(no subject)
I think Facebook may be killing my brain. And not because of the relentless Farmville spam, either, although I seem to have finally locked that down Cuban trade embargo style. People can feed their own damn chickens, it doesn't seem like the sort of activity that would require neighbors.
I started comparing the timelines earlier and it really seems like the rise of my Facebook existed in inverse relation to the fall of my blogging. It's so much easier to just shoot off a status update and look for some instant gratification from other people trolling through their news feeds (incidentally also much easier than going through a blogging f-list) than it is to put together something well-constructed enough that you feel alright putting your name on it. Because contrary to all available evidence, some of us do still believe in sentence structure and punctuation.
Life just kept getting busier and busier. Facebook's design kept getting more and more streamlined...then less...then more again...then less again...then Martian for a brief moment...then finally more again. LiveJournal, or any blog really, began to feel out of the way. Like your favorite mom and pop store three miles off after a SuperMegaLoMart has opened next door. On the surface, I felt I was really accomplishing more or less the same thing through FB that I was through the blogosphere, and the entries died off to a trickle.
This is not the case though. Facebook, to me, the more I analyze it here during my annual year-end blowout clearance sale on introspection, is the worst kind of faux interpersonal relationship. I'm not saying it doesn't serve its purpose. When it comes to the most basic acts of keeping in touch with far away people and disseminating news to distant relatives and whatnot, it's all well and good. When things are crazy and you are consumed by other projects, it's a very convenient way to let people know you're still alive, or thinking about them, or plotting their deaths, everyone's mileage may vary. And lord knows I barely remember my own birthday each year, much less anyone else's, so those reminders are nice.
But over the long term, Facebook is to friendship what Twitter is to journalism. Bullet points, a press release, sound bytes, still frame photos of what was much more impactful as a moving picture. It's easy, but that's not how it was supposed to be. The effort is what made it a friendship, isn't it?
And the effort, the thought, the conversations that were sparked as a result are what I miss the most about the blog. Reading back through some of the comment threads that occurred when I was...ahem...working at Scholastic, there were moments of hilarity and sheer genius rising like the pillars of Hercules from the sea of our banter. The most I think I've ever managed on Facebook was a sandbar in a tidal shelf. Not because the people there are any less clever, but because there isn't as much material to work with. The water can never get as deep in 450 characters.
So part of my 2011 plans is to get back to the blogging. Yeah, I know, I say that a lot, but there's a new found resoluteness to these 2011 plans, collectively referred to as Operation Pummel 2011 Mercilessly. I want to come home. To get back to my LiveJournal's friend page, although I can't promise to try and catch up, because I literally wouldn't know where to begin. Mostly, I want to stretch that writing muscle again. To have it become habit and not chore. To return to where I felt antsy if I didn't get a good hour at a keyboard on any given day. Because that feeds into other parts of this operation. Good times ahead.
The moral of the story: Don't rely on Facebook to keep track of your friends, if they're nearby hug them, and don't let a social networking website train you to think with a character limit.
I started comparing the timelines earlier and it really seems like the rise of my Facebook existed in inverse relation to the fall of my blogging. It's so much easier to just shoot off a status update and look for some instant gratification from other people trolling through their news feeds (incidentally also much easier than going through a blogging f-list) than it is to put together something well-constructed enough that you feel alright putting your name on it. Because contrary to all available evidence, some of us do still believe in sentence structure and punctuation.
Life just kept getting busier and busier. Facebook's design kept getting more and more streamlined...then less...then more again...then less again...then Martian for a brief moment...then finally more again. LiveJournal, or any blog really, began to feel out of the way. Like your favorite mom and pop store three miles off after a SuperMegaLoMart has opened next door. On the surface, I felt I was really accomplishing more or less the same thing through FB that I was through the blogosphere, and the entries died off to a trickle.
This is not the case though. Facebook, to me, the more I analyze it here during my annual year-end blowout clearance sale on introspection, is the worst kind of faux interpersonal relationship. I'm not saying it doesn't serve its purpose. When it comes to the most basic acts of keeping in touch with far away people and disseminating news to distant relatives and whatnot, it's all well and good. When things are crazy and you are consumed by other projects, it's a very convenient way to let people know you're still alive, or thinking about them, or plotting their deaths, everyone's mileage may vary. And lord knows I barely remember my own birthday each year, much less anyone else's, so those reminders are nice.
But over the long term, Facebook is to friendship what Twitter is to journalism. Bullet points, a press release, sound bytes, still frame photos of what was much more impactful as a moving picture. It's easy, but that's not how it was supposed to be. The effort is what made it a friendship, isn't it?
And the effort, the thought, the conversations that were sparked as a result are what I miss the most about the blog. Reading back through some of the comment threads that occurred when I was...ahem...working at Scholastic, there were moments of hilarity and sheer genius rising like the pillars of Hercules from the sea of our banter. The most I think I've ever managed on Facebook was a sandbar in a tidal shelf. Not because the people there are any less clever, but because there isn't as much material to work with. The water can never get as deep in 450 characters.
So part of my 2011 plans is to get back to the blogging. Yeah, I know, I say that a lot, but there's a new found resoluteness to these 2011 plans, collectively referred to as Operation Pummel 2011 Mercilessly. I want to come home. To get back to my LiveJournal's friend page, although I can't promise to try and catch up, because I literally wouldn't know where to begin. Mostly, I want to stretch that writing muscle again. To have it become habit and not chore. To return to where I felt antsy if I didn't get a good hour at a keyboard on any given day. Because that feeds into other parts of this operation. Good times ahead.
The moral of the story: Don't rely on Facebook to keep track of your friends, if they're nearby hug them, and don't let a social networking website train you to think with a character limit.