On Reading My Facebook Friends Recommendations
Like anyone who has a Facebook account, I get e-mails occasionally telling me that someone or other wants to be “friends.” I’m normally pretty accommodating, I think; though like most thoughtful people, I resist the idea that these shared data streams actually constitute friendships. I could write the rest of this post putting the terms in scare quotes each time—“friends”—but I prefer another corrective. I’m going to refer to all 235 of my Facebook connections as Friendz. And I’d submit, as just one piece of evidence that Facebook cheapens the notion of a “friend,” that I’m embarrassed to have only 235 Friendz, while I’d want to hire someone if I had to send 235 Christmas cards. Friendz are not friends. (Though certainly, some of my Friendz are friends! Like, if you’re reading this, and we’re FB Friendz: I’m not dissing you! You really are one of my Friendz!)
But I digress. When that e-mail comes, it directs me to my Facebook page, where I can confirm or “silently deny” the request; but FB takes the opportunity to suggest others whom I might like to invite to be my Friendz. I’ll usually glance at a few and lose interest, or patience; but the other day, on a lark, I decided to make my way, methodically, though all of FB’s suggestions.
There were—ready?—1658 suggestions. Clearly FB can’t tell a “friend” from an “enemy”: or more to the point, they can’t tell Friendz from complete & utter strangers.
Some of these suggestions have got to be jokes: Do I really know someone named “Will Power”? Well of course I don’t: if I did, there would be less (fewer?) Doritos eaten at my house at midnight.
Some of these suggestions sound vaguely familiar: in some cases, because their names are so generic. But too often, their profile photos are “gags” (which, to be fair, mine is too): there’s no way for me to look at that photo of a funny road sign and figure out whether I really know Bill Cooper. This problem is surely exacerbated by the the Krazy Kropping of profile photos in the friends view: somehow FB’s algorithm seems to take a random swatch from one’s actual profile photo and show it to identify potential Friendz–often rendering them totally unidentifiable. Whose nose is that? Is that a . . . what, a dishcloth? Do I know any dishcloths named Shirley McPherson?
Looking at often bizarre profile photos for 1658 Friendz is a surreal, hallucinatory experience: At a certain point in the interminable scroll, one’s temped to click just because a name seems vaguely familiar. (I think it’s the same neuron firing here that convinces you that you really want to hear “Don’t You Want Me Baby?” when scanning the radio dial in the car. It’s not good; it’s just familiar.)
We’ll delve further into the surrealism of FB Friendz suggestions a bit more next time.
Do I know you? And I’m thinking that the distinction between “Friends” and “Friendz” may require a thorough-going rethinking of Barthes’ “S/Z” for the 2010s.
Coincidentally, I was sunk deep in my sofa last week scrolling and scrolling the interminable list of friends recommendations. There had to have been more than a thousand but thankfully my job doesn’t require me to count these things. I found the suggestions were almost always based on ‘mutual friends’.
With the first hundred or so, 15-20 mf’s were shown as evidence of what or who I might be missing. And logically, as the list progressed, the number of mf’s dwindled to one, while scattered throughout were the many suggestions w/o an mf at all. Such lack of credential would send me from glossing over to outright glassy. But altogether I do Like my 3 new hard won friendzzzzzzz!
First, I must say to Richard that “mf” meant something entirely different to me than your intended meaning. Or perhaps not.
Moving on… I decided long ago that I would only become Facebook friends with people I’d actually met or I’d cheerfully give the keys to my house if I ever went on vacation. I never go on vacation so don’t worry – you probably won’t ever have to feed my dog or scoop out my cat’s litter box.
In some ways, Facebook has been liberating because I would normally pick and choose what I say depending on how I know someone. Facebook makes it far too much effort to sort people according to real-life categories. Everyone gets the same ridiculous me.
It’s also been a test of my ability to tolerate and accept people for who they are. Some friendz with quite opposite views as my own can really chap my hindquarters. I could hide their posts so I never have to see them. After long thought, I decided if I was going to hide a person’s posts, I could not call myself a friend – or even a friendz – and I had to decide if I would ‘keep’ that friendz as is or unfriend that friendz.
These procedures probably indicate, more than anything else, that I spend entirely too much time on Facebook.
Smart stuff, Kathy. FB is certainly a strange “discursive space,” as we’d call it in my neck of the woods. I really need to finish the post!
I think “Don’t You Want Me Baby?” is brilliant.