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Tuesday Humor: When Social Media Gets Real
In a period when social media stars are getting clobbered, we thought this quite appropriate...
"I haven't got a computer, but I was told abouy Facebook and Twitter and am trying to make friends in the real world applying the same principles..."
Source: @_youhadonejob
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I fap to real world lingerie ads at the bus stop also...
This fake reality is what people crave. People out in the real world are chained to it. They need the reinforcement of their "friends" to build their wall.
It's not for me. I don't want to be in contact with people I knew 20 years ago. If I did, I would talk to them.
If someone came up to me and told me they had 500k followers on Twitter I would feel sorry for them, not envious.
People have become great at talking but have forgotten how to listen.
Maybe it is just not for me.
pods
Not to mention what this has all done to the average attention span which was probably already deficient before the digital revolution.
Not to mention that Facebook and other anti-social sites are fronts for CIA. That made tehir spyinga and public mind control so much easier.
All you need is to look at the recent gay marriage debate. There were several articles that revealed that they were using that as a test to see how many users would chage there profile to rainbow colors. And they would see how long they wold keep it for. In other words, they were testing how much control they had, and for how long they could control the droids...oops i mean people.
It was actually a cool test to see what friends of mine belong into the sheeple category...
I challenged a 'friend' who went FB rainbow and he didn't like it one bit. He unfriended me and actually contacted FB to tell them that my FB 'pen name' was not my real name. FB has hounded me to send proof of identity of who I am. Fuck that. I played games with FB, wanted to see what twists and turns they would take me on, gave them various weird documentation. Needless to say I no longer can access FB, and am thankful this happened, helping unchain me from one more distraction in my life.
I have seen how people have lost the ability to communicate. It is really scary. Me and the Missus have long talks to figure shit out. When I hear about other couples who are having problems it is mainly because they simply cannot communicate.
My attention span as a kid was pretty short when I wasn't interested, but when I liked something I could sit for hours, just observing. Now, I doubt kids could do that.
pods
It's very easy to see when couples have problems on facebook. When they start posting how happy they are, a break up is imminent.
Put a video game in front of a kid, they will stare at it for days. Real life stuff, not so much.
I'm almost embarassed to say what I used to do. Watch birds at a bird feeder. I once watched a colony of ants get taken over by a colony of larger ants. Hours on end.
Maybe I am just a nut?
pods
No you are not.
Right now I have a picture window with a deep easement in the living room I am looking out. I have an apple tree, several kinds of bird feeders, sunflowers, millet, and other things going on out there. You can't see it from the street, it is set up for "us." My cat, as we speak, is on a perch in front of the window, stalking some blue jays (sometimes they fly right into the window and my cat slams his head into the window on the other side he cannot restrain himself).
My husband and I have red bellied wood peckers, downy woodpeckers, a few humming birds (that feeder my husband set up for me, I love them), cardinals, jays, and many, many, other varieties of birds that come through. We look up new ones on-line a lot. My husband is good at IDing them. The millet and sunflowers are growing because of the seed. I weed some of it but not all. It is kind of pretty and we watch the progress of the growth daily. We have also watched red bellies, downy's and cardinals raise their families in front of our window. We know from experience what cardinals look like as their feathers change and the grow out of their awkwardness. Squirrels are real clowns on the bird feeders, we laugh our asses off making bets on what they will and won't try, or are capable of. The latest is the raccoons. Not sure how I feel about all five of them, but right now they are adorable. But they do get into my garden and the bird food.
Perhaps we are too easy to entertain, but when company comes over, and we have the shades up, they are compelled by the action, it will be a topic of conversation. They almost always comment that they would have never guessed that they would be as interested as they were in that.
Edit: That may have been a lot like a Facebook post, egads.
Lucky you!
We have pretty poor variety in my LA-burb, but I have managed to attract orioles to the hummingbird feeder, and a whole family of goldfinches eating my cosmos which had gone to seed.
I love hummingbirds! We have wild chickens, and they are so much fun to watch.
Lucky you, down in New Zealand we have very boring brown birds. Even our national bird is boring, the kiwi, brown, blind and flightless. A sarcastic South African said to me once when I offered him a book of New Zealand birds that that would be a very short book.
I did the same shit when I was a kid pods, I especially loved the ant battles!
I helped the smaller ants survive by burning the bigger ants with a magnifying glass.
My brother and I attempted to integrate the large black and red ants. In every case we failed. Too bad we were to young to apply for a federal grant to study this phenomenon.
Miffed;-)
And to think Pods you did all that without the aid of medications.
My daughter was disappointed the beginning of her high school junior class. They had ended the chess club for lack of participation. Unfortunately in chess, you must have the attention span more than a gnat to keep interest.
I think part of what helped my kids was when ever they came to me and said they were bored, I'd find an interesting project for them. Cleaning out the rain gutters, mucking horse stalls. Soon they no longer approached me and discovered our books in the basement and fun games to do outside. Our poor local Horny Toads.
Miffed;-)
Wonderbar.
A simple description puts the infinite narcissism of the silly thing on display.
@Pods
I have to be politic about the whole thing. I don't and won't have an account for all the reasons you list and more. Old boyfriends have found me any way, God why would I want FB? And people get all bent about answering fast enough and did someone "like" it or not. Who wants to be in that mess? I don't.
But here is the killer for me-- people have hurt feelings that I don't participate. I have been told I am anti-social and that it is hard to understand why I am the way I am by...wait for it...family members. I have been told there is something wrong with me and I don't understand how I am hurting people by not having an account. People (that means more than one) have tried to set up accounts for me and I could, you know, use it or not, or just use it to look at other stuff. If someone wants to share something they will let me know they feel put out because they had to email it to me.
I can't tell you the flack I take on this. I know I am fine that I don't want to be a part of it but I still get treated like I am mean and thoughtless or something. I have no safe place to talk about this because everyone thinks I AM THE ONE who is fucked up about this.
I love my people, but on this one, I am "out there" and by myself.
Haha that's EXACTLY how people have reacted to my absense. I just stopped using my account, didn't delete it. And several people have freaked out, even sent me hatemail telling me I've really "hurt" someone by my absence.
Tell your family that you'll get an FB account and use it if they each get a ZH account and use it.
There are more of us than you know. It is tough when people harp on you, and maybe for the fairer sex it is more difficult to play the part of the asshole, but at least you have some semblance of privacy?
pods
The trick is to be so antisocial that you have no real world friends to bug you about getting FB.
I have tried this and it works quite well. It's now a lifestyle that I wouldn't change.
Lol, Amen.
I teach for a living, I am good at my job, no brag, I have my deep insecurities, but not about that. People think I am an extravert.
When I leave, I need time to myself very badly. I will start to feel trapped and freaked out without it. I can switch on to do the job, but I must decompress afterwards. That privacy you speak of is a must.
I have colleagues getting in all kinds of trouble with stupid posts. Me, I will never say the wrong thing on Facebook. I don't have the account, I don't need to worry about my image there. Life simplified.
I can only be reached by email, for most.
lol. That's me. Even you edit was spot on.
I can present to a packed room of colleagues and work a room afterwards, but I need the decompression time where it's just me and my thoughts.
Work the room is a great way of saying it, make a lecture seem more like a conversation, let them voice your points if you ask the right questions. At times we are downright "in the zone" if I read you right. If we are anxious at first, we ride it and it looks like enthusiasm to the viewer, and then we slide on into being present. Nice to meet another one.
Pegged!
No matter how comfortable I am with the crowd or subject matter, I invariably get an anxiousness for the first 2-3 minutes before I get in the zone. Never fails!
MsCreant,
I responded to you (I think it's way down below), but to add to that:
I really think I confuse people because I am very nice and fun and funny in a group setting, but I don't NEED that. Some people do, but I don't. I prefer to be alone. If I am in a group, then I have a good time, but a little of that goes a LONG way for me.
So I definitely get where you are coming from.
But isn't this part of your miscreant personality, to not follow the usual and standard rules everyone else does? I'm sort of the same way, although I do have a FB account which I use not to display my latest meal or my cat, but to try to provoke thought and sanity in an irrational world. My latest rant is regarding how social media is an easy and quick way to gin up a 'lynch mob' for the cause du jour; recently this was the evil dentist who likes to kill Simba. The vitriol and vile hatred of this man quickly reached fever pitch... it's a scary thing to think that the government could use this power for themselves... and the sheep would all fall in line.
"it's a scary thing to think that the government could use this power for themselves"
I am certain they do. The tech folks need the govt. to leave them alone on stuff. I am sure they cooperate in order to get quid pro quo, or worse, they were all teamed up from the start.
I grew up in a tiny town and if I wanted to find out what my business was, I'd just go to the local post office or trading post and ask. I have no use for FB. I just make an ass out of myself here at ZH.
That is why I took the screen name I took, so I could be a MsCreant and have some fun.
Thanks Ms, I thought I was the only one. ZH is all the social media I need - i seem to fit in with the other misfits here...
I have also thought that it is possible that I get my FB kinds of needs met here, so I don't need it.
Clean & Facebook free for 5 years.
Nobody needs that poison.
Ditto
MisCreant, pods, et al:
Those of us who don't use FaceBook, Twitter, Instagram, and there are several more that I don't remember the names of, are SERIOUSLY disrupting the comfort zones of those who do use them. I don't take as much flak for it as you seem to, but people are definitely uncomfortable when I say I don't have FaceBook. I always say it politely and non-judgmentally, and the response is ALWAYS 100 excuses as to why they DO use social media. Even though I didn't ask. It's like they feel the need to justify it.
I try to joke and say that I'm too boring to use FaceBook, but the truth is I don't want people bothering me. LOL.
I try hard to frame it as "we are different." I really need to get my Zen on, because the other side says "Yeah, you see it as different and we see it as you are not interested in connecting with us." If I get judgemental, it will not help my cause anyway. So I stick with my script, "I am different, not better than you." But damn, their judgement really makes me want to tell them that their shit is trivial prattle and I don't want to be a hostage to responding to it.
I like your screen name. Avoiding all the social media would go a long way towards getting you there.
Have you thought of an avatar?
You're on to something with that "hostage" comment. I really think a lot of the social media is used as a control mechanism. Just tell them to F off. LOL.
I like your screen name, too. I got mine from George Costanza screaming "Serenity Now!" on Seinfeld, LOL. But it suits me, as I try to avoid drama as much as possible. (I don't even have a TV now.) I don't know about an avatar. Probably a sailboat. Or maybe a pic of George Costanza. Hahaha.
The anon avatar is perfect.
Bonzai, Tylers and many of the peanut gallery are instantly recognizable and an opinion is in precog before reading.
I have avatars in the other places I post, but here a bag over my head seems right.
You shoudl feel envious of the guy with 500k twitter followers. That is something you can turn onto real income, just mention drinking a Pepsi or buying a BMW - Money for Nothing as Dire Straits used to say.
relevent song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waNh7s6sOqw
No wonder he has no friends ..... he's a boreass.
Yes, he is British.
But ZH has twitter.
Doesn't have computer. Wife, dog, gardening, holiday.... Does not compute. Does not compute!
When people have to 'forage' for food after the reset, they'll learn some 'people skills' fairly quickly. That is, if they're not summarily eliminated from the gene pool beforehand.
What a dumbass IRL'ing is so 2005
I thought you couldn't do Twitter...Unless you're sitting on the Shitter...
Facebook: Lots of "friends," but no life, privacy, or Liberty.
Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission..
For those that know, it is "FaCIAbook." For those that don't, it's "Facebook."
If my face were a book it would look like the cover of a 1950's dime store novel. So yeah no need to broadcast that to the entire world.
Facenoir.
I like the way chinese say someone is ugly. They use nan kan which translates as 'difficult to look at."
Radioface.
Awesome. I was ultimately chased off Facebook by cousins and other extended family members who apparently had nothing better to do than post the most innane bullshit to Facebook; posts about the sandwich they ate for lunch, the trip they took to the mall. Just absolutely stupid bullshit that other people were apparently supposed to care about. What will these people do when they realize that you can actually go do stuff and enjoy it without telling the world about it.
I got chased off too, not only by the stupid narcissistic bullshit involving "here's a picture of my children/dog/vacation/lunch" and "here's my retarded political opinion" but because facebook seems to boost narcissism and sense of entitlement in real life. I was getting messages like:
"Can you do the calculations for my/my girlfriends MS thesis (50 hours work)"
"Can you lend me money because I'm buying a house/need to pay the rent?"
"I need a place to stay, can I stay at your place?"
Etc etc.
I almost stopped answering my phone as well to isolate me from all this insanity. I don't know what the fuck is wrong with people.
Easy canned response:
"Can your girlfriend take in an 8 inch cucumber without gagging?"
pods
Otherpeoplesproblemsbook.
I have never been to faceplant or twatter and I am ok with that.
Just hope I'll surive!
They have a file on you if you know anyone who has used facebook on their phone and has you in their contact list.
pods
But have you ever done a faceplant on a twatter?
Good times!
Haven't had Facebook since 2009 and I have no social media presence to speak of.
People look at me like I have 3 heads since I'm in my early 30s. I'd rather privacy & less popularity than have to read that drivel again.
With all the biological variants wondering around out there meeting someone with three heads would actually seem refreshing.
LOL, this thread is the funniest one I've read in a while.
What??? Make friends face to face???? That is just so....so....1980's.
I loved the 1980s. Still do. And in case you loved them too, you should listen to Aqua's song...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mTIjA74vHU
I preferred the 1960's, or at least what I remember of it. For some reason things seem a little hazy even though the colors were very bright and kind of 4th dimensiony.
Proud without a facebook and twitter accounts.
Real valueable friends are the ones that you don't contact all the times but still stay strong. You pick up where you left off even you haven't met for months or years. Everytime you meet up again, you talk about the same good old memory and still laugh on the same subject again and again. Your maturity also go back in time to where you build up your friendship.
Real friends are the ones who still exist after all the computers have been turned off.
I don't talk to my extended family anymore----they put a wedding photo on facebook that had me in the background----I'm done with them
I forgot to mention that. I don't talk to several people anymore after they posted photos of me without asking me permission. Facebook seems to have stripped the sense of privacy and courtesy from its users.
Psst..with all the cameras in the UK the GCHQ is probably following you too.
The only friends I have are you assholes here on ZH.
That and gold are all you need.
Wow, only 4 thumbs up as of 9.30. Maybe gold has bottomed
At least you don't have to look at pictures of our assholes.
You'll always know where you stand on ZH
Love you too!
"if you need a friend, get a dog". start with
a virtual dog, it is cheaper and less painful
when they die or pass you on.
.
"QI closes this post with a cite from 1841. The attribution may be questionable, but many embrace the sentiment [SNC]:
As Lord Byron said, ‘nobody need want a friend who can get a dog.’"
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/23/washington-dog-truman/
.
very funny post.
I do tire of cleaning up the virtual dogshit all the time though.
i get that brother, at least real shit
decays in time and is no more.
Oh well, at least he’s not getting bombarded 24/7 with advertisements for gardening tools, swimming pool cleaning services, pet clothing, family vacations, and public speaking classes, like he would be if he actually was on Facebook.
Yeah well I can come right here to get that kind of abuse!
There's a delicate balance between increasing revenue per page view and driving away users thus reducing total page views. ZH is a bit over the top. It's not just seeing the ads that's a problem. The more auto play and animated ads they include the buggier the forum software becomes. It took two attempts to post this because "the system was reset." Let's hope it's only two.
Everybody has ad blocker. But I've gone so far as to keep using the old version of Flash. Since my browser won't run anything without my approval anymore, it's been a great way to avoid 'commercial interruptions.'
And yes, it's hard to resist the constant invitations to 'upgrade' to the latest version of Flash so I can enjoy all the improved features. But at least I don't have to watch anything I don't want to watch.
I am such a social deviant. Facebook probably knows me quite well as one of those pervs who is in their alternate database of people who aren't members.
Anyone else seeing an ad on this page that says "20 Embrassing 'Nooky' Questions Answered!"? How many "Nooky Questions" are there anyway? Are there any that aren't "embarassing"? And who goes on ZH to get answers to embarassing "Nooky Questions"?
Two words: Firefox, Adblock.
But then I won't know the answers to the "Nooky Questions"
Where are my Nooky questions?
What is funny is the more we talk about Nooky, and Nooky Questions, the more Nooky screen action we should pull in for everyone (if I understand how it works). I also crack up when they talk about accepting "cookies" on a website. Should we really take sweets from a stranger and not expect trouble? And in my circle, well, lets just say you can get a cookie (or more) when you get Nooky.
I only give Nooky when I get a cookie!
Lookie, lookie,
They're having Nookie.
The little one just got a cookie.
And isn't the hairy one a Wookie?
No shit. My laptop blows up everytime I'm here. Now apps are spontaneously popping up on my phone. This rubbish needs to end
What worries me about social media is the selfie addiction I see many women developing. They constantly take pictures of themselves and post them on Facebook or Twitter for approval. After a while it seems like they are insane, especially when they take selfie after selfie in public.
Shit, women used to CHARGE for that stuff.
What a world, what a world.
That the word selfie exists is also disturbing.
my cat has a facebook account (to get free shit).
dont ever let your cat get a facebook account. she has joined all kinds of shit. she is now a muslim who follows ferrykan and we constantly fight over sancuary cities and leftist crap. she even uses the same kitty litter that peloise uses....
Your cat will soon be running off to marry an ISIS catfighter, then will come home carrying a litter of
Muslim rebel bastard kittens, with her tail between her legs.
I really hope you had the foresight to have her declawed.
I don't have facebook but I leave all of my curtains and blinds open at all times as well as leaving the lights on at night. I can't understand why my friends who love facebook think I'm crazy.
FB & Twitter are no different than the Romans creating gladiator games to keep the masses preoccupied with sensless Bullshit.
But the Romans didn't stage the games inside everybody's bedroom.
Even though I know there must be Facebook groups devoted to anime and masturbation, it's just not a group activity, y'know?
Fesse-Plouc is so passé. Really, who among your thousands of friends will volunteer help when you announce that you're moving?
Not many, I'm positive they'll all be busy on that specific date.
Just remember, Friends help you move, REAL Friends help you move bodies...
+100 to you. ;)
Sorry friend, I'd love to help you move those bodies. But I live in Australia and it's hella commute.
I take pictutres of fat people eating pre packaged monkey grub and post it to tumblr under the alias chubbychaser
You've left out a class. Facebook hackers who create accounts, photoshop the profile photos, then post hacker symbols: pictures of kitties and bunnies.
I deleted my facebook accounts last year. Now I get more time to troll Zero Hedge. I feel much better now.
If you're trolling ZH, life is good
People on Facebook and other 'social media' suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder. But not the one according to your DSM-IV/V. No, they don't get enough attention so they post the most idiotic things about themselves on facebook in the hope they will get some attention from their 'friends'. And if they don't get attention they get nervous and depressed.
Everybody likes to get acknowledged. That is why we post on ZH as well. But over here you learn something new every day. On Facebook you learn nothing.
I witnessed a few 'friends' in a swimming pool last weekend. They were sitting next to each other for an hour or so, not saying one word but busy with their phones all the time. Just checking if there was a new message or new posting somewhere.
Here is what kids do when they go to a museum: https://www.flickr.com/photos/gijsvanderwal/15893868835
The most stupid of course are people that do selfies, have selfie sticks or that have blue tooth, talking to themselves. If you did all that in the past they'd lock you up in an institution.
No CP, no TV, no FB, no video games. Those are all useless time thieves that can cut into real, productive activity. Being "connected" 24/7 is nothing more than a distraction from engaging in a more meaningful life. I know a lot of people who would give me hell over some trivial issue, but, few bother calling my landline at home to do so.
The internet is a useful means by which to learn useful or practical stuff, and has been, IMO, the greatest invention since the Gutenberg Press. I am always amazed by the fact much of the world's knowledge is now at my fingertips, at almost no cost. No longer should people accept doing something a certain way just because "that's how it's always been done". Unfortunately, I think many have missed that point.