At the beginning of May, I noticed that I was spending a good 23.9 hours a day on Facebook (due to some sort of secret privacy setting, my dreams contained Facebook ads on the right-hand side).
I thought I was due for a Facebook Break; some time for "myself". No longer would I be encased in the oppressive shackles of an all-too-ubiquitous social networking website; I needed to better myself...like, you know, read a book or talk to someone that wasn't just me in a mirror, sobbing uncontrollably. Yes; like "Watching Ellie" and Jesus, I went on a hiatus for "retooling".
Here are the top reasons I left Facebook:
1) Wasting Time: I can't tell you how many times I said to myself "let's get started on that work...right after I check the Facebook status of each and everyone I am randomly connected to on Facebook"...then got stuck for hours down ye olde "looking at pictures of people I have not yet and never shall meet" rabbit hole. Hey, that comedian is randomly friends with this other comedian I met once at a party who knows that girl who was friends with that guy I kinda didn't like in high school. CA-RAY-ZAY! Pics or it didn't happen.
2) Getting Invited To Things: I know you're supposed to "support your friends", but I live in Hollywood where "supporting your friends" doesn't mean "being by their side when they need you", it means "showing up to every stand-up comedy performance and checking out every band at that 20 seat venue". I would literally get about 10 "event invitations" a day and I was running out of excuses as for why I couldn't make any of them (there's really only so many times you can use "sorry! I was crying profusely while looking at pictures of sumer camp from 1996" as a viable excuse). If you are friends with me, I most likely consider you to be the talented sort, but it's occasionally hard...especially considering that LA is a city full of 9.8 million people who play instruments and attempt to say potentially funny things. Not everyone can be talented. In fact, I'd say it's a good 1 in 10,000.
If, as the artist, you don't find the 10 other performers performing that night "funny" or "talented in the slightest"...how on earth am I supposed to sit through them? I'm just one man, not some sort of shit-comedy watching Robot, programmed to suffer the world's most unhilarious comedy lineup with the "I should really be saying this to a therapist" opening act. Seriously though. Not you...you're funny.
3) Not Getting Invited To Things: Hey, you know what's worse than being invited to things? Not being invited to things. Sure, I don't mind missing out on the odd "boys night out" or "strip club-extravaganza", but when I see a picture of 5 people I consider close friends all getting beers together and writing comments like "I sure had a great time last night...without Matt!" on each others wall, it brings me straight back to middle school where my nickname was "Jewy Mcbignose-nofriends" which was quite the nom-de-plume. Seriously, they coulda just called me "loser"...but it was New York and everybody's gotta be fancy in the City of...larger than average fruit.
Yes, Facebook is the great equalizer: it's the place where you find out if people you meet at parties like you, and the place where you find out your "good" friends...kinda don't like you...
Now...that isn't to say I won't sign back into Facebook sometime soon. In fact, I probably will. Maybe even by tomorrow.
Sure, I'm a turncoat hypocrite, but it's worth examining why:
1) I Still Waste Time: Yeah, it's kinda nice to think that I stopped going to a social networking website. I certainly possibly might have potentially bettered myself. I spent less time on Facebook, but really...Facebook is kinda like an Island surrounded by pornographic shark infested waters. Anytime you try to leave, there's a shit load of "youjizz.com"-type websites out there to engulf you in masturbatory distraction. Anytime I started typing "facebook.com" into my browser, I said "no, fuck Facebook, I'll just google something to learn about...you know...something about the world!". So a google search about "flotillas" will undoubtably lead me to an article including links to "other headlines" which will undoubtably lead me to a story about a knife-wielding porn star...which, of course, leads me to look at porn, which...kinda really distracts me just as much if not more than Facebook does. Damn you, Internets.
2) I Kinda Miss Getting Invited To Things: Yeah, Facebook invites me to shit like "CRAZY WACKY STAND UP FUNNY TIMES!", but it also invites me to shit like "My Birthday Party" and "Anything involving friends from the age of 18-49". The days of email invitations are, basically over. Evite? A ridiculous dinosaur-like fossil, frozen in useless time, a joke of museum-esque proportions. So yeah, if like...I don't know, I want to find out if I'm invited to something, Facebook's gotta be the website. I don't like it, but I'm a lonely human being; thirsty for contact with the outside world, and if I'm not invited to your pool party; I might as well have functionally ceased to exist...kinda like Aerosmith.
3) I Still Don't Get Invited To Things: So yeah, avoiding Facebook doesn't prevent me from not getting invited to things. Just take a text message exchange on a Saturday at 8pm that I had recently with a friend who came in to LA from NYC:
Friend: Hey Matt, I'm In LA. Just wondering what you were up to tonight!
Me: Hey (friend!), being that it's 8pm, I have plans tonight, but would love to catch up another time. How's tomorrow?
Friend: No problem, I knew it was late notice and would have felt bad if you found out I was in LA and didn't contact you!
So yes, friends still do let friends feel like shit. I wish there was some sort of multi-million dollar ad campaign to combat this scourge, but there ain't. Somehow or another I will still find out that I wasn't invited to something and somehow or another there is still some uncoth malcontent intent on pointing it out. At least with Facebook, I didn't need to learn about it by watching you.
And it's true, I will be logging on to Facebook again soon, in part to keep up with my hobbledehoy acquaintances; but mostly because I've got some awesome pictures to upload to prove to these hobbledehoys that I actually somehow have friends...
...and isn't that what Facebook is all about? Proving you have friends?
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