In Barons’s readings about away messages she talked about the “best me” trying to portray the best self image of one self. Personally, have seen away messages, but not of that type. Usually the ones I have seen is just the icon that says your away, or online, or offline. I have not actually seen the type where you can post a message on your away message. However, a lot of the things some of the students said during the study made sense to me. For example, the person who posted the list of things they would be doing for that day or week. It made sense that it was used for a conversation starter, that way they could avoid the usual what are you doing? or what did you do? That persons friends could be updated and maybe if they needed them for whatever reason they could know exactly where they could find them. On the other hand, some people post things like cleaning my room when they are not actually doing that. That can actually go along with the messages that people post saying things like they are out taking salsa lessons, when in reality they are not. They are trying to portray themselves maybe as not lazy, or maybe like they are socially active. Some people do not want to appear boring and they lie. I have a Facebook, and I know I see a lot of people always posting things that makes them look like they are the next great adventures or like they are socially active, or like they always have something to do. Makes me feel like maybe my life is not that exiting. Yet, most time these people are not being completely truthful. They are trying to portray themselves as something else in public, maybe like adventurous, or exciting people. Also, away messages serve as maybe a way to ignore some messages and reply to the most important ones. It gives people the option to be selective and still be available to the people they prefer if they wish to. People have more options to be at two different places at the same time, even if they are really only at one place, but who will know?
7 thoughts on “Blog V- Away Messages”
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I agree with you that there are a lot of people who posts things that are not real just to look great and show off. Don’t feel bad about yourself because if someone have the time to post more than 10 posts everyday that means that they have nothing to do in their lives, feel bored, and want just to get everybody’s attention by saying things that doesn’t exist in real. I don’t feel that I’m not excited person when I see others doing this;instead, I see myself more valuable and more authentic. Unfortunately,lately, the Facebook become like business market where everybody is competing to show how talented he or she is even if they did not have any!
Do you see other similarities between the AIM away messages in Baron’s study, and Facebook status updates? What is the role of humor in these messages?
I definitely see similarities between AIM away messages and Facebook status updates, even more so than Tweets. Despite the Naaman, Boase and Lai article, which found that most Tweets were of the meforming category, I follow people who share information or tweet opinions about topics of interest to me. I would conjecture that a much higher percentage of Facebook status updates are focused on the self than Tweets. There are certainly instances of humor and opinion sharing on Facebook, but a lot of people seem to use it Facebook as a self-presentation platform. It’s less about connecting and staying in touch with others as it is making yourself appear a certain way.
Martha, I know exactly how you feel! Except the thing that gets me is when I see people posting how happy they are with their signifigant other when I myself am single. It always makes me wonder why I am still single. I however always stay positive and generally when I say I am doing something on Facebook, I really am doing it. But there have been times I have stayed home on the weekend but yet I will post on Facebook about how much fun I had simply to make it look like everything was good with me. I do not want my Facebook friends to see me down.
I always think it’s so interesting how people post their schedules online. I think most of them do it to appear popular and busy (while they are complaining about how busy they are). You bring up a good point about their friends being able to meet up with them, too. But every time I see that, I just cringe at the amount of personal info they are putting out online.
I agree that it seems that most facebook posts are happy and upbeat, but why would anyone post when they aren’t having a great time with something. Saying I’m bored and depressed doesn’t leave the door open for anyone to comment and say how interesting. However, saying I’m doing this new fun activity or out and about does leave the door open to comment and agree that that does seem fun and they could get information about it so that they can try it out too. They are social networks, so people will post things that get people to socialize with them.
Yea I guess you are right Erica, bringing something interesting up in a post leaves the door open to socialize. However, there are those who post sad faces or talk about how horrible their day was, or of some tragedy like a family member passing. I think, it had a similar effect because people would comment asking what happened, hope you feel better, I am here for you. Maybe, it would be harder to interact with because there is only so much you can say with something negative or tragic versus something fun and upbeat.