What Are Your Rules For Friendship On Facebook?
Posted by: Wendy Atterberry
Filed in:
news
8:30AM, Friday January 30th 2009
Burger King ran a promotion this month called “Whopper Sacrifice,” in which a free burger was offered to anyone who deleted 10 friends on Facebook. When Burger King started sending notifications to castoffs letting them know they’d been dumped for a tenth of a whopper, Facebook suspended the campaign. All this got me thinking: what else besides the lure of free fast food makes people un-friend someone? And how do people decide whom to friend in the first place? In an article in the Times this week, a recent graduate of Harvard (where Facebook got its start) advised “culling your friend list once a year to remove total strangers and other hangers-on. Keeping your numbers down gives you more leeway to be selective about whom you approve in the first place,” he said.
The real question is: how selective are you in the first place? Do you accept friend requests from everyone, even strangers? If not, what are the rules of friendship? I see people with hundreds of friends and wonder how many of those people they actually know, let alone like. Brian Gies, a vice president of marketing at the agency that came up with the “Whopper Sacrifice” idea said of the campaign: “It seemed to us that it quickly evolved from quality of friends to quantity, which was interesting to us because it felt like the virtual definition of a friend became something different than the friends that you’d want to hang out with.” (I’m reminded of this sentiment every time a particular “friend” of mine updates her status with a different bible verse).
Fortunately, “Whopper Sacrifice” aside, you can un-friend someone on Facebook without him or her being notified. “We believe that relationships change, and users should be able to have the friend list respect those changes without the pressure of a public notification,” said Brandee Barker, a Facebook spokesperson. If only real life could be as free from drama. [NYTimes]
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lilo
wrote on January 30 2009 @ 09:09 am: [report]
interesting article. i was friended by a colleague, who i wasn’t wild about, but i accepted his friend request because it would be rude not to (i thought). then he later un-friended me. lesson learned.
dirtyboots
wrote on January 30 2009 @ 11:09 am: [report]
My general rule is that I only befriend people that I would actually say “hi” to if I passed them on the street.
Lynn
wrote on January 30 2009 @ 12:07 pm: [report]
I used to have dirtyboots rule. But after rejecting a couple people (people who I’d seen at parties, or in class, but probably wouldn’t be confident enough in my recognition to actually say “hi” to if I saw on the street), and in return getting friend requests from them about a billion times before I finally just accepted their request, I started just approving all friend requests of people I’ve at least met. Strangers still get ignored. I do block a lot of people from certain parts of my profile. My coworkers, for example, can pretty much only see my picture and basic info. They can’t see additional pictures, my wall, my posted items, etc. I don’t want to be rude by not friending them, but I definitely don’t want them to be able to learn all about my life without actually talking to me, either.
But I won’t actually ask someone to be my friend on facebook unless I actually think we’re “friends” in real life. I guess I’m pickier than most people, because I don’t even remember the last time I had to ask someone to be my friend on facebook. They usually ask me first.
elthrilla
wrote on January 30 2009 @ 12:19 pm: [report]
Personally, I friend people if I have a picture of them and want to tag them. For example, I hung out with a friend and another girl for New Years. I had some cute pictures of girl and she of me, so I friended her.
I don’t friend too often anymore. I friend those from my sports teams or other organizations/clubs in order to communicate with them better. I don’t friend strangers. And I can’t lie, I will friend people for ‘stalking’ purposes, which is the only reason I accepted requests from people from high school, so i can see what’s going on with them with out actually contacting them.
Linz
wrote on January 30 2009 @ 12:52 pm: [report]
I usually accept people if I know them (not total strangers). There are some people I went to high school or college with that I don’t really want to be friends with, but also don’t want to be rude. I usually accept the request and them dump them 3 weeks later. There is also a feature where you can see less of soemone, I use that a lot.
kickassk
wrote on January 31 2009 @ 02:24 am: [report]
I love the, “‘“We believe that relationships change, and users should be able to have the friend list respect those changes without the pressure of a public notification,” said Brandee Barker’ comment.
Sure, I can un-friend someone without the whole world knowing. But, when I break up with someone—or worse yet, get broken up with—the everyone and their brother knows and leaves comments. Where is the respect in that?
AAA131
wrote on February 6 2009 @ 07:44 pm: [report]
If I de-friend them, how am I going to read about all the intimate details of people’s lives?