Last week, two major city firms issued the first bans on the "social networking" website Facebook, much to the chagrin of most of their members of staff. Too much work time was being wasted at the expense of the employers, said the bosses, in a feeble attempt to justify the ban. "But it helps us get in touch with people who could prove useful on the work front," is the general gist of the employee's reaction. Yeah sure! That's of course what Facebook is all about.
Like myspace and youtube and lovematch, and all those other dotcoms that have now become part of our daily vocabulary ("I met him on myspace" "did you see it on youtube?"), Facebook is one of those sites that appeared and spread like wildfire in a matter of weeks. I was first invited to join by a Maltese friend who lives here. "Are you on Facebook?" she asked, her tone of voice insinuating that if I wasn't, then I had better start thinking about it. Later at home, I visited the site and decided against it. Having just decided to remove several of my profiles from sites I no longer bothered to visit, I thought it made sense not to.
Then all these invitations to join Facebook started pouring in. "So and so has invited you to join Facebook" read the title of the e-mail with the invitation - the invitee often being someone I'd not heard from in ages. It was only when I finally succumbed and registered that I realised that upon registration, Facebook gives you the option of sending out invitations to all those in your e-mail contacts list. So much for thinking that all these people had been thinking of me!
Once I joined, invitations to become friends came in from every direction. I joined groups that gave me even more friends, mainly Canadians of Maltese origin who were desperate for news from the island, (until recently, Toronto had the honour of being the country with most Facebook members. Now it has been neaten by London) with information about where to go when they finally visit. There were several attempts made by myself to sit down and search for people from days long gone, who I had lost touch with, but to be honest, I no longer have the patience required to do such things - nor the mental capacity (I can no longer remember names of people I don't meet regularly, which is worrying!).
For the first few weeks, I made as many friends as I possibly could (who cares if you don't know these people from Adam), from all around the world, and all walks of life. I'll say now that at no point was work ever discussed, or the possibility of making contacts who would prove useful on the work front.
And then I got bored. As people continued to ask to be my friend, and nudge, and poke and write graffiti on my wall - all actions that can be performed on Facebook - I lost interest as one does with many of these sites. Now, when someone sends a friend request - and it's a person that I know, and like in real life - I accept it, and that's it. If it's someone I don't know, or a group that I sense could lead to a bombardment of e-mails, it simply gets the delete treatment.
So if anybody reading this has sent me an invite and not received anything yet, please don't be offended. With the attention span of a goldfish with ADD, I tend to get bored very easily, and things often fall along the wayside with me. Facebook is one such casualty.
Like myspace and youtube and lovematch, and all those other dotcoms that have now become part of our daily vocabulary ("I met him on myspace" "did you see it on youtube?"), Facebook is one of those sites that appeared and spread like wildfire in a matter of weeks. I was first invited to join by a Maltese friend who lives here. "Are you on Facebook?" she asked, her tone of voice insinuating that if I wasn't, then I had better start thinking about it. Later at home, I visited the site and decided against it. Having just decided to remove several of my profiles from sites I no longer bothered to visit, I thought it made sense not to.
Then all these invitations to join Facebook started pouring in. "So and so has invited you to join Facebook" read the title of the e-mail with the invitation - the invitee often being someone I'd not heard from in ages. It was only when I finally succumbed and registered that I realised that upon registration, Facebook gives you the option of sending out invitations to all those in your e-mail contacts list. So much for thinking that all these people had been thinking of me!
Once I joined, invitations to become friends came in from every direction. I joined groups that gave me even more friends, mainly Canadians of Maltese origin who were desperate for news from the island, (until recently, Toronto had the honour of being the country with most Facebook members. Now it has been neaten by London) with information about where to go when they finally visit. There were several attempts made by myself to sit down and search for people from days long gone, who I had lost touch with, but to be honest, I no longer have the patience required to do such things - nor the mental capacity (I can no longer remember names of people I don't meet regularly, which is worrying!).
For the first few weeks, I made as many friends as I possibly could (who cares if you don't know these people from Adam), from all around the world, and all walks of life. I'll say now that at no point was work ever discussed, or the possibility of making contacts who would prove useful on the work front.
And then I got bored. As people continued to ask to be my friend, and nudge, and poke and write graffiti on my wall - all actions that can be performed on Facebook - I lost interest as one does with many of these sites. Now, when someone sends a friend request - and it's a person that I know, and like in real life - I accept it, and that's it. If it's someone I don't know, or a group that I sense could lead to a bombardment of e-mails, it simply gets the delete treatment.
So if anybody reading this has sent me an invite and not received anything yet, please don't be offended. With the attention span of a goldfish with ADD, I tend to get bored very easily, and things often fall along the wayside with me. Facebook is one such casualty.