Sunday, August 16, 2009

You're so vain, you probably think this facebook status update is about you.

In the past couple of weeks, I've been discussing the various uses of facebook, blogs, and twitter with some friends, and family. It seems everybody has different reasons for being online and apply different combinations of personal filters to their various online presences.

One of the frustrating/weird things about facebook/blogs/twitter is the temptation to overshare personal information. Usually I'm cool with that, even if I don't personally like to share too many private thoughts. Standards are changing and sharing the details of one's life is becoming more common and acceptable - and since that's the case, who am I to judge where people should draw the line?

Well... that's what I used to think until earlier this week: A high school acquaintance of mine posted on facebook that he's getting divorced, then - and this is the part that I take issue with - his grandmother commented on his status, asking: "is this true [name of friend]?" (I think it was his grandmother... because of her gray hair in the tiny little picture next to her comment... but possibly it's his mom or an aunt.)

However blurry current standards for online profiles are, there's no way this is anything but gauche. (The guy took the post down a few days later.) And, I'm pretty sure that, no matter what the future holds, there's no way it can ever be ok to announce a divorce to your family in this way.

Would I feel differently if he had a smaller circle of friends on facebook? Maybe - although, if that were the case, I would certainly not be one of them. In fact, the funniest thing about this is that I didn't even know he was married until his divorce was announced on my facebook newsfeed.