Think back to second grade. You are the lucky recipient of a “Do you like me? Yes or no?(circle one)” note. The message is scrawled by an aspiring Romeo or Juliet and relayed by your best friend. Fast forward to 2005: Crayons swapped for keyboards, paper converted to electronic codes and your best friend traded in for … a Web site? Welcome to www.thefacebook.com – the cyber-rage sweeping campus with a flurry of friend-confirming requests. And we thought we grew up.
This free, trance-inducing Web site lists all your registered friends, their friends, their friends’ friends and those friends’ friends. It may well be the newest gateway drug, given its highly addictive nature. (Everyone is doing it. Just give it a try, I promise you will love it!) There is a catch, however, of relationship certification. You cannot get in without a ratification of “friend” status – the college equivalent of a circled “yes.”
So why bother with this seemingly juvenile pastime? My favorite answer comes from my former life as a student at a tiny, private and religious (and exceedingly boring) college where a pictorial directory was handed out to the entire student body. The curiosity of human nature ensured the book was studied with a fervor never seen in the classroom. “The Facebook” is the Ohio State-sized equivalent of a student directory – with improvements. Pictures are in color, the information is extensive and (best of all) it provides the ability to discover whether the hottie who knows a friend of your friend would like to be “friends” with you – at the rapid-fire speed of e-mail (or faster if the person in question lists their AOL instant messenger name).
In addition to meeting new people, you will find out things about current acquaintances that may turn them into bona-fide friends – shared disdain for a class, favorite books and movies and perhaps a mutual interest in mullet-spotting (“For the Love of Mullets” group). The common interest groups range from the serious (“Campus Republicans at OSU”) to the ridiculous (“We are Better Than You and We Know It!” group) and the hilarious (the “Mirror Lake Jumper-Inners” group, which has more than 1,000 members). There are the inside OSU warring groups (“Blonde is Better” vs. “Brunettes Have More Fun”), the ever popular OSU against the world groups (“Muck Fichigan”) and of course, TV show groups (272 members in “Seinfeld”).
The sheer massiveness of our university guarantees that most of us walk to class with headphones on, alternately staring into space and looking at the ground. “The Facebook” breaks this impersonal cycle with the effectiveness of mass quantities of alcohol. It is a way to make OSU smaller – an online student exchange with the chat-potential of a bar, 24 hours a day. I am shamelessly captivated by the potential to revive a few of the better qualities of a small school without removing myself to a high school feeling, cramped campus of 1,000 students.
So go ahead and try “The Facebook.” It is not illegal, immoral or fattening and you are sure to make a friend – or 10.
Rebecca Miller is a senior in psychology. She can be reached for comment at [email protected].
