Thursday, April 10, 2014

Curious Reveries - Facebook

As I was scrolling down my Facebook Newsfeed not too long ago, it occurred to me that everyone's feed looks totally different from anyone else's based on their friends, likes, interests and what they choose to hide or not hide. 

Mine usually has a ton of pics of my friends kids and milestones from first smile to a photo of an upcoming graduation announcement.  There are a lot of status updates that start with "5 years ago today..." and "I can't believe my baby is getting a drivers license today!", or something similar.

There are a lot of pet related posts on my feed as well.  I too often have to post words of sympathy to a friend whose status is a picture of a beloved pet who crossed the rainbow bridge that day.  There are shared posts of people passing on a post of a lost dog in Okemos, MI or a sweet kitty in Nashville, TN that needs a home.  And I really never get tired of the funny pictures people share of their pets or even the silly ones from the internet.  LOL Cat still cracks me up!

Honestly, I don't have any political stuff in my feed because I'm not interested in social media debate (or bashing) so I end up hiding that friend's updates from my feed.  Sadly, that same friend might have something to say that I am interested in but I'll only notice it if a mutual friend shares it on their timeline.  Same thing about religious posts.  

Lately, my feed has a bunch of activity about "first 5k" or similar.  Apparently, my friends of a certain age, all at once decided to start walking/running and over the course of 12 months have been training for, and completing, various k's, 1/2 marathons, and multi-marathons.  Of course this mishmash of friends from different times and places in my life would have no way of knowing that, since they are completely unconnected outside of my feed, and yet, they all did it together.  Collectively, I'm proud of them.  I did walk my first 5k last week for a Heart Walk and yes, I did update my status to let them know.

It makes me feel better that in today's transparent world, packed with information and online friends, we're all still individuals.  At least on our own Timelines.

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