Strange Facebook Trend Semi-Directed Status updates
Strange Facebook Trend (SFT) : Semi-Directed Status Updates
I’ve been on Facebook over a year and I’ve noticed an increase in the amount of Status Updates that are at least partially directed at specific people. But the strange thing about it is that the actual person who the status update is directed at is not specifically identified in the status update. To make things more confusing, the actual status update is on the person’s own wall instead of the wall of the person who perpetrated the wrongdoing. So I’ve read things like, “Step off…bro” that show up in my Facebook status news feed. And I’m thinking, “Step off of what? Is my foot on the dog’s tail?” But then I realize that this girl is talking to someone else completely. There have been other updates like, “You know who you are. You need to shut your mouth for once!”
This is a Strange Facebook Trend because it is almost a form of interactive communication, without actually committing to the consequences of directly contacting someone. Because someone could say, “Shut your own mouth!” And the person who wrote the original status update could then say, “I wasn’t talking to you, Roger. You are so narcissistic and egotistical to think that everyone is talking about you all the time.” And then poor Roger could easily develop a complex.
After some analysis of this trend I find that these Semi-Directed Status Updates appear to be a form of lashing out. But in reality, this SFT is a withdrawal symptom which is a result of a lull in over-stimulation. Many people have become so ingrained by contact with other people that they have actually acquired a bio-neural-chemical need for single sentence or like-button communication. It has gotten to such an extreme degree of integration, that many users are even attracting potentially negative attention to their profiles in order to get some sort of contact. This kind of behavior is less like a hobby or recreational activity and more like dependency.
The interesting part about this Strange Trend is that it seems to be increasing and growing in commonality. I’ve noticed this first hand because I’ve stayed at around 800 Facebook friends for half of a year. And not until recently has this phenomenon become prolific enough to write about. After pondering this subject for quite some time, my only conclusion is that this cyber-trend has manifested itself into a physical illness. So one could say that Semi-Directed Status Updates is the first computer virus that has ever successfully infected a human physical host.
To explain this in more detail let’s take a look at the viral nature of Semi-Directed Status Updates. One person, let’s call her Rosie for the purpose of this thought experiment wants extra attention on Facebook. This is because she is so used to constant contact, that she often feels the “longing” sensation, that one has when she has been separated from a lover for an extended period of time. But her longing comes from Facebook ‘likes’ and comments. So she posts a Semi-Directed Status Update on her wall. Now, since she has good looking pictures in her albums, and she occasionally has witty things to say, 200 of her 500 friends frequently visit her profile. So those people often see her status updates within minutes of when they are posted.
But Rosie’s status update is Semi-Directed and says, “I hate it when you treat me like that.” So, one of Rosie’s friends called Frank, comments on her status and says, “Maybe if you weren’t so rude at parties, I wouldn’t have to.” But instead of Rosie saying to Frank that she wasn’t talking to him, Rosie decides to accept the contact and actually build on the communication…whether the communication was intended for Frank or not. So Rosie comments back, “Yeah, well. I was having a bad day.” And now something interesting has happened. Not only has Rosie gotten what she originally set out for, which was communication on Facebook. But she received it without exerting much more than minimal effort and risk. Also, Frank not only got to talk some sassyness with Rosie, but he also learned a new technique for communication on the social network. And the follow-up comment by Rosie, validated the form of communication. So now the Semi-Directed Status Update virus has spread virtually from Rosie’s profile to Frank’s notification area.
But since Frank now has a new tool in his online communication arsenal, if he ever gets lonely on Facebook, he can use a Semi-Directed Status Update in order to attract attention to himself. If he uses this technique enough times, there is a high likelihood that he will eventually acquire the very real and neuro-chemical dependency on the cyber-contact that Rosie originally had. Therefore the computer virus has a dormancy period that is directly related to the psychological needs for contact and attention of the infected host.
Possible implications for this type of crossover-disease may be medication prescriptions for an at-risk population of 500 million or more. There is tremendous potential for the pharmaceutical industry to capitalize on this phenomenon, and require vaccinations for social network users that log-in for 2 hours per day or more. Perhaps a new type of multi-vitamin may be created in order to supplement the psycho-emotional immune system of Facebook users.
-Tyler
