites!

John said...

I'm glad y'all respect facebook just as much as me. Thank you for all the nice comments, I usually just get SPAM with Russian porn viruses and ads for penile enlargement. Which are both fun, just not as nice.

karoppi said...

You're cute...will you be my Facebook friend?

Leslie said...

My picture that is currently up is of me getting an ice cream cone from the Big Gay Ice Cream Truck in NYC. The only reason I wanted to go to NYC was to meet them. And I did.