Sunday, September 9, 2012

My Digital Life Rough Draft


November 23, 2007, the day my Facebook life began. It’s weird because I actually remember that night that I was trying to convince my parents to let me get a Facebook and they were very hesitant and skeptical. It was the latest thing so of course I wanted to see what it was like and wanted to try it out. My parents, on the other hand, were very worried it wasn’t safe and didn’t want me to spend all my time on it. It took my parents a lot of convincing but they finally gave in. My little 8th grade self was so excited. I loved adding all my friends and seeing who was going to add me or what notifications I was going to get. I loved everything about Facebook.
I remember back at the beginning of Facebook when there would be different “apps” and games. My favorite was the bumper stickers. I would spend hours finding cute ones and add them to my profile or send them to my friends. Another was Graffiti wall, which was kind of like paint but on Facebook, and you could write little messages on other people’s wall. There were so many things that you could customize you profile and organize it how you wanted. The most resent layout is the timeline, I can go back and see what has happened throughout my entire time on Facebook.
It’s funny to look back through my Facebook and to see how I have changed and my various phases I went through. When I look at all my past statuses in middle school, I say to myself, “what was I thinking?” They were so silly and pointless I don’t know why I would put these things as my status. Even the way I talked is different, I hardly abreviate at all when texting or talking to someone on Facebook.  At one point I loved Picnik where you add words and things to different pictures. I did it to so many pictures that it became a problem. As I look back through my pictures, just in my profile pictures alone, I see how I have changed. At one time I had glasses and braces and looked so young. At one time I remember that I was very concerned with how many friends I had and wanted to make it as many as I possibly could. I wanted to be able so say that I had lots of friends, even if it was just on Facebook. Now I realize how ridiculous that is, its so much better to just be friends with your actual friends and not people you have never spoken to and barely recognize.
 
As I was looking back through my profile I found people that I’m not friends with anymore, haven’t talked to in years and I went back and looked at their profile. I completely forgot that at one time I was good friends with them. It’s very interesting to see how people have changed from how you originally knew them years ago. Its weird to think that times have changed and so have people.
 
In 2004, Mark Zuckerburg started Facebook out of his dorm room at Harvard. It’s hard to believe one guy created a site that now 8 years later over 500 million people are active users. It’s crazy how quick it has grown.  These days’ people of all ages are on Facebook, many grandparents and younger kids are on Facebook. Nowadays it seems like the entire world is on Facebook. When you apply for jobs, that employer is more than likely going to look at your profile and see what kind of life you portray on there. They can get to know almost everything about you in a matter of minutes.
 
I have always been very cautious about what goes on Facebook and how others would see me. I wanted it to be an exact representation of me and not some fake person that wasn't really me. I have always thought about what I put on Facebook could affect me later. I wanted others to know that what they see on Facebook is the real me.
I love Facebook because it makes it really easy to keep up with family that live out of state and seeing what they are up to. Also most of my closest friends went all over for college and Facebook lets me keep in touch and still be part of their lives. Lots of my parents friends like to keep up with me and see my photos as I grow up.


 
 My digital life as a whole has dramatically changed since the beginning of my journey. I have grown up and matured a great deal. To some extent I'm a different person than I was when my social media life began. I have been through many things in my life that I didn't even see coming and have grown from these experiences. I have met new people that I didn't know back then that now I don't see how I ever lived without them. I have enjoyed looking back through my Facebook life over the past 5 years. Im interested to see where the next 5 years take me and looking back on my Facebook life 5 years from now. Seeing where my life has taken me and what I will be doing with my life and spending it with other people I know and love.
 

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