Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Facebook ka Kamaal.

Has anyone come up yet with a word for Facebook addiction? Well there are some legitimate ones for other web addictions but not specifically for Facebook. This definitely needs its own name. How about faddiction? But what exactly was Zuckerberg thinking when he came up with this idea with his other buddies in their college dormitory? Did he check with people outside Harvard if they were interested in getting in touch with others after having turned themselves into something like sleeper-cells? It's just like the Harvard crowd to think everyone must be looking in the direction they were looking in. Perhaps some of us were deliberately hiding in various closets and the back boards. Maybe we didn't want to come out. Maybe we were ensconced in our own little world and were happy with the world flitting by. Perhaps we were blissfully ignorant and oblivious to the state of others and how they were doing. Maybe just maybe some of us were not interested in sharing and comparing ourselves to others and inducing self-destruction.  Perhaps we believed that Destiny had it all figured out for us and what could a web site with a name like Facebook do to foil our plans for this life and and after-life. This is a classic case of Zee chose not to see. On the other hand, few of us who would've died pining for people we never contacted, FB saved us from this trajectory.


The 26 year old Zuckie baby is the CEO of this great upheaval which woke people around the world enough to be damned forever on his social networking site. Zuckie rests easy in the 35th place on the list of 400 richest people in the USA. Thanks to us suffering fools, Z's wealth has grown 245% to $6.9 billion. He is one of those young entrepreneurs who has breathed the free air of America and allowed that to lift them anywhere they have wanted to go. Along with him are some more lifted dudes responsible for this global phenomenon called Facebook. There are hardly any humans on this planet that have remained un-touched by this social light. Even the hate mongers have been affected by the FB experience despite their unnecessary hatred for the Jewish race on a pure ontological basis. My advise - create something, build stuff, invent tracks of beauty not blow up paths of progress. For such pitiful beings and as one belonging to this race,  Zuckerberg may have single handedly shown better ways of communication and inflecting change. Aren't you on FB - is the new age question. It is with shock and horror when one hears that so and so refused to be a part of the madness or he or she threw this marvelous life line away. You wonder why. Ah well, they're not with the times and like it or not leave them alone and they'll find their way home to Facebook.


On FB, I find people and people find me without looking. I am led by this invisible force to check out Facebook every day. I hear stories about people who live on FB, in fact they are so much at home that Facebook has become the party state. These are people completely committed to the network. Unfortunately even devotion of this kind doesn't tempt Zee to share any of his wealth with any of the FB addicts. And why should he, it's all his after all. I have tried to mark my days as 'FB off' ones but so far the attempts have remained sadly unsuccessful. The genie is out and we are compelled to find out who is doing what and saying what to whom and why. FB has given rise to passions of a kind not seen in a while. Everybody has something to say; most have things to display; there is art, poetry, photography, prose, sightings, sighings and ruminations, and it's all here free on Facebook. The entire human race is discussing politics, economics, global warming or cooling depending on one's political leanings, philosophies, memories, births, deaths, and what not. Revolutions are being planned while protestors are being squashed and Facebook coming under strict scrutiny. While North Koreans may not be aware of FB, the Pakistanis, Iranians and Chinese are definitely looking into throwing a whole bunch of FB friends into prisons and labor camps for at least 10 to 20 years or maybe even a lifetime, that is if the poor souls survive the no-food-no-water-no-air captivity. 


Forget the friends-since-school saga. It is now FB friends time. I have a few friends who are pure FB material. Others I considered friends have been hastily un-unfriended on FB by just a click of this beautiful feature called 'delete'. I am not the only one to experience this strange high from a mere click. I see the 'numbers' of friends running into thousands. How is this possible I ask myself and others. No one knows. I think there may be a semblance to the rat-race occurrence. Could this be a keeping-with-the-jones syndrome on FB as well? All kinds of groups have taken birth on FB. Some exist merely to force others out. Then there are others who take root to flush the ones trying to flush others out. There are groups against humanity and then groups anti-against humanity. Some seriously threatening ones are quickly removed by Zee and his company only to re-surface under different names and threats. The blue logo is everywhere and nowhere is everywhere. This is the largest extended family where everyone knows someone connected to everyone and nobody truly knows anyone. Even junk mail has given up trying to compete with the volume of Facebook replies and mails.  And so the zuckerberg tree continues to grow and bear fruit some sweet and some bitter. However in all fairness, judging by its growth, Facebook is fast on its way to transform itself from a tree to a celestial planet and beyond. It may have to do with its ever evolving and revolving nature.