Stalking 101

When I first registered for Facebook, I knew almost nothing about social networking. I joined because one of my girls insisted on me joining this social network that had become a global phenomenon; so I signed up. I didn’t even have more than two profile pictures for the longest time because I hardly went and checked on what was happening there. I was mostly confused so I opted to observe for a little while. The mind-fuck was in that I only had people I knew personally as friends, and so when I saw other people inviting me who were friends of friends, I always asked them how they knew so and so. I remember how Lesego Mmusi once responded to me and said: “I’ve never met Flo Mokale…he’s just on my friend list”, this after I accepted his friend request on the basis that Flo was our mutual friend…alas!

Five years and more than 1000 “friends” and just under 50 photo albums later, I’m back to being mostly a spectator on Facebook. I’ve had one public relationship, of which I disclosed very little about on that network, and I made a lot of friends in these past years. I was even “discovered” by people I hadn’t seen since High School, and some as far back as Primary School. Facebook had its fair share of fun times, what with my flirtatious ways having landed me in hot water over a man I cyber-dated for almost a year. Like most things that fail to capture my attention, I got over it. I’m on Twitter now.

Well, I’ve been on Twitter since 2009 and technically only started tweeting a year later cos once again, I had to observe how this 140-character social network operated. The day I got the hang of Twitter, all hell broke loose. The world suddenly got even smaller than I had imagined it could be. All the people I admired in the entertainment industry were there. It felt like I was a part of their thoughts and daily habits. Everything seemed to be easily accessible. My thirst and love for all things interesting was being quenched in 140 characters. That was powerful! Having had conversations about nothing and sometimes something with artists I’ve been listening to and never thought would be part of my personal life (even for a few minutes) was just insane! I loved THAT more than anything. You could ask your favourite producer about a beat and any artist about their lines and you’d get a response…well, sometimes (if you’re me, you get a response :-P). The best thing about Twitter however is the immediacy of news. I’ve watched so much TV via Twitter that you’d swear I spent too much time in front of the box. This probably put a lot of tabloids out of business for a little while because celebrities were able to, with their 140 characters, dismiss fabricated articles. But then like almost anything that thrives under spotlights, these very celebrities came back and filled page 3 of daily papers with all the drivel they shared in their unprotected tweets. (Protected tweets kind of defeat the purpose of Twitter…)

Anyway, here’s where the limitations annoy me: people tend not to use their real names on Twitter. I don’t know if this is to further hide behind their tweets in order to bully other children or if it’s to keep a safe distance away from their partners who would possibly frown upon their flirtations and derogatory tweets that are submitted in the name of being mischievous and/or cool. Whatever the reason, it’s annoying! Especially when I have my eyes set on someone whose profile gives almost nothing away. Google can only assist so much, you know *sigh*?

This is where the combination of Facebook and Twitter is an absolute winner. Facebook has people’s history and more info than a congested bio and tweets can offer. I can literally probe profiles and click through photos to my heart’s content (provided that those Facebook profiles are not protected), until I’d feel like what that person was willing to share on the public platforms had further stirred enough curiosity in me to want to get to know them on a personal level.

Social networking has handicapped me into believing that I can get to know people without them having to feed me any information, directly. We share so much of ourselves on these networks that we don’t realize when sharing becomes over-sharing; right down to the photos that we post and revealing the state of affairs that we live under. All these things add up to anyone being able to piece a whole picture of you without you having conversed with, let alone met them.

There really isn’t any prophetic reason for this post. I’m just annoyed at not being able to Google anything further than the twitter handle of someone who grabbed my attention. And if you know me well, you'll know that I hat enot knowing things. Curiosity is a cat that needs to be skinned, and I'll gather the patience of an ugly virgin in my quest to find out more about this man, shears et al in hand.