Further conversation on de-friending

I know I’ve blogged on this topic before, but I can’t seem to find the original post at the moment.

What is the point of de-friending?  I’ve maybe only done it once and it was right after I started playing Farmville when I added a bunch of people I didn’t know in order to get free gifts.  I de-friended these people because I have no idea who they are, and I don’t want them accessing my private info.  But other than that, I’ve never had the urge to de-friend someone I actually know.  The closest thing would be not friending someone because I don’t know them that well.

At what point does someone say to themselves, “Hey, this jerk!  DEFRIENDED!”?  Is there something I’m missing here?  I was kinda under the impression that a social netowork was about building a network of people you know, not de-friending people that you haven’t talked to in 2 months.

I probably don’t talk to 95% of my friends list on any kind of a regular basis, but that’s because the fact that we are in a network changes that.  Just because I haven’t talked to someone doesn’t mean I can see whats going on in their life, that’s what the activity stream is for.  It’s like we are talking, just not directly to each other.  I can see that they got a new job, broke up, moved to a new town, and so forth.  It’s passive conversation.

Friday, September 25, 2009 | Categories: Personal, Web | Leave A Comment »