Facebook is no place for valentines

A few words about Facebook. After doing without it for a week, I can say that the self-exile didn’t make much difference. At the start it did feel like the loss of some vestigial sense — that third eye that focuses only on other people’s minutiae — but the feeling quickly faded. At this moment my little deadline has expired, but I still haven’t felt a strong urge to return. It appears the world keeps turning whether I do or not. Good to know.

Over the past week I did seem to waste slightly less time. That left me free to waste more time on other things, like watching old clips from Flight of the Conchords on YouTube. Hilarious! If I did happen to be doing anything productive, I was slightly less distracted by the urge to see if my latest dopey status update was getting any traction. They almost never do. I’m pretty sure I didn’t miss much.

Bottom line: Facebook, meh. The Internet is important, but the world’s largest social media site is surprisingly not — at least to a man whose Facebook friends and family couldn’t fill a two-car garage. It’s not an evil force, but it’s not much help either. Especially when you consider the time spent on it versus the superficiality of the social connections it purports to provide. Then there’s the privacy thing. And the certainty that everything you do on Facebook makes it that much easier to sell you stuff you don’t need.

Anyway, it’s Valentine’s Day. My exile’s up, but I think today’s Facebook time might be better spent picking up some small token of affection for the wife. Here’s to the physical world! Besides, I imagine the site will still be there when I get back.