Last week an interesting thing occured: I received a friend request from my grandfather. Soon after I received an instant message from my cousin saying “dude grandpa joined facebook.” While my grandfather may be more hip than most grandfathers, it brings to light an interesting phenomenon: older generations are joining Facebook in droves.
Over the past few weeks I have been asking everyone that I come into contact with if they are on Facebook. The majority of them are and they aren’t the college students that once dominated the site. This weekend Mark Hendrickson questioned whether college students would start migrating to other social networks in search of a place where they can play among themselves.
While I don’t think other social networks will be as successful as Facebook in gaining the attention of college students nationwide, Facebook does need to hurry up and release their grouping features that will enable users to differentiate among their contact relationships. This will protect users when they want to prevent those pictures of them partying last night from reaching their business contacts.
I assume that most people haven’t had their extended family reaching out to them on Facebook but I definitely have. The mixture of professional, social and family contacts on Facebook has now become more challenging for me to maintain and I hope that Facebook releases their grouping features soon. Have your family members friended you on Facebook?
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so far its only only my brother and two sisters. i know a friend who's been added by his friend's mum! awkward much?i really wish facebook would have a much better option for sharing such postings like photo albums. i'm also an active multiply and i really love the privacy settings you can set on your photo albums. you can set to public, just your network, immediate contacts or my personal favorite, to specific individuals.and the other annoying thing is also the one-photo-at-a-time photo upload in groups. seriously, whats the deal with that?
Comment by facebooker — November 5, 2007 @ 5:59 am
so far its only only my brother and two sisters. i know a friend who's been added by his friend's mum! awkward much?
i really wish facebook would have a much better option for sharing such postings like photo albums. i'm also an active multiply and i really love the privacy settings you can set on your photo albums. you can set to public, just your network, immediate contacts or my personal favorite, to specific individuals.
and the other annoying thing is also the one-photo-at-a-time photo upload in groups. seriously, whats the deal with that?
Comment by facebooker — November 5, 2007 @ 7:59 am
That's pretty sweet. I think that is a good thing. Socializing keeps the old age away, or at least the feel like getting old away and keeps old people young.
Comment by esvl — November 5, 2007 @ 8:14 am
That is exactly why <a href="http://www.College.com” target=”_blank”>www.College.com was created
Comment by Sam — November 5, 2007 @ 8:24 am
That's pretty sweet. I think that is a good thing. Socializing keeps the old age away, or at least the feel like getting old away and keeps old people young.
Comment by esvl — November 5, 2007 @ 10:14 am
That is exactly why http://www.College.com was created
Comment by Sam — November 5, 2007 @ 10:24 am
When my sons mention to their friends that their mother is on Facebook, the first reaction of the friend is "oooh, that's cool". My sons give them a withering stare and say "Think about it. Would you want *your* mom on Facebook?" A slightly more dubious expression crosses the friend's face. And my sons smile and say, "Exactly…"My sons will not "friend" me on Facebook, but they do connect with cousins (same generation cousins) on Facebook. We can all be on Facebook at the same time, but some relationships will be held at more of a distance in the environment than they would be in the physical world.
Comment by Jill — November 6, 2007 @ 5:10 am
Well,I agree, completely and have used this as an example to many people explain what Facebook is all about. But now the big question is, how do I get my grandpa on facebook?
Comment by Sean Otto — November 6, 2007 @ 6:31 am
When my sons mention to their friends that their mother is on Facebook, the first reaction of the friend is "oooh, that's cool". My sons give them a withering stare and say "Think about it. Would you want *your* mom on Facebook?" A slightly more dubious expression crosses the friend's face. And my sons smile and say, "Exactly…"
My sons will not "friend" me on Facebook, but they do connect with cousins (same generation cousins) on Facebook. We can all be on Facebook at the same time, but some relationships will be held at more of a distance in the environment than they would be in the physical world.
Comment by Jill — November 6, 2007 @ 7:10 am
Well,
I agree, completely and have used this as an example to many people explain what Facebook is all about. But now the big question is, how do I get my grandpa on facebook?
Comment by Sean Otto — November 6, 2007 @ 8:31 am
I wrote a similar post a few months ago- though I really can't imagine my GRANDPA on Facebook. My Grandpa becomes utterly overwhelmed merely by the appearance of my desktop. Then he returns his attention to Wheel of Fortune. Hee.http://webnography.blogspot.com/2007/08/my-dads…..
Comment by Jenny Ryan — November 10, 2007 @ 8:38 pm
I wrote a similar post a few months ago- though I really can't imagine my GRANDPA on Facebook. My Grandpa becomes utterly overwhelmed merely by the appearance of my desktop. Then he returns his attention to Wheel of Fortune. Hee.
http://webnography.blogspot.com/2007/08/my-dads-c...
Comment by Jenny Ryan — November 10, 2007 @ 9:38 pm