Facebook Sucks...There I Said It.

I was talking to Kelly for a few minutes on the phone today and she complained that I hadn’t accepted her Facebook friend request.

Now, the truth of the matter is that I fucking hate Facebook. I signed up for the sole purpose of tracking down and old friend from England, and when I found that the Anthony Halley listed on Facebook wasn’t the Anthony Halley I was looking for…I signed out of facebook and haven’t been back since.

Kelly then made the mistake of asking why.

The short answer is ‘Facebook is retarded’. Facebook is nothing more that an extra conduit for people to send you bullshit and spam. It’s like email, but email that only accepts forwards, eCards and crap.

So, why on earth would I start using Facebook? All the people I know and like have my private email address, skype info and phone number already.

For example, I just logged into Facebook for the second time ever and apparently Sunny has sent me ‘two pieces of flair’, a ‘hug’ and a ‘wrapped gift under my Christmas tree’.

Why? Oh dear God why?

We live in the same fucking house! If you want a hug, actually hug me. The ‘gift’ was a picture you could have just called me over to the computer to show me…and the pieces of flair were just more pictures made to look like badges.

Why? Why send me something when we use the same computer? I’m sitting less than ten feet away!

At this point, Kelly accused me of sounding like a ‘Grumpy Old Man’…and you know what, she was absolutely fucking right.

When it comes to the internet, I am a grumpy old man. You see, I saw those same ‘funny’ forwards back in 1995. Those ‘awesome jokes’ I get fifteen copies off because everyone in my address book forwards it to everyone else in their address book come from BBSs that pre-date the internet. The novelty factor of an eCard or anything similar wore off over a decade ago.

So, yeah, I am a grumpy old man. I’m the old guy sitting in the restaurant, shaking my head at the two kids who are sending text messages to each other from opposite sides of the table.

Long story short, it’s not ‘social networking’, it’s just a way for people to send each other cutesy crap because it’s still a novelty to them. It’s a way to say something to someone when you don’t actually have anything to say.

Basically, imagine how you’d feel if all your friends and family got their first ever telephones and were calling you every fifteen minutes for absolutely nothing just because talking on a telephone was brand new to them.

That’s what Facebook, MySpace and all those other social networking sites feel like to me. You might find those jokes funny, but I’ve read them a hundred times. You might think it’s cute to send someone a ‘hug’ or a ‘smile’ over the internet, but I just see it as more junkmail to deal with.

So, basically, it’s nothing personal. If you send me a friend request and I don’t accept it, it’s just because I never use Facebook. I mean, after all, if you’re actually my friend, you already have another hundred ways to contact me…and if what you have to say isn’t worth a regular email or a phonecall, it’s probably not worth saying.