Facebook:Social Networking at Its Best

Since the invention of the Internet, it has undergone many changes. Before the Internet became as we know it today, it was strictly used to transfer information and rarely used for entertainment. Currently, in 2008 the World Wide Web is used to share information, watch videos, and be apart of a large social network. To further elevate the advancement of the World Wide Web, Tim O’Reilly coined the term “Web 2.0” in 2004. O’Reilly stated that, “Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as a platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform.” This means that Web 2.0 technology is hoping to change the way that we utilize the World Wide Web. One of the many popular features of Web 2.0 is social networking sites. Social networking sites are “web-based services that allow individuals to (1) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system, (2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection, and (3) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system” (boyd & Ellison 2007). One of the most popular social networking sites to date is Facebook. Facebook is a Web 2.0 medium that is a cultural phenomenon that has gained a lot of attention for its many functions and implications.

Facebook.com is popular social networking site created on February 4^th, 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg was a student at Harvard University when the site was created and initially only students at the school had access to the site. He created the site so that students on campus would be able to connect with one another. After noticing the popularity of the site he, with help from his friends and fellow classmate Eduardo Saverin and Dustin Moskovitz, expanded it to other prestigious schools such as Yale and Columbia. Before long students at other colleges and universities gained access. Shortly after, Facebook was opened to high school students and today Facebook is used by anyone with a valid email address as well as provide your name, age, sex as well as other self-identifying information. After you sign up for Facebook, each time after all you have to do is type in your email and password and you are in. According to a New York Times article because Facebook opened its doors to everyone the average users are adults and teens. Many people use Facebook to reconnect with old friends, share their lives with existing friends and to meet new people. Not only can those things be done, they are also able to upload photos, videos and experience cool applications. Facebook seems like another place to spend time with friends and in most cases family.

The popularity of Facebook also created a stir of controversy. The controversy came from other students at Harvard who claimed Zuckerberg stole their idea. In a Rolling Stone article, Divya Narendra, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss three fellow students said that they wanted Zuckerberg to work with them on a social networking site they were creating. They wanted him because they aware of Zuckerberg’s reputation as a premier programmer. Narendra and the Winklevoss brothers claimed that he agreed to write the code for their site, but whenever they asked him to produce what he was working on; he continued to give excuses. Soon after he gave them the brush off, Facebook launched. This caused them to believe that he was using them all that time, until he launched his own site. One other student, Aaron Greenspan claimed that he created a site also named Facebook before Zuckerberg and the others conceived their sites. Greenspan goes on to say that he confided in Zuckerberg about his plans and even asked him to work on it with him. These battles for Facebook have been taken to the courtroom, where no resolution has occurred. Even with these battles, it has not hindered the popularity of the website.

Although Facebook is easily accessible to almost everyone, there are still some divisions. Danah boyd noted some observations in the division of Facebook and Myspace users. Through her observation she noted that when both sites were created Facebook was used predominately by college students and Myspace high school students. Although Facebook eventually allowed high school users to use the site, they had to be invited by their college friends. Another division between the sites came with the fact that Myspace was looked at as dangerous and a breeding ground for sexual predators and Facebook was looked at as a safer environment. Boyd also looked at the difference in socioeconomic status. She observed that Myspace was mostly used by minority, specifically Latino teens, who did not value education and would be less likely to pursue higher education unlike Facebook which was used by mostly white, “good kids” who were involved in many school activities. She goes on to say that the sites have been used to create the “good” kid “bad” kid dynamic. Some teens that are using Myspace are not aware of Facebook’s existence, but those on Facebook, are aware of Myspace’s existence, often having a negative attitude towards it. They look down on it saying that it is “gaudy and immature,” unlike facebook that has a “clean and fresh” look. As she closes her observations, she states that she fears the Facebook and Myspace will be the new representation of the youth division in American society.

Despite the divide that Facebook may create the site has some great features to offer. When Facebook was first introduced they did not have the infamous mini feed and the applications that users are now able to add to their pages. The mini feed was added to the home pages of each Facebook user and it documents all of the things that each one of your friends is doing. It states who is no longer in a relationship, who is attending what party or program as well as who wrote on a friends wall. The mini feed has been a pest to some especially because in some ways in obliterates your privacy, by allowing your friends to tract your every move. Some of the uproar caused Zuckerberg to issue a letter of apology to users, assuring them that none of their original privacy settings were altered. Soon after, applications were added to the site. There are over thousands of applications currently that allows users to do all kinds of things such as: add top friends to their profiles, add an honesty box, add bible verses as well as scrabble, to name a few. These applications have enhanced our Facebook experience making it more enjoyable. Facebook allows users to upload an unlimited amount of photos to share with friends. Users can also post and tag others in personal notes that they create; these notes also allow friends to comment on the content. One of the features of Facebook that give meaning to the “networking” aspect of the site is the groups that you can join. Facebook has a lot of groups that anyone can join. Usually people join groups that are of interest to them. Each of these groups allow their members to post videos and photos that pertain to the group, post comments on the groups wall or pose a question that the members can answer. There is also the marketplace which allows users to sell and buy items. Through all these features that Facebook has to offer it shows how multifaceted it is and how this is the true definition of social networking.

Since Facebook has been created there have been observations to track personalities of some users. One observation was about narcissistic personalities on Facebook. One college professor decided to see if narcissism can be detected by looking at ones profile. She concluded that narcissist tend to be active users of the site and that their profiles tend to have pictures of them that would be considered “glamorous” and pictures of them surrounded by people of the opposite sex. One other thing that she noticed was those same narcissistic people had in their “about me” sections information that one would consider boasting about how successful or popular they are. Facebook allows its users to be the star of their own show and express themselves the way they see fit. Through my observation I noticed that there were many people with the infamous bathroom dorm room shots, usually displaying their body or a close up of their face. Even with these narcissistic personalities on Facebook it does not appear that the average user is that way.

The use of advertising on Facebook has also been a focus. If you are a user of the site than one should notice the advertisement banners that appears on the screen. According to the article, advertising on Facebook has not been successful. The reason why it has not been successful is because users of the site are not looking for things to purchase, they are more interested in socializing. The advertisements are a nuisance to users because it gets in the way of the objective of the site, which is to socialize. According to Facebook Ads anyone with an existing Facebook account can create an ad. When they create their ads they can set it to target certain people as well as set the amount of money they make each time someone clicks on it. It can also be customized to add a photo and to add text to their advertisement. The frequency asked questions section provides further detail about the ads such as the inability to remove ads from your page and by giving the ad a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” allows advertisers to record the success of their ads or ways that they can improve. One of the things that advertisers has to realize is that Facebook is a charge free site and it will only make money in advertisements if the users are willing to participate. If users are unhappy because they are unable to control what ads they see, Facebook ads will continue to be unsuccessful.

Social networking sites have been created to strengthen connections between people. They have helped further build upon those friend of a friend interactions and has helped us meet new people (Shirky, 2008). Not only is one interacting with others, but information is flowing between one another. Shirky mentions that these sites work in tandem as “amplifiers” and “filters.” The important things that everyone in your network knows about it will come to you and if it is not important enough to the network, then no one knows about it. Although we all share the social network, a division still exists. Bridging and bonding capital have been ways that social networks connect to one another. Bridging capital is the ideal that social networks would like to achieve, but this is hard when people prefer to communicate in a particular way.

Facebook is a great site that many people use. The site has been a social networking phenomenon since its debut. The ability to share “your world” with friends and family has been attracting new users each day. The popularity of this site has prompted others to take a look at it for them selves and experience what the buzz is about. Facebook affords its users the opportunity to connect in everyway possible through its many features and functions. Although this site has many positive aspects the negative aspects come in the form of privacy issues with the creation of the mini feed and the social divide that it causes with its equally popular counterpart Myspace. Facebook has also been cited for using specific targeting ads to its users. The advertisements have been a nuisance because it interferes with user activities. Even with these unfortunate incidents Facebook is growing rapidly as one of the top social networking sites on the Web. At the rate that it is growing, soon enough it will eclipse Myspace as the top social networking site.

boyd, d. m., & Ellison, N. B. (2007). Social network sites: Definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13(1), article 11. http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison.html

boyd, danah. 2007. "Viewing American class divisions through Facebook and MySpace ." Apophenia Blog Essay. June 24 . http://www.danah.org/papers/essays/ClassDivisions.html

Buffardi, Laura E. (2008). "Mirror, Mirror on the (Facebook) Wall" The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2008/10/10/CU2008101002890.html

Lyons, Daniel. (2008). "Facebook's Roar Becomes a Meow; Putting ads in front of Facebook users is like hanging out a party interrupting conversations to hawk merchandise." Newsweek, Enterprise; Techtonic Shifts; Pg. E22 Vol. 152 No. 16. http://www.newsweek.com/id/163120

Shirky, Clay. (2008). Here comes everybody: The power of organizing without organizations (Chapter 9). New York: Penguin.

Facebook:The Draft

The term Web 2.0 is still a fairly new concept that leaves many people puzzled. Web 2.0 was first coined by Tim O’Reilly; he described Web 2.0 “as a set of principles and practices that tie together a veritable solar system of sites that demonstrate some or all of those principles, at a varying distance from that core” (para.5). Although this definition may not be clear, many of us use Web 2.0 communication media on a daily basis. Facebook is a Web 2.0 medium that is used by many people and of the most talked about social networking sites.


Facebook.com is popular social networking site created on February 4th, 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg was a student at Harvard University when the site was created and initially only students at the school had access to the site. Before long students at other colleges gained access. Some time later Facebook was opened to high school students and today Facebook is used by anyone with a valid email address. According to a New York Times article ,because Facebook opened its doors to everyone the average users are adults and teens. Many people use Facebook to connect with old friends, share their lives with existing friends and to meet new people. Not only can those things be done, they are also able to upload photos, videos and experience cool applications. Facebook seems like another place to spend time with friends and in most cases family.


The popularity of Facebook also created a stir of controversy. The controversy came from other students at Harvard who claimed Zuckerberg stole their idea. In a Rolling Stone article three students said that they wanted Zuckerberg to work with them on a social networking site they were creating. They claimed that he agreed to write the code for their site, but soon after he gave them the brush off Facebook launched. One other student claimed that he created a site also named Facebook before Zuckerberg and the others conceived their sites. These battles for Facebook have been taken to the courtroom, where no resolution has occurred.


Since Facebook has been created there have been different observations about the site. One observation was about narcissistic personalities on Facebook. One college professor decided to see if narcissism can be detected by looking at ones profile. She concluded that narcissist tend to be active users of the site and that their profiles tend to have pictures of them that would be considered “glamorous” and pictures of them surrounded by people of the opposite sex. One other thing that she noticed was those same narcissistic people had in their “about me” sections information that one would consider boasting about how successful or popular they are.


The use of advertising on Facebook has also been a focus. If one is a user of the site than one should notice the advertisement banners that appear on the screen. According to the article, advertising on Facebook has not been successful. The reason why it has not been successful is because users of the site are not looking for things to purchase, they are more interested in socializing. The advertisements are a nuisance to users because it gets in the way of the objective of the site, which is to socialize. One of the things that one has to realize is that Facebook is a charge free site and it will only make money in advertisements if the users are willing to participate.


Social networking sites have been created to strengthen connections between people. They have helped further build upon those friend of a friend interactions and has helped us meet new people (Shirky, 2008). Not only is one interacting with others, but information is flowing between one another. Shirky mentions that these sites work in tandem as “amplifiers” and “filters.” The important things that everyone in your network knows about it will come to you and if it is not important enough to the network, then no one knows about it. Although we all share the social network, a division still exists. Bridging and bonding capital have been ways that social networks connect to one another. Bridging capital is the ideal that social networks would like to achieve, but this is hard when people prefer to communicate in a particular way.


Facebook is a great site that many people use. The site has been a social networking phenomenon since its debut. The ability to share “your world” with friends and family has been attracting new users each day. The popularity of this site has prompted others to take a look at it for them selves and experience what all the buzz is about. Social networking sites such as this one have helped to elevate us to the next level of communicating.





Buffardi, Laura E. (2008). "Mirror, Mirror on the (Facebook) Wall" The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2008/10/10/CU2008101002890.html



Lyons, Daniel. (2008). "Facebook's Roar Becomes a Meow; Putting ads in front of Facebook users is like hanging out a party interrupting conversations to hawk merchandise." Newsweek, Enterprise; Techtonic Shifts; Pg. E22 Vol. 152 No. 16. http://www.newsweek.com/id/163120



O'Reilly, Tim. (2005). What is Web 2.0: Design patterns and business models for the next generation of software. Retrieved August 21, 2008 from http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html.



Shirky, Clay. (2008). Here comes everybody: The power of organizing without organizations (Chapter 9). New York: Penguin.

Observing Facebook...

For the final essay my job is to observe Facebook. Since I use Facebook more than I use my own textbooks this shouldn't be hard. Observing Facebook is something that I have been doing since I joined the site a few years ago. Facebook has changed drastically since I first began to use it. The introduction of the mini feed was perhaps the biggest change of them all. I know that Facebook is a social networking site, but once that was created it seemed more like that annoying little sister snooping around for dirt. The mini feed has caused an eruption of privacy on the site and it details everything that all of your friends are doing as well what non friends are doing. When I was first introduced to it it bothered me very much because I knew at this point everything I did on the site would be completely highlighted. Although, I realize that Facebook is a social site and that you pretty much knew that all of this was public when you signed up, it is more annoying that you know everyone will defintely see it. It is hard to explain the privacy issue with Facebook especially since people are willing to put their phone number and home address on the site. That is something I will personally never do because that is a bit extreme. Despite the privacy issues I really enjoy using Facebook especially since it has kept me in contact with old friends and family members who live far away. Some of the applications are cool, especially the friend wheel, and the whole idea of you being the star of your own show makes it interesting. Facebook was created for people to connect and despite the other problems, it does just that.

Fitting our tools to a small world

For today’s class I read chapter 9; Here comes everybody: The power of organizing without organizations by Clay Shirky. This chapter discussed social networking and the creation of two types of social capital. First, Shirky discussed the phenomenon of a “small world” network and how in most cases social networks connect because of the few people that are connected rather than a large number of people that are connected. One reason that we are often connected to people in a “small world” scenario is “homophily” or “the grouping of like with like” (p.213). The chances that you will share a common friend or an acquaintance with someone is more likely than one would think especially when you both live in the same city.

According to Shirky, bonding capital and bridging capital are different ways that people can connect to increase their social networks. The difference between the two are bonding is the strengthening of a group of people who are within the same group and bridging is the strengthening of connections between different groups of people. One other way of looking at it is bonding capital is exclusive and bridging capital is inclusive.

One of the things that I found interesting in this article is how small the world actually is. It is amazing that you can meet someone at a random location and happen to know someone that they are connected to. It is even more interesting when you happen to know the same people in a large city such as New York City. If you look on Facebook you can discover connections between people that you know. I remember I was on Facebook and I was looking at someone’s profile that I went to middle school with and I realized that she was also friends with someone that I had met in Albany. In a situation like this you realize just how small the world.

LiveJournal

For today's class I read "Shout into the wind, and it shouts back" Identity and interactional tensions on LiveJournal by Lori Kendall. Throughout this article Kendall sought to explain the dichotomous nature within LiveJournal such as: private journal vs. public performance, efficiency vs. audience management, control vs. connection and autonomy vs. the desire for comments. Each one of these is strategies used on this site. The first the thing Kendall delves into is the idea that people are using LiveJournal as a diary for everyone to see. Many of the people that she interviewed for her research admitted that their journals were a way for them to publicly perform for an audience, while others liked LiveJournal because updating friends and family on their life was much easier.

Some problems that may arise are the lack of total privacy. Although it is used in a public space, your journal can be controlled to allow for some people to see one thing while others may not gain total access (Kendall, 2008). In some cases mistakes have been made where confidential information was shown to the wrong people, which lead some people to only post information that everyone can see. Besides this issue some people enjoy being able to connect with people on LiveJournal through the material they present. This connection leads to increased commenting on a journal entry which is one of the things that people admit, they enjoy.

One of the things that I found interesting about this article is how people desire comments. I think that’s interesting because it gives people that sense of importance while at the same time stroking their ego. Even more interesting, people posted things that they thought were sure to give them a lot of attention that got absolutely nothing. I think one reason why people do not respond well to postings about how miserable life is because they don’t know what to say. I am sure that they don’t want to say the wrong thing that would be unhelpful or could make matters worse.

Blogging @merica

The idea of blogging is still a fairly new concept in the world that we live in. Many people perceive blogging to be a waste of time and energy. There has been a lot of negativity aimed towards bloggers who some stereotype as “weirdo loners in their mothers’ suburban basements” (Barlow, 2008 pg.37). Many argue that bloggers are simply trying to form a community extensive to the one that they live in. In my observation of the blogosphere I realized that shared interests can contribute to the rise of community.

The blog that I decided to observe was Popwatch Blog which is located on popwatch.ew.com. I chose it because it is an entertainment and pop culture blog and I thought that this would be something that I would find interesting. Most of the stories related to celebrities, new movies, television shows and random video clips. These all contained a mixture of humor, information and creativity. While observing this blog I noticed there was also a high level of activity on the site. This was evident in the Latest Comments section located on the right side of the screen. It provided the audience with the amount of comments a certain blog had as well as the last person who wrote it. There was also a blog roll on the side of the screen that linked to similar blogs such as PopBytes and Tv Tattle. I also noticed that there was some hierarchal system within this blog because they had a sectioned that was designated for the “top authors”, which insinuated to me that there were other authors who wrote on the site.

One of my duties was to post a comment to the blog that I was observing. None of the stories that I read was of any interests to me, so I decided to search for the HBO television series True Blood. I found something that was dated September 8^th, 2008 and the question was What did you think? Many of the comments I read were positive about the show and many people were optimistic about its future. Although it was posted awhile ago the comments were coming in on a daily basis, so that is where I decided to comment. I made a simple comment about my love for the show that did not earn any responses from anyone. I noticed that many of the people that commented on the post were regular posters and this created a relationship between some of them.

According to Aaron Barlow (2008), “community, that is what lies at the heart of the blog” (pg.37). Reading many of the comments about True Blood embedded that in my mind. Everyone wants to be apart of a community at some point in their lives and I think that blogs offer people that opportunity. Barlow also comments that bloggers do not wish to reject the idea of community, but to embrace it. While I was reading the comments many of them related to one another. For example, I read a comment from “NACHO MAMA”, who admitted that that site was to addicting to stay away, “Carlos” another poster was telling a fellow poster “NOLA” that he had a flat screen television that was exactly like one in show. Also, “NOLA” refers to “Carlos” as lover and she even calls him that in one of her comments, and she tells “malee” that she hopes that she is feeling better because “malee” has pneumonia. Another example I saw was “Kristin” gave “NOLA” her email address and told her that she had a facebook page. The idea of the “blogging glass”, as discussed by Lance Strate, can also play a role in blogging communites (Barlow, 2008 pg.61). This idea sheds light on the fact that as we look through that glass we began to see similarities between ourselves and others as we move through it we began to connect with others around us.

While observing this blog I realized that it was a lot more entertaining then I initially believed it was going to be. I think one of the problems that bloggers have is that many people underestimate just how important the blogosphere is. A lot of things that we read on the Internet from the nytimes website or aol.com can be put into someone’s blog and exposed to more people than you can imagine. One of the things that are important about the blogosphere is it is a community where people can share their interests and interact in a space where they feel comfortable. Connecting with people who share your passion makes it much easier to connect with them. For some people it may be easier to talk over the Internet than face to face. Blogs may have not always been popular, but they are sure to grow as we head into the future.

Works Cited

Barlow, Aaron. (2008). Blogging America. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers.

Joining the Blogosphere #5

Today is the final day that I have to observe my blog. I enjoyed doing it especiallybecause it was all about entertainment. Today they had a blog about the new Karate Kid movie that may come out without the legendary Pat Morita. The idea of a Karate Kid without him sounds absurd, he was the heart and soul of the movie. They also were rating new music releases from Beyonce, Christina Aguilera, Taylor Swift, T Pain as well as David Archuleta( the American Idol guy). Most of the ratings were quite dismal with the average being a B, but some artist weren't even fortunate to get that. Speaking of American Idol, a blog was up there about the deal that was struck with YouTube to air exclusive Idol footage. I guess that's a cool idea, but I don't watch the show so it doesn't matter to much to me. I checked back on True Blood and unsuprisingly there wasn't much going, just a couple of new comments. I had a good experiencing with this and I will most likely come back to check it out.