Aha! It's NOT just me.

[gurdymonkey]

Everyone was doing it, you see. So I logged on for the first time. And they said, "Give us all the addresses in your email." So I stopped. Right. There. Visions of spammers and hackers danced in my head like a thousand smirky Hugo Weavings in cheap suits and dark glasses. Friends don't do that to friends. Not real friends anyway.

Then someone who is a rational, intelligent human being - or at the very least, my kind of crazy - friended me.
And somehow I tripped on a root and fell down the damned rabbit hole.  And they asked me to put my home address and phone number in my profile! Sure, that's JUST what I need.

It's weird in there. It's pointless. It's all "Here, play this game," and "Here, I saw this roll of imaginary toilet paper and thought of you." WTF? Two whole people actually asked me how I've been.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2009/04/29/notes042909.DTL

I don't have enough hours in my day as it is.

Comments

[lisa-marli.livejournal.com]

I said the same thing about Live Journal when I joined. :)
Yeah, I joined Facebook, but I already warn people, I don't have much time for games and just ignore all the requests piling up. No, I don't hit any buttons, I just IGNORE them, period. Some times something interesting pops up and I go do that, but I just glance at the list and then go back to reading what my friends are up to.
I still can't figure out twitter, but several things I do use it, so I joined and follow a few conversations.
The Mythopoeic Society does use Yahoo Groups, Live Journal, Facebook and Twitter to communicate with our members. And to encourage our members to communicate with each other. It seems to be helping.
The trick is to not even Try to Read or Do Everything. Just what gets your interest.
And yes, you CAN refuse friend requests. I do on occasion, and I've been refused on occasion too. Everyone is entitled to keep their list as small or as big as they like. And no one should have their nose bent out of shape on how someone else keeps their list. But then again, I've never played status games.

[spearweasel.livejournal.com]

Ditto this. I don't use FB for anything other than the occasional "oh, so that's what you are up to".

No need to take it as seriously as SFGate Energy Vampires guy.