Sometimes I look up dead people on Facebook. Not, say, Thomas Edison or Washington Irving or George Washington Carver. If they had Facebook, I wouldn’t be here– but that’s a different story.

But maybe I’m watching the six o’clock news and there’s a story on how Randy Rappelstein, a junior at Rutgers, crashed his RAV-4 into a lightpole. Hop on over to Facebook, type in Randy’s name, and boom: a picture of him at his Sig Ep formal with his date cropped out. A remnant of his life when death seemed an abstract possibility.

It’s a creepy habit of mine, yes, but the Facebook has emerged as a virtual graveyard for such real – life situations, and it’s hard not to pay attention to the amount of dead matter on the site. Read More »

We’ve all created groups on facebook for various reasons — boredom, procrastination, humor… But yesterday, many of us took the time to dedicate our groups to something serious, something real — the horrific, sad, scary shooting at Virgina Tech.

I heard what happened on the news yesterday. I was shocked. But I can’t say what happened to those poor, unsuspecting students hit me until this morning when I saw the many V-Tech memorial groups on facebook. I saw pictures of the actual students who were shot and killed having fun with their friends, enjoying college, living a carefree life like the rest of us. I read other students’ comments from other schools and felt the sympathy and sadness in their words.

Check out the links to the memorial pages. Read More »