Creepbook: Media Meditation #4

It's the most nerve-wracking question some people ask these days: will you be my facebook friend?



Ah, facebook. The Cadillac of social networking sites. Where would we be without it?

Recently, though, I faced quite the conundrum: should I add my mom?

I mean, I love her to death, but this is really brand new territory in our relationship. She's never had exposure to anything I've done on the internet (save for monitoring my activities when I was really young) and I wasn't sure if this was too big of a step.

There's a completely new set of rules and e-etiquette for social networking. This certainly isn't your grandmother's address book, adding to my problem. I decided to ask my friends.

"OH DEAR GOD DO NOT DO THAT. PROMISE ME YOU WILL NOT DO THAT" was the average answer from basically all of them. I scoured the internet for more answers.

It is really odd how one little internet application can completely change the way we interact. Before facebook, the teenager's biggest dilemma might be something like "should I let my mom see what people wrote in my yearbook?" Facebook, and the personal shift that it has contributed to, is quite the game changer.

My mom apparently had a few games up her sleeves, too. She e-mailed me the following video and said something like "lol is this our situation? love you!"


Her friend request remained in my inbox untouched. Despite her persuasive techniques, humor and repetition among them, I still had to think.

Whether it is helping college grads find work or proving to us once again that the internet is scary, it's hard to deny that facebook isn't a gigantic force of nature that keeps our limbic brains and neocortex plenty busy (and reptilian brain too, if one's farmville game gets really intense).

In the end, I decided to make a compromise: I would add her, but block her from seeing basically everything that wasn't my profile picture. My friends would be happy, I would feel less exposed, and she got another facebook friend. However, she was still a little upset that she wasn't considered a "real friend".

Don't worry about her, though. Her other 32 friends will keep her plenty busy.