Information inundation: We need it! | Jon and Randy, Part 2

When we last left Jon, Randy and me, the three of us were at a table in Silver City with beers in hand (Randy’s required two hands) and bright ideas in our heads.
I sat there trying to pay attention to the conversation while constantly yet discreetly checking out the cute girl at the next table. I recognized her as the daughter of my mom’s friend. Pretty soon she left and after one last look, I gave my undivided attention to the Five Questions. Jon refilled my glass with Panther Lake Porter and we moved on.
When I asked Jon and Randy what we get out of Facebook “friendships” and keeping track of people online, Randy pointed out that people nowadays feel like they need to be constantly “in the know.” We feel like we’re left out if we aren’t constantly up to date with what’s going on in our friends’ lives.
Maybe we’ve been conditioned that way. We’re inundated daily with information, most of it useless to our everyday lives (that’s no new concept; read Amusing Ourselves to Death), and Facebook is just one of the latest additions to that pile of crap. (See also: Twitter, MSN, People magazine, etc.) But at the same time, like Chad said, Facebook and other social networking sites have their usefulness. Facebook is a communication tool (more on that in the next post). (Am I using parentheses too much?) And it can bring long lost relatives and friends back together.
Back to the subject at hand. Randy’s point was that we get some satisfaction out of keeping tabs on our friends and acquaintances because we feel like we need to do those things. We don’t want to be left out in any way. Life moves so fast, and we don’t want to be left behind. (I’m extrapolating a little, but I think Randy was getting at all this. And yes, I’m still using parentheses too much.)
Another interesting response came earlier in the night, when Katelyn was still at the next table, looking like she was worth every penny of what it would probably cost to keep a girl like her happy. When I asked Jon and Randy why we were friends on Facebook, they both had the same answer. Surprisingly, it wasn’t, “Because I’m friends with you in real life.” It was, “Because you created an account for me.” It was true. Both of them had been slow on the uptake when it came to social media. I, having been conditioned more successfully by modern mass media, was on Facebook long before they were and wanted to stay up-to-date with the life and times of my friends. So I created Facebook accounts for them. In the two or three years since then, they’ve gradually begun to use the site more and I’ve gradually eased back. I still check my home page almost daily, sometimes more often, but I don’t use the games and pointless applications that are there just for distraction. Like I mentioned earlier, Facebook is a pretty useful communication tool, and I use that feature to a fairly large degree. But I’ll get to that in my next post.

By the way, Randy told me his Facebook password is still the same as it was when I set up his account. It’s an homage to his peaceful little Chihuahua, Nacho. If you want to mess with him, it’s: ilovenacho. Have fun.

Speed Bump

I hit a speed bump in my project last weekend. A pretty large speed bump, to be honest.
Apparently I’m not the only one (and definitely not the most famous one) trying to visit every Facebook friend I have. A girl from Brooklyn has been hired by the makers of a Blackberry-imitator called the Kin to travel around the U.S. and visit all her Facebook, MySpace and Twitter friends. She’ll use the product to take videos with each of her friends and post them online. Supposedly she will do this with more than 800 friends.
When I first heard this, I was pissed off and depressed at the same time. I wanted to cancel my own project. I started coming up with other ideas for crazy stunts involving travel that I could write about. I may have come up with a pretty good one, actually. I had all but made up my mind to quit the Project, but then I decided there was enough reason to press on.
I announced my frustration on Facebook, and several of my friends told me they thought I should keep going with the Project. And then I thought, “This girl from Brooklyn will have to give up before she’s visited everyone on her list. They’re not going to keep an ad campaign going for 800-some visits, are they? And this imitation Blackberry probably has a pretty good chance of failing anyway.”
So that’s what I’m banking on, that the girl and the product will fail. I hope they do. I know that sounds callous and unkind, but I came up with the idea first. And I’m doing it to try and launch my career as a travel writer, not to plug some electronics.
I’ll keep going with the Project for now, and keep tabs on the Kin, and we’ll see what happens. If the Kin really takes off, I’ll call the Project quits. No one wants to read something unoriginal. But if the Kin crashes and burns, I’ll finish the Project.
I visited five more friends this weekend, so I’ll write up that discussion over the next few days.

What's the point of snooping on your friends? | Chad and Emma

“I don’t give a shit about Facebook,” Chad said. "Fuck Facebook.” He smirked. He was repeating a line from the Adam Sandler movie “Funny People” in the second half of that quote. But the first part was his honest opinion. Chad’s not big into the social networking sites like he used to be.
“I originally joined MySpace to find chicks,” he said. “That was when I was a teenager, and I would talk to girls on there. But I got on Facebook just to kind of stay in touch with people I don’t see very often, like my brother, who lives in South Dakota.”
I was sitting in Chad’s living room with him, his wife Emma, their dog Toots (pronounced like the first half of Tootsie) and our friend Jon. We had just finished watching a rather mediocre, pretentious Jon Krasinsky movie and now I was asking them the Five Questions.
Emma uses Facebook the same way her husband does. Even now, Chad and Emma are hardly ever on the site. They don’t see the need to constantly know what’s going on in the lives of their friends and acquaintances. If they need to communicate with someone, they’ll call or send a text. But there’s not much of a need for Facebook.
“I was friends with some ex-girlfriends on there, because some people added me and I didn’t want to be rude and just ignore them, so I accepted,” Chad continued. “But then, it’s like, I never talk to them on there or in real life, so I just deleted them. And Emma wasn’t too happy about me being friends with those exes, so at that point I was like, maybe I’ll just delete my account. Nothing in my life would change if I got rid of Facebook.”
“I think that’s probably true for everybody,” I responded. Although after I said it, I realized I was oversimplifying. Everyone would get along fine without social networking sites; we did for centuries. But many people use sites like Facebook and MySpace to keep in touch with even their close friends. These sites are replacing older forms of communication. My brother uses Facebook’s chat feature to contact his buddies all the time.
Some people spend hours at a time on those sites, and wouldn’t know what to do with themselves if those sites didn’t exist. And like Randy said two days earlier, people have a constant desire to be in the know. (I’ll write more about that later.) We feel like we’re left out if we aren’t always up to date with what’s going on in the lives of those around us. But not everyone feels that way. Chad and Emma certainly don’t.
“I rarely use it,” Chad said. “I mean, I’ll use Facebook to talk to some people, I guess. I used it to message Erik about something when his phone wasn’t working, because he’s on there all the time.”
Chad went on, “They have this thing now when you sign out of Facebook that says, ‘Take Facebook with you by using our mobile app,’ or something. Why would you need to know what people are up to when you’re out and about? Why do you need to know what they’re doing wherever you are?”
Chad and Emma are not alone in their views of social media, but they seem to be going against the trend. More and more people are joining Facebook and similar sites. I recently received friend requests from my uncle and a cousin, both of whom are in their 40s.
These websites started out as communication devices to connect high school and college friends. Now they’re used for relatives and acquaintances who want to say hi or just peek into the lives of those they have any sort of connection with, no matter how small. Our communications culture has developed in us a strong desire to be constantly in the know, even if what we know has no bearing whatsoever on our lives. And, as I alluded to earlier, that’s something Randy, Jon and I discussed. I’ll tell you more about that in the next post.

Two of my oldest friends help me define the word | Randy and Jon, Part 1

Last week I met up with two of my oldest friends, Jon and Randy, to talk about The Project and have some drinks.
Jon had a couple gift cards for free beer samplers at Silver City, so he and I split a platter of six, four-ounce glasses before Randy showed up. We picked one of our favorites – the Panther Lake Porter – and ordered a pitcher to share with Randy, who despite ordering an amber ale the size of a midget's leg, was quite lucid in his answers to the Five Questions.
Randy’s definition of a friend was similar to that of my editor. “A friend is someone who you genuinely enjoy spending time with," he said.
Jon had a more elaborate response. I told him I’d have to paraphrase it in my blog, so here we go: “A friend is someone who is there for you and who you can be open with. You don’t have to worry about them judging you.”
I’d agree with both of them, but I’d have to say Randy and my editor have the best definitions I’ve heard so far. Their definitions may be somewhat broad, but I think the other definitions I’ve heard are too narrow. And in this day and age, especially with things like Facebook, our friendships have become broader than they used to be. So Randy’s definition makes sense.

Something else we talked about was the idea that there’s not just one type of friend. We categorize the people we know into different levels of friendship. I like to think of it as a series of concentric circles. The innermost circle is, of course, your closest friends, who you hang out with one-on-one and feel comfortable telling your secrets to. Outside of that, you have close friends who you usually hang out with along with other people. They might not know your secrets. But you still feel pretty close to them, and spend a good amount of time with them.
Then maybe you have people who you hang out with along with others, and who don’t know you quite as well as the people in the two inner groups. They’re friends, but not close ones. Maybe you don’t make much of an effort to spend time with them. Maybe you only think of them when they invite you over. You don't think to do the inviting.
Then there’s the friends you only see when a mutual friend has a birthday or a wedding. Outside of that, you have the realm between friend and acquaintance; you know the person a little, but not enough to consider them a friend. It's a big step, going from acquaintance to friend, after all, isn't it?
Outside that, you have acquaintances, and then strangers. But I think Danny Wallace said something to the effect of, “Strangers are just friends you haven’t met yet.” He might have been quoting someone else, but I think it’s an admirable sentiment nonetheless. You may get knifed if you're too friendly with certain strangers, but you'll learn from the experience.
Randy, Jon and I talked some more about the Five Questions that night. I’ll post some of the highlights next time.

Defining the word "friend" with co-workers

I had a chance to ask five of my co-workers the Questions yesterday. But I only managed to ask two of them two questions.

A bunch of us went out to lunch, and as we sat there munching our burgers I realized I had a great opportunity to start a discussion. Unfortunately we were just about ready to leave, so I bided my time.

I rode back to the office with my boss and one other co-worker, Leila, and decided I’d just ask them the Questions along the way. But I had to wait just a little longer. As we walked toward the car, I looked back to see Leila, the driver, digging through her purse.

“I can’t find my keys,” she said.

A couple of seconds later and she realized what she’d done.

“They’re in the car.”

It would be the third time I’d used AAA in the past eight months. And I’m not even a member. Last August, I’d been swimming at a lake in Port Orchard and locked my keys in the car. My friend James (not the guy in my previous post) called AAA to break in and get me on my way. Then, about a month and a half ago, I was in Bellevue driving a Mini owned by a friend of a friend and I’d run over a curb and popped a tire. After discovering the donut was also flat, another friend called AAA to tow us home. But that’ll be a whole other blog post, later.

Now here I was in the parking lot of the Filling Station in Kingston, waiting for someone to come and break into Leila’s car. I kept thinking I should ask the Questions while we waited, but I couldn’t find a good opening. I needed a segue. 

Finally, on the drive home I found my opening. As we drove past Emu Topsoil, my boss mentioned that the soil was fertilized with emu poop. I jumped in.

“This has nothing to do with emu poop. Did I tell you guys about the blog project I’ve been working on?”

Nice segue, eh?

My boss pretended to plug her ears. “I don’t know you have a blog outside of work.”

“Yeah, I have a blog that has nothing to do with my job. But that’s OK, right?”

“Yeah,” my boss replied. And she told us the URL for hers.

I could only think of the first two Questions since I didn’t have my notes with me. But I got some good answers.

My boss came up with the best definition of the word “friend” that I’ve heard so far: “A friend is someone who you spend time with willingly.”

I’d agree. It’s a little broad, but it’s narrower than Facebook’s definition, which appears to be: A friend is someone whose name you click on and who decides, “what the hell, I’ll return the click.”

We all agreed that Facebook is a nice tool for staying connected with people we’d like to spend time with but often can’t.

Leila commented on the fact that we all have friends who are not close by, but whom we nevertheless feel close to. And I’m paraphrasing here, because I’m not used to taking mental notes. I normally carry a notepad with me when I need to remember exact quotes. She said, more eloquently but with the same sentiment, “That’s the thing about good friends, no matter how far apart you are, it doesn’t matter; you’re still close.”

Speaking of close friends (am I the master of the segue, or what?), I had beers that night with a couple of guys I’d consider to be in my “inner circle" of friends. It turned into a long, deep conversation. I think we solved world hunger. OK, maybe it didn’t get that deep. But it was good, and I’ll tell you about it in my next post.

It's James! Or ... How to lose friends

I met James at a bar called Winterland the night before he came to my house. Now here he was, rapping on the front door as my buddy Chris went to answer.
I hadn’t gotten to know James very well when Chris introduced us at the bar. All I knew was that he could shoot pool and was dying to get laid. He had a game plan for both: Play all the best angles. And he was aggressive about his game plan. Nevertheless, it seemed to get him a lot further on the pool table than it did with the ladies.
Chris had only known James for a couple of months. Two weeks ago, the two had been at Winterland for St. Patrick’s Day and James had helped Chris meet his latest love interest. James was taking a piss on the wall outside and called out to some girls walking by. Chris noticed the exchange and came over to introduce himself to the young ladies. He hit it off with one of them, Lauren, and the rest was history. Well, not really.
Now James was in my living room, cracking jokes and a can of Coor’s Light. He seemed harmless enough. Sure, some of his jokes were risqué, and he had a penchant for exaggerating his sexual exploits, but otherwise he appeared to be a nice enough guy in small doses.
That night, we got a large dose of James.
Chris and my brother, Daniel, started drinking Black Velvet and Coke before James arrived and they didn’t take a break until dinner time, when they went over to James’ mom’s house for “the best burgers they’ve ever tasted in their lives. No joke.” Everyone was relaxed.

Before visiting James’ mom, we found out her name was Alberta. This might not seem important, but it’ll come into play later. Stick with me.
Chris latched onto the name with gusto, and when the 50-something woman asked for a beer, he responded with an emphatic, “Oh, I got you Alberta!” His forthrightness made us all laugh, but I later wondered if it bothered James a little.
That evening, we went our separate ways. Chris, Daniel, James, Lauren and another friend, Dorothy, went to a party at a friend’s house while I headed back to Winterland for metal night.
When we reconvened at home around 1:30 am, everyone had had enough of James. My brother told me James had tried to start a fight at the party with a confused guest. Now, at our dinner table he was rambling on and on about how he had played matchmaker for Chris and Lauren.
“I hooked you up with your fuckin’ wifey, cuz,” he rambled.
“I owe you everything,” Chris responded sarcastically.
Then James asked Lauren about her cup size. Then he spilled a beer. Then he tried to give Chris more relationship advice. Finally, he started making nonsensical raps. All of these antics were forgivable as the goofy escapades of a man who had had a few too many. We were goofing around at that point. But then things got weird. And rather annoying.
“You’re being ridiculous,” Chris said.
“Oh, I can be ridiculous. I can be ridiculous. I really can,” James answered. And he couldn’t have been more correct.
At about 2:30 we were gathered in the living room, listening to James freestyle about dishes in the dishwasher and whatnot. We listened as he started a new rap about his ‘G’s “that didn’t survive.” He started grunting out the chorus in a way that we couldn’t help but laugh at. This apparently offended James. He became rigidly serious. Chris told him to shut up, which he didn’t appreciate. A few minutes later, Chris complimented Alberta’s cooking again and James went off. He told Chris to stop talking about his mama. Chris just laughed it off, telling James to relax; he was complimenting her cooking. But James was defensive.
“My mama fed you. And she will continue to feed you.”
At that point, my brother and I went out of the room because we didn’t want James to see us cracking up. A few seconds later, Lauren came out to tell us we needed to break up a fight. Chris let his temper go and pounced on James. It was just a little more than a shove, but things were beginning to get out of hand. We separated the two of them, sending Chris out to cool down.
Daniel and I talked to James for 10 minutes, trying to make him realize that Chris was actually complimenting his mom, not saying anything bad about her. He just couldn’t get it. He sat there, actually trembling, just saying, “Not about my mama. Not about my mama,” in a whisper. Daniel and I were befuddled. There was no reasoning with this man.
Finally it looked like James and Chris were going to make up. But James still couldn’t drop it.
“Cuz, you can’t be talkin’ ‘bout my mama. That woman gave birth to me.”
And so Chris lost it again. He shoved James and shouted at him. My brother and I had to separate them once more. That was it for me.
I asked Lauren if she would drive Chris home. I went upstairs, grabbed my keys and license, and stormed back downstairs. Somebody said, “Hey, it’s cool now,” but I paid no attention. James and Chris were standing together, seemingly trying to patch things up, but I didn’t care. I was on a mission. I grabbed the beers from their hands and stashed them by the sink.
“Alright! Chris, you’re going home with Lauren and I’m taking James home!” I barked. “Let’s go!”
James stood in the hallway. “Come on, cuz,” he pleaded.
I stood right in his face. “We’re done. Let’s go. We’re done. We’re done. We’re done.” Until he finally gave way and moved toward the front door.
Outside, I asked him to get into the car. He refused, saying he would just walk the three blocks to his mom’s place. I offered again, but again he refused. So I gave him a cigarette and sent him on his way. Or so I thought.
Chris asked if he could stay, now that James was gone. “I’m fine,” he said. I reluctantly agreed to let him crash, like he normally does on Saturday nights, knowing he was sobering up and wouldn’t cause any more problems now that James was gone.
I headed to bed, but the adrenaline kept me from lying down. A few minutes later, I heard a knocking at the front door and James’ voice outside. I crept down the stairs and turned off the porch light, hoping James would take the hint. It was close to 3:30 by then. We waited and waited, but James was not going anywhere. He continued to knock once a minute for about 20 minutes. I told him we were calling the cops. We probably should have. He called my brother’s cell phone and asked us to send Chris out so they could make up. We weren’t buying it. He called back a few minutes later and I grabbed the phone. “Hey, cuz, can I get that ride now?”
“James, I offered you a ride home several times and you refused. Like I said, we’re done.” And I hung up.
He tried to call again, but my brother ignored it. Finally he left.
The next morning, Chris and my brother had several text messages from James. The first couple were angry, but the next ones were sent during that remorseful “what-did-I-get-into-last-night” period of the hangover.
James and Chris are still friends, at least online, but Lauren didn’t like what she saw that night. She and Chris are no longer speaking.

Next up: A couple co-workers and a couple old friends talk about social media!

Daniel and Chris, the first two subjects

It’s April 6, and I’ve started to interview my Facebook friends. I’ve visited five of them, but only asked two of them The Questions.
The first two interviewees were my brother, Daniel, and our buddy Chris. I had actually let the Project slip my mind when Chris remembered my latest status update on Facebook.
“So what are these five questions you have for every Facebook friend?” he asked.
It was Saturday afternoon and we were hanging out in the living room, as was our custom at the time. My brother, who owns the house, keeps telling Chris he should be paying rent because Chris basically lives here from Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon (and sometimes longer) every week.
Daniel and I have known Chris for about eight years, I suppose. He’s my brother’s age, about three years younger than me, and the two of them met in high school. I met him shortly after, when he started to work at the old folks home where my brother and I were servers in the dining room. Chris used to come up with little raps about our job. “Little server, servin’ sherbet, looking up old ladies’ skirts like a pervert.” Goofy stuff like that.
My brother kept in touch with Chris after we all retired from working at the retirement home, but I didn’t. My brother would mention once in a while that Chris was still making rhymes, and had actually cut a CD with a friend over in Seattle. But it wasn’t until this past Christmas that I finally saw him again. Actually, it was a week or so before Christmas. I was living in Kingston, way out in the boonies but close to work, and was getting ready to move in with my brother. I came by one night to drop something off, and Chris was there. He and my brother were having a good time and I doubt he remembers our encounter. The next week, on Christmas night, I was all moved in and Chris and Daniel learned why rum and wine don’t mix well.
And then we didn’t see Chris for about two months. We had our own things going on and he had his. Chris lives on a stipend from the Army that, how should I put this? allows him to be free of the traditional encumbrances of employment. We were all friends on Facebook, though, so we could stay in touch.
Finally we met up with Chris again and started hanging out every weekend. He’s still really clever when it comes to rhyming, by the way. He and Daniel keep themselves busy with rap battles, but Chris usually wins.
So there we were, the three of us in the living room getting ready to watch the Final Four, and I had a chance to discuss the Questions with two of my Facebook friends. I grabbed my laptop and set to work.
The five questions I asked Daniel and Chris were:
1. Why are we friends on Facebook?
2. How do you define the word ‘friend?’
3. Why do you think people need friends? What do you need in a friendship?
4. What do you get out of Facebook or MySpace or other online “friendships?”
5. Are we friends or just Facebook friends? How come? And what’s the difference?

It’s possible that those questions will change as The Project develops. I won’t go through all of Daniel and Chris’ answers, just the most interesting ones.
Their answers to the first question were pretty obvious. “We’re related,” my brother said. Duh.
“Because I’m here every weekend,” was Chris’ response. “This is my weekend home.”
They both agreed that people have an innate need for companionship. Why? “People need someone to drink with and mack on hos,” was Chris’ explanation. He was only half joking.
As for the online friendships, they help us stay in touch with people we don’t get to see too often. But they also show the world how many “friends” we have and allow us to mass communicate and boast. Those Web sites are also just one more thing to keep us from being bored, Daniel said.

Shortly after we finished our discussion, one of Chris’ acquaintances knocked on the door. The events that followed gave me an idea for another question: What does someone have to do to lose that “friend” status?

The Project has begun

The Project has begun. So here’s the gist of it. I’ll write more later.
Beginning April 1, 2010 (last Thursday), I have one year to visit each of the 218 Facebook friends I had as of March 31, 2010. I won’t have to visit all the people I add after April 1; that would make things too complicated.
I will have a drink or meal with each one of my “friends,” and ask them five questions. Each of the questions is related to Facebook and friendship.
I’m doing this for several reasons. Among them: I only see a handful of my Facebook “friends” on what I’d consider a regular basis, so I think it’d be interesting to visit all of them in person. It would force me to get to know them better and, more importantly, travel all over the world to see them.
Also, having online “friends” who you almost never visit is quite different from having “real” friends, who you hang out with every week or month or at least once every few months. I want to get to the heart of why we think we need these online relationships and what those relationships really consist of and mean.
On that note, here’s a little anecdote from a cartoon.
I was watching The Cleveland Show a couple hours ago, and Cleveland ranted about the uselessness of Facebook. He said he’s friends with Margaret Cho. “A woman I’ve never met, nor have any desire to meet, is somehow my friend.” Then he proceeded to tweet something on Twitter.
I’ll let the reader draw their own conclusions about this gag. But I will note that only one of my Facebook friends is someone I’ve never met. And I do have a desire to meet him, because I loved his first documentary and look forward to seeing the next one.

Those are the basics of The Project. Do I capitalize “The” in The Project? I don’t know. I can’t promise I’ll be consistent with that.
One last thing I have to say. Originally, I was just going to visit each person on my friend list and not ask any particular questions. But then I decided that wouldn’t give me enough to write about. Sure, it’d still give me an excuse to travel, but I also want to explore other people’s views of relationships, and specifically how relationships have changed or stayed the same with/despite the advent of social networking Web sites.
I’m looking forward to writing about my first visits with my friends. I’ve already interviewed two of them, and I really hope I can keep the process of asking the Questions pretty informal. After all, I’m trying to connect with people I haven’t hung out with in a long time. I’m not just trying to do a huge survey.
I’ll have more tomorrow, hopefully.