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MINARET
Facebook Addiction Keeps Students Wanting More [From Front, Addiction] schools and companies are forced to limit accessibility to Facebook because some people seem to be unable to perform other tasks if they have access to this online social network,” said Howard-Payne, a lecturer at South Africa’s University of Witwatersrand. “While Facebook is often a great way of maintaining both social and professional relationships, it seems to take on a destructive force with certain personalities.” Ultimately, what is it that makes the website so addicting? Facebook is available 24/7 anywhere the Internet is accessible. Because of this, it is easy to be distracted and even obsessed by its constant availability. Chatting with friends in the comfort and privacy of home adds a convenience factor, combining the opportunities to relax and socialize in one place. A More Productive Fix Launching and maintaining a Facebook presence may seem attractive, but sometimes students use the social networking source to a point that it negatively affects their education. “Facebook addiction is not healthy,”
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Checking Facebook multiple times a day has made users obsess over their profile pages.
Paine said. “What good are you doing for yourself, and what are you accomplishing [when being addicted to Facebook]?” Paine advises students to consider these questions the next time they find themselves choosing between the computer and the textbook- with hopes that Facebook addicts find a more productive “fix”. Josh Napier can be reached at joshua. napier90@gmail.com.
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Facebook Stalking: More Common Than You Think The Five Types of Stalkers to Look Out For Online
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By KRISTI MARSILLI
Every time I sit down at a computer I have a routine. I turn the computer on and then sign into Facebook, even if my class starts in 20 minutes. I always have the justification, “I’ll only be on for two minutes.” Then 25 minutes later, I’m late for class, but I’ve managed to find out the kid’s name that sits beside me in that class, who he is dating, how long they’ve been dating, his favorite TV shows and that he attended the same party I did last weekend. My first question to my fellow creepers was what constitutes stalking on Facebook? Facebook stalking is a gray area that is defined differently by everyone. I discovered that Facecreepers come with different intensities; five to be exact. The five levels are the Casual Creeper, the Consistent Creeper, the Conniving Creeper, the Cool Creeper and the most dangerous and dedicated, the Ex-creeper. The first category of Facebook stalking, the Casual Creeper, is the most innocent of the creeps. Facebook was designed to “keep in touch” with friends, family and coworkers as well as “networking,” so of course looking at the mini feed for updates on your friends is normal. Even the sporadic “Liking” of a post or picture is fine. But that’s about as far as the Casual Creep will creep. Moving up with intensity of stalking will be the Consistent Creeper. This person will say “Happy Birthday” to their close friends every year, actually clean out their Inbox and event invites and will update their status and comment on someone else’s. Again, innocent, they are just keeping up with the buzz. The Cool Creeper is a deceiving a name but fits the actions of these people. They tend to have pictures in bikinis and bars. The Cool Creepers are going out of their way to find these pictures and they’ll judge someone for what they have to show. Some would call this stalking while others might call it research. The second to highest level of Facebook stalking is the Conniving Creeper. This individual is going to ‘Like’ or comment
every single wall post, picture, status update, event confirmation, info change and friend acceptance. Don’t worry, they won’t stop there, now you are on their radar. Next they will click on you and go straight to your pictures. If you have several pictures with someone of the same sex they will assume that is your best friend. If you have several pictures with someone of the opposite sex (and your ‘sex interest’ indicates you are straight and your ‘relationship status’ is single) the Conniving Creeper will assume you and this person are hooking up and one of you doesn’t want to admit it. Just remember, it’s not official until it’s on Facebook. Most of these gossip queens will have alternative motives when they stalk someone out. “My friend that is in a sorority friended everyone in another sorority and started acting like the were friends until they thought she was actually in that sorority. Now, she gets all the dirt on this sorority and her sorority can plan accordingly to sabotage,” said Steph Roland. The final and most extreme of our
creepers is without a doubt, the ExCreepers. These people should have some sort of detective certification for the information that they can uncover. These ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends will be very consistent with their stalking. Log in times will multiply any Conniving Creeper’s and the depth of information they will go through is more research than most people will do for a thesis paper. They will do pretty much anything to make sure that they are happier and cooler than you are after the break up. This could get very ugly and keeping your password secrete is recommended. Facebook doesn’t make it difficult to stalk someone. Especially after introducing their newest iPhone app, Facebook Places. This application will be able to tell anyone exactly where you are if you’re signed into the application as well. Facebook stalking is what our generation does. It is our job to control which category we fall under and which ones are become victims of. Happy Creeping! Kristi Marsilli can be reached at kmarsilli@spartans.ut.edu.
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Don’t worry, they won’t stop there, now you are on their radar. Next they will click on you and go straight to your pictures.