I, like every other college student, spend a fair amount of time on the ‘book, from creating party events, to shameless stalking of ex boyfriends, and of course, rick rolling people like it’s my job (never gonna give you up!). There’s nothing wrong with that; I mean, that’s what Facebook is for.

Unfortunately, as Facebook becomes more and more pervasive, for some people it’s becoming less of a place to post pictures and musings from their lives and more a place to actually live them. Remember the groom who posted on Facebook during his wedding? Funny? A sign of the times? Yeah, but also a little bit pathetic. And that doesn’t even hold a candle to these most recent Facebook updates…. Read More »

Would you say goodbye to the FB?

Back in the ages of early social media, I turned to Facebook to find as many friends as I could before I went to college my freshman year. “Hey [insert name here], it says you are living in [insert dormitory here], like, OMG let’s meet up and do our laundry together or something!”

Facebook was there for all my major college needs, and I quickly came to depend on the status update to let people know I was really fun/cool/endearing, busily tagged myself in pictures, and coyly searched for the cute boy in my Spanish class…

Then things started to change.

The mom friend request. The 13-year-old sister friend request. The 13-year-old sister’s friend’s friend request. The sparkly new mini-feed, which loaded itself and pressured me into talking to people on Facebook I forgot I was friends with. (“Bill is lonely. Reconnect!” Um, Facebook? Chill your jets, Bill is lonely because he peed his bed Sunday morning after our first football home game.) And now, Facebook is begging you to check in with Facebook Places.

Oh, goody.
And by “goody” I mean, “WTF IS YOUR DEAL, FACEBOOK?!”

I can’t count how many times I wanted to meet the people who were changing the online community I had built, take them by the shoulders and shake the ‘idiot’ right out of them. How many times I drew a line in the sand and threatened to say goodbye to FB forever.

But would I really?

Well, that option is becoming reality as a barrage new social networks come our way. One of which will give us the opportunity to go back to the way things were so many years ago: college kids only. Read More »

When did Facebook turn into my verbally-abusive ex-boyfriend?

He’s full of empty promises and is always “I really care about your privacy and I’m not going to show the whole world that photo of you doing naked Olympics.” Then he turns around the next day and broadcasts everything to the world with a “seriously, you’ll end up liking the fact that everyone, including your mother, knows exactly what you did this weekend. And if you don’t, then go back to that dirty heathen of a boyfriend, Myspace, and see if I care.”

And now he’s done it again. He’s introduced a Foursquare for Facebook, called Facebook Places, that takes everyone’s favorite stalker application to the next level. Not only will your friends, frenemy’s, second cousins, and co-workers be able to check into locations, but they’ll also be able to check you into locations. Apparently they’re claiming that it’s just like tagging someone in a photo because it has a detag option. Except tagging an ugly photo of me on Facebook in not equivalent to telling the Facebook community that I’m in the third stall at the Olive Garden on Grove street.

Change your privacy settings today or prepare to see your entire life ruined. Think I’m exaggerating? Just look at my Wikipedia-approved reasoning:

1. No More Lying – So you wanted to get out of your friend’s birthday dinner (because she always insists on wearing a tiara and “kiss me, it’s my birthday sash”) and made up a story about having to cram for a hugeeee test the next day. Instead you go out with some other friends to happy hour where they tag you as being at the bar. Add some photo proof to that tag and you’re about to be defriended…in real life. And that’s the least of your issues. How about the fact that you got out of your boyfriend’s great aunt’s funeral by telling a small white lie that you were really, really sick — only to be location-tagged as being at the school’s biggest tailgate party ever.

2. No More Privacy – Facebook stalking is a totally healthy part of life, real life stalking is a total calling card to spend some time in prison. The two are about to overlap pretty quickly when your stalker starts literally following you from class (because your lab partner tagged you) to the library (because your freshman your roommate spotted you across the stacks and tagged you) to Starbucks (because somehow the barista and you are Facebook friends and she’s trying real hard to be web-savvy). Read More »

[Everyone’s got a vice, a bad habit, something they know they need to change. Unfortunately, everyone also has a million excuses why they just can’t do it. Not anymore. Every month we will be following a different CollegeCandy writer as she takes on a personal challenge. This month we're following Ariel as she, GASP, quits Facebook. Last week, her body shut down (no, for real); how's she faring now??]

Two weeks without logging in to Facebook and I still have a pulse. This is a very, very, VERY good sign!

My second week Facebook-free has gone surprisingly well. I’ve even managed to convince a bunch of people to come along this journey with me. (Editor’s Note: Who ARE these people!?) It seems that I’m not the only one who has become emotionally and physically dependent on a website.

I feel your pain, fellow addicts. Let it all out. This is a judgment-free zone.

With classes starting back up in ten days (Is this real life?) and having to move back into my apartment in less than a week, I haven’t had a lot of time to sit down and sort through my email… let alone stalk friends-of-friends-of-friends. And I’ve barely missed it.

But maybe it’s because I’ve continued to fill this Faceboook-induced void with multiple pairs of shoes and tons of new outfits. (I’ve spent a lot of time at the gym too! I need to look good in these new clothes.) Isn’t that what always happens? People replace one addiction with another? Yeah, I’ve got a ridonk new wardrobe, but now there’s a void in both my wallet and my heart.

I’ll tackle budgeting my time and my money next month. Read More »

I am a Facebook creeper.

I have this compulsive clicking disease when it comes to my news feed. All of a sudden its 12:33 AM on a Sunday and I am looking at photo 433 out of 602, trying to figure out who this person is and how I even got to their page.

It is a SERIOUS problem.

I over analyze guys that I hook up with by the state of their Facebook wall, I get jealous of ex-friends spending drunken nights together, and I stalk profiles of people I know who are abroad like there is no tomorrow. It affects my school work and my overall productivity. This is why I decided to quit Facebook cold turkey and give up my creeper tendencies for one loooonggg month.

And hopefully, by the time I’m done and back at school, I will be able to get things accomplished without wasting hours on the world’s best procrastination website.

Instead of completely deactivating my account (I don’t want to be that girl without a Facebook account), I let one of my friends change my password (one I trusted enough to not change my status to ridiculous things that I wouldn’t even know about). I didn’t want the temptation of opening up my Facebook app on my Blackberry or drunkenly logging in.

In preparation for my Facebook diet, I’ve reactivated my library card, found some websites that stream movies, and stocked up on good blogs to read and new websites to browse (DearBlankPleaseBlank, Catalog Living, and, of course, CollegeCandy). Unfortunately, I don’t think any of that is going to be enough to fill the gaping, Facebook-sized void in my heart. Seriously, I dare you to try and find a site that can entertain me for hours on end like FB. Not because I don’t think you can, but because I need it for my mental health. Please. I’m begging you, dear readers! Read More »

Facebook can turn even the most confident girl into a crazy stalker. Whether it’s clicking rapidly through photo albums and tagged pictures or checking out every. single. girl. who posts on your random hook-up’s wall, we’ve all been there. And that’s OK. It’s not like we’re sitting in a windowless van outside someone’s house for hours, watching their every move. No, we’re just reading what they wanted us to read. No privacy settings, no problem!

But while creepin’ on The Book is totes acceptable, there are some things that just aren’t. So if you’re so-bored-you-want-to-die at your summer job, or even if you’re just obsessed with finding out which of your long lost high school peers has gotten knocked up – if you want to keep your creeping under wraps, remember these few things when you go on a stalking expedition. Read More »

God, I wish I didn't defriend the ex....

We’ve all been there.  You break up with your boyfriend, fight with your Bio lab partner, resent your freshman year roommate for getting a better internship than you.  In a booze-fueled rage you sit at your computer at 2am going through Facebook, wanting so badly to cut these people off altogether.  Why do you need to know that the old roomie is hanging out with Kanye?  Or that your ex already found a rebound girl and her boobs are really, really big?

Before you know it, you get caught up in the whirlwind that is FB’s newsfeed and suddenly you’re hating on people you haven’t seen in three years.  Sarah’s mom sends her care packages from Sephora?  Bitch!  Jamie is dating that hot TA?  You had your eye on him first and she knows it!  Your best friend is dating your little brother?  Gross and unacceptable!

In a flash, the floodgates have opened.  You’re going to defriend them all, that’s what you’re going to do!  With your mouse hovering above the delete button, you pause for a moment.  Sure, consciously getting rid of a Facebook friend is the modern day equivalent of sending someone to the guillotine.  Off with their heads and their damn status updates!  But while it might feel good in the moment to erase these people from your life account, it’s more than a little likely that you’ll come to regret your cutthroat ways.

In a few months you’ll probably be dating someone new and the hurt caused by your ex-BF’s fling with Pam Anderson will have subsided.  It was, after all, just a fling and apparently he ditched her via wall post.  Too bad you gave him the axe; you would have loved to read that one.  Not to mention your roommate got fired from her internship for enjoying an event’s open bar a little too much.  Talk about the funniest tagged photos you’ll never see.  Actually, it seems that whole unfriending spree really cut you out of the loop with everyone. Read More »

So according to a recent study, the Internet is making us depressed.

While the scientists behind the study link depression to the amount of time spent in a virtual world, I have a few of my own theories as to why the Internet is making us all very, very sad.

1: Checking on the Ex.  If you are about to say that you have never fallen prey to Facebooking our ex you’d better grab a fire extinguisher, because your pants are on fire.  After a break-up, as detailed by Ted Mosby on “How I Met Your Mother,” there is a clear winner and a clear loser.  And of course, you want your ex to be the loser.  So you’ll casually click on his Facebook, just to see how he’s doing (i.e. hopefully read a bunch of depressing status updates regarding his horrible life since you guys broke up, maybe some encouraging wall posts from his friends trying in vain to get him out of his depression of knowing that there was no one else for him than you…) and what do you find? NEW PICTURES OF HIM AND SOME GIRL?!  IT’S ONLY BEEN A WEEK!  WHO IS THIS “JESSICA”??!  You click through the entire album at least twice, only to find that this little witch is now apparently dating your vile ex, and (after a small amount of clicking) she’s just gorgeous and cool and perfect.  <Insert depressing Status Update here.>

2: Online Shopping. You avoid the expensive stores in the mall because you know you can’t afford them, but there’s no avoiding that amazing Botkier bag or Louboutin pump that you happen to come across while absentmindedly surfing the web in lecture. And seeing it there, taunting you with its beauty, sends you into a deep fit of depression when you know you can’t afford it. Read More »

"He's got a new GF!?"

I have a pretty boring morning routine. I hear my alarm go off on my iPhone (“Pretty Young Thing” by MJ, if you must know) continue to hit snooze until I only give myself twenty minutes to get ready. Then the routine:

-          Stretch. Rub face seven times.
-          Tear out of bed when I realize that I’m already running thirty minutes late.
-          Get in shower. Shampoo. Condition. Etc.
-          Dry off, get dressed, brush teeth, make goofy faces at myself in the mirror.
-          Run upstairs, notice that I have an extra five minutes.
-          Check Facebook.

Yes, Facebook is usually a part of my morning routine. Sometimes even taking precedent over a nutritious breakfast. Sad, but true.

You log in and scroll through Newsfeed, which usually goes a little something like this: status updates from “kind-of” friends, photos posted from family vacations that you don’t care about, “top 5 favorite Miley Cyrus songs” (she even has 5 songs?), event notification for a band you’ve never heard of, “What’s my Ghetto Name,” more status updates, ex-boyfriend is no longer listed as single, status upd… WAIT WHAT?!

Scroll back up in a panic, hoping you misread. Nope. We have confirmation: That stupid little pink heart is practically jumping off the screen paired with your recent ex, boyfriend or crush’s name. Maybe you already knew they were in a relationship, maybe you had no idea, maybe they broke up with you via Facebook, maybe you went out on a few dates and you thought things were going places but now they are in a relationship with someone who is NOT you.

Whatever the case is, this relationship update is a slap in the face…book. Read More »

Every week, I write College Candy’s “Weekly Ten” about whatever the hard-hitting, relevant issues of the week are.

Obviously.

This week, I’ve decided to focus my Weekly Ten on my Top 10 Facebook Pet Peeves. Because it doesn’t get more relevant or hard-hitting than that.

10. Status updates all the time.
Seriously? Facebook (even though they’re trying really hard to be) is NOT Twitter. Get that shiz outta my news feed. You’re clogging it up.

9. Constant profile picture changes.
Okay, so I might be a little guilty of this one. However, when you’re changing your profile picture more than your underwear (people like that exist, I know it…), it’s time to reevaluate your life.

Special Mention: Annoying peace-sign-and-pouty-lips profile picture. Doubly worse if the picture is taken with MacBook’s photo booth. Triply worse if you’re wearing giant sunglasses. If there’s a small dog or a Coach bag in the picture? Do everyone a favor and just delete your whole profile. Read More »