I still don't get Facebook

[xiphias]

Like, ALL of my cousins have Facebook accounts, so I got one.

I still don't get what it's for, or how to use it.

I also suspect that it's not really designed for folks my age: Lis updated her profile to state that she and I were "practically married", and I thought that was wrong, so I went to re-edit it.

There isn't an option for "ACTUALLY married" -- "practically married" is as close as you can come.

So, according to Facebook, Lis and I are practically married. Which we are, I suppose -- it's just that we're also legally and religiously married, as well.

Comments

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Profile, Edit, Basic details, relationship status.
:)

[cheshyre]

We've done that, but it doesn't affect what's on the friend list.

[paper-crystals.livejournal.com]

There isn't an option for "ACTUALLY married" -- "practically married" is as close as you can come.

Poor people at U Utah, Brigham Young U and Yeshiva U. And of course those who have actually married.

[ron_newman]

I thought you had to be a college student to use this service?

[unquietsoul5.livejournal.com]

Nope, not any more. They have decided to compete directly with myspace and try to draw in some bucks from other sources (like all those people running for president who think they need a myspace, a second life space, a blog, etc. to look cool and gain voters as 'friends').

[nitoda]

I sympathise. I'm getting better at telling people that I don't like Facebook and am happy here at Livejournal though. ;-)

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

I just checked; the options for "Relationship stats" are

single
in a relationship
in an open relationship
engaged
married
it's complicated

So I think you're okay. However, I've seen lots of people on facebook who are "married" to either their best friend or to their profile at another school.

Now, as for the people who are in an open marriage... what are they supposed to say?

[mattblum.livejournal.com]

Now, as for the people who are in an open marriage... what are they supposed to say?

Surely that would fall under "it's complicated."

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Oh, I can state that I am married, but I can't state that I am married to Lis -- I can only state that Lis and my relationship is "practically married."

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

are you sure? When I attempt to change my relationship status to "Married", a box appears into which I can type the name of the person I am married to. I don't want to fool around with this, though, lest it look like I'm married to somebody.

(and I've seen plenty of profiles that indicate the person in question is "married" but none that indicate "practically married", at least as far as I can remember.)

[cheshyre]

My profile shows

Relationship Status: Married to Ian Osmond

But on the friend list, the best it can do is

You have lived together since 1995.
You have dated since 1994 and are practically married.

The one status doesn't mirror to the other.

It's bizarre.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

Okay, I see. There are two seperate places where the status is listed.

You're not the first ones to complain about this.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Well, they're clearly seperate objects.

Each profile is an object, which has characteristics such as photos, and graffiti wall, and status, and so forth. One of those fields is "relationship status". That field in the profile object can hold the value "married"

Each relationship is its own object, which has, as characteristics, two profile-objects, and information defining how those two profile-objects interact. Um. That was really imprecise. I think I mean something more like "has information describing the real-world interactions of the people who are referenced by those two profile-objects."

THAT information set, and THOSE fields, do NOT hold the value "married".

The problem, naturally enough, stems from bad database/object design. The same information is being stored in two different places, and in two different ways. It should be possible for the system to populate the "Relationship" field in the profile from looking at the list of relationship-objects which are the vertices -- although, if I was married to someone who didn't have a Facebook, it would have to create a "virtual Facebook" account to hold down the other end of the relationship-object. And it would have to be smart enough to, if said person DID eventually get a Facebook, transfer the data over from the "virtual Facebook" to the real one.

I mean, that would be the obvious way to do it. I wonder why they didn't?

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Yes. We're talking about different things.

You know how, when you put someone into your network, it asks you how you know them? And your choices are:

Lived together
Worked together
From an organization or team
Took a course together
From a summer / study abroad program
Went to school together
Traveled together
In my family
Through a friend
Through Facebook
Met randomly
We hooked up
We dated

Notice that none of those are "we are married." But it's got "we dated". So you choose "we dated", and it gives you an optional sublist for how it turned out:

went out once
short and sweet
got a little serious
it's complicated
practically married.

So, when I confirmed that Lis Riba was my friend, and went to fill in the details of how we know each other, we could let people know that we've been dating since '93, and living together since '94, and that we're practically married, but not that we're married.

My relationship status, on my profile, does state that I'm Married to Lis Riba, but the relationship details on the relationship between Lis and me only states that we're practically married.

Um.

Okay.

So, it looks like, in Facebook, you've got two basic forms of Objects. One Object is a Profile, which would be a node, and one Object is a Relationship, which would be a vertex between nodes.

The Profile Object has a subfield which is "Relationship Status", and THAT subfield on THAT object CAN hold the value "married."

But then, you also have the Relatioship object, which is an object which points to two nodes, and has fields/characteristics of its own, which describle the relationship between the nodes -- and THAT object, the vertex object, the relationship object, doesn't include "married" in its set of values.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

Okay, I see what the problem is.

Maybe you should contact the facebook people and let them know? I can't imagine it would be difficult for them to add "actually married" as an option, and there are probably more people that would want that option than there used to be.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

If I cared, I might. At this point, it's really just the sloppy data archetecture that bugs me.

[sethg]

Maybe "married" is in the sublist for "in my family" rather than "we dated"?

There's a guy in my shul who introduces his wife as "my closest relative".

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

It's not.

[cheshyre]

But that relationship status doesn't affect what's shown on the friend list.

[unquietsoul5.livejournal.com]

Facebook really is the 'college freshman' turf on the net these days...

and like myspace, it's main competitor (which is designed to handle a slightly older audience) not useful for anything more than a weird form of personal PR rather than anything practical.

I give both of them a wide berth and stay clear of them.

[ron_newman]

As far as I can tell, the main purpose of Myspace is to promote bands. That's usually why I end up following a link to there.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

You might want to read "Viewing American class divisions through Facebook and MySpace", which made the rounds a few weeks ago, if you haven't yet.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I have heard that that was its original purpose, but that it has developed other purposes since then. I don't actually know what those further purposes are, however.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

myspace's purpose is to send me annoying e-mails every couple months when somebody sends me a message through it. every time someone messages me through myspace I have to look up my password, because I don't use it at all.

[babalon-it.livejournal.com]

I actually got calculus help via facebook - I just posted a "HELP?" on my facebook and my friends at school connected me up.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

Bands? I thought it was just phone sex workers.

[autographedcat.livejournal.com]

Well, that's very practical, don't you think? I'd hate to be *impractically* married. That's what leads to the high divorce rate, I'm sure.

I have a Facebook account. I logged into it once, the day I created it, in order to look at a photo someone had linked to that required registration to view. I've never been back, but every so often, I get an email that someone i know has found me and added me as a friend/contact/whatever Facebook calls it. Like you, I have no earthly idea what the site is for. I suppose I should go explore it.

[elisem.livejournal.com]

Somebody told me that Facebook is sort of like blogging for people who don't actually want to blog. Sort of.

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

That analogy seems incredibly bad to me, although I can't put my finger on why I don't like it.

[cheshyre]

Well, it does seem much more visually-oriented than text-oriented.
Or maybe I'm still having trouble figuring out what to do with it. :)

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I feel exactly the same way. I signed up because everyone said it was so great, but I can't figure out WTF it's for or what its point is.

I tried a search for *anyone, anywhere* from the high school class of '82.

I am utterly alone.

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

Not while you have LJ friends.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Heh, that's true! I like it here at LJ with all the other geriatrics over 30. :-)

[gilmoure.livejournal.com]

LJ is for old folks? Nooooo! I'm not old!

[ailsaek.livejournal.com]

Cool, I'm class of '82 too. I'm not on myspace or Facebook, though.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Yay class of '82!

[madcaptenor.livejournal.com]

I just got a link in gmail to married but looking. I can only assume that the gmail computers are reading these livejournal comments and not interpreting them correctly.

[marquisedea.livejournal.com]

yeah...it's basic purpose is so that shallow little numbskulls can cause drama and post pictures of themselves in competition to show how cool and fun their lives are while yours sucks.

how dare my browser spellcheck numbskulls?!?!

[phantom_wolfboy]

The last time I was on Facebook I set my status to "is wondering what Facebook is for". So far, no one has been able to tell me.