Category Archives: Technology

How to Save Links on Facebook For Later (and Find Them Again)

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There are two types of people on Facebook: people who see a whole bunch of things in their feeds that they love and want to come back to later, so they share all of them… and people who are scrolling along, noticing that one of their friends has shared 12 Tasty videos in a row.

To be clear, I’m not share-shaming. I’m too heavy of a Facebook user to do that. But there is a seriously underutilized Facebook feature that I want to talk about that allows you to save all the links, videos, pictures, events, cat memes, etc., that your heart desires without putting 40 new posts into your followers’ feeds at once by going on a share-spree. This feature is a little bit hidden, but gives you the ability to bookmark items within Facebook (not just links, but virtually anything on FB – videos, pictures, events, etc.).

I know there are people who only share so much because they want to be able to find that stuff later (I know this because when they share, the write stuff like “saving this to come back to it” and “sharing so I can find this later”). Hopefully knowing about this feature will help you to never again spend 20 minutes scrolling through your feed trying to find that recipe or article you shared three weeks ago.

And best of all, this feature is as easy to use on the mobile app as it is on the desktop version of Facebook. You can save items from your friends as well as from public pages.  Continue reading →

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Social Media and the Validation of Existence

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Life’s been kind of funny lately — putting people in places I would never expect to find them, prodding at the void left by people I hoped would be there forever, presenting me with some interesting career opportunities (among them — I just got my first experience teaching adults about social media last week, and it was overall a pleasant experience). So I guess in a lot of ways, my see-saw is balanced enough.

Comme ci, comme ça.

I’m a very stressed out person. When it came time to vote on senior class superlatives in high school, I was one of the final contenders for “Most-Stressed Senior Girl.” In the end, I was edged out, but stress still has a way of shutting me down. At the same time, it soothes me. I like being busy and I like the odds being stacked against me. I like the feeling of accomplishment when I can cross something off of my to-do list or when my emails are down to 0. I’ve been called an over-achiever. Really I’m just trying not to let my mind overtake me.

Most of all, I love when my mind is so occupied that I don’t have time to think about the things that are bothering me. And that’s what I’ve been doing. I’ve been keeping myself so busy that I can’t wait to go to sleep at night, and in many cases, I never remember my head hitting the pillow (impressive for someone who’s been dealing with insomnia on and off since fourth grade).

However, a combination of the nap I took earlier (owed to the fact that I’m sick for the fifth time in eight weeks) and paranoia (some shady characters who are known to steal things for drug money were caught looking in the windows of my car and discussing what is — was [it’s all been removed] — inside) has me awake now.

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A 100% Super Serious Open Letter to Facebook

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Dear Mr. Zuckerberg,

I have been an avid user of your site since 2005 when my college friends and I joked about how Facebook should really be called StalkerNet. I’ve mumbled and groaned with the best of them about changes you have made to the site in the past, but with this new set of changes, it is clear that I find in you a like mind.

While I can’t say that I’m surprised at all that you read all of our minds in taking the StalkerNet concept to the next level, I am a bit surprised that my thoughts aren’t automatically showing up in my Facebook feed already. This is America in 2011, is it not? After all, if my thoughts and all details of my life including likes, preferences, and what I’m doing at every second of the day can automatically show up in several locations on Facebook (including places where people I may not want to see that information can access it), I can finally stop interacting with people in person. In fact, I won’t even need to talk to them at all — not in person, on the phone, through email, IM, or any other medium! Actual social interaction is so painful for awkward people like me. But why am I telling you that? I know you understand!

I write this letter to propose a change to Facebook that will help make all of that a possibility. This will have to be rolled out over time, so your developers won’t need to rush in any way. Take your time and really perfect this.

Assuming we all survive the apocalypses of October 21, 2011 (you know, the make-up date for the May 21, 2011 Apocalypse That Wasn’t) and December 21, 2012, you will need to begin rolling out this first piece of technology immediately. December 22, 2012 kind of immediately. What it is, is a neurobiological-ish chip that is implanted behind the ear of every newborn baby. This Facebook Chip comes automatically linked to a profile page for that child that is activated upon implantation.

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Reading My Social Media Profiles Doesn’t Make Us Friends

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You know that girl from high school who has added every single person in your graduating class on Facebook? Much like she was in high school, she won’t actually talk to you, but boy is she nosy. By definition (according to social media, anyway), though, you are friends.

We come to expect this kind of behavior from people that we don’t know so well. We put them on limited profile and go about our business, hoping they just mind theirs.

But what happens when social media starts becoming something of a substitute for actual friendships? This is something that has bothered me for a long time.

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When Social Media Becomes Internet Bullying

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Maybe you’ve noticed a lot of your Facebook friends advertising their Formspring accounts lately, especially if you’re friends with high school or college students. By my [completely unresearched] estimation, they seem to be the largest demographic. If you haven’t heard of Formspring and don’t know what it’s all about, suffice it to say that it’s a social media forum through which people ask each other questions. If you’d like a more thorough description of its services, feel free to check it out.

In an age where we have so many different resources available to ask people questions, I’m not totally sure why a service like this is even necessary. If you want to know what your friend’s favorite movie is, why not just ask in person? Ask on Facebook. Ask on Twitter. Ask on AIM. Pick up the phone and call or text. This seems to be billed as a “getting-to-know-you” kind of service, allowing people to ask questions in order to, well, get to know someone better. In that respect, it seems like Internet speed-dating. Remember back in the ’90s when everyone warned us not to meet up in “real life” with anyone we met in AOL chat rooms? Then all of a sudden online dating services started encouraging us to do just that. Did people suddenly become much more honest and trustworthy? Doubtful. But I digress. Formspring also advertises this site as a way for people to ask questions of their favorite authors and celebrities (something that many of them already do on Twitter. I see public figures advertising their Twitter accounts all the time. I’ve yet to see one advertise a Formspring). Continue reading →

5 Facebook Habits That Annoy Me

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No, I couldn’t come up with a more clever title. It’s hot. My brain is lagging hours – maybe days – behind my body.

I think it’s pretty safe to say that those of us for whom Facebook is an integral part of life are all guilty of some kind of obnoxious and/or annoying Facebook behavior. That’s totally to be expected. I will be the first person to admit that, especially when I’m bored, I update my status way too often, and usually not with anything close to revelatory. In an attempt to justify my own less-than-ideal habit by pointing out that it could be worse, I’ve come up with the 5 Facebook habits that most irritate me, and why. This is not in any way meant to offend any of my friends (although it would appear that it’s mostly just randoms, mostly in California, who are reading my blog, anyway). Then again, when you consider that most of the people a person is friends with on Facebook aren’t really that person’s good friends…. well, I’ll get to that. Continue reading →