See, thing is, it's not that it made me annoyed or anything, what this post did was remind me that a particular time, a better time, in "technological history" is over you might say and this young woman's post, and in particular, everyone commenting, made me realize that these people have no idea! Believe it or not, there was a time back in the early days of social networking sites, late 2003 to 2005ish, that getting random messages from a man or woman (likely depending on one's sexual preference) was considered completely normal & fun. From my recollection, as well as many of my peers at the time, all of whom aged in the range, from their late teens to late 40's, and from all walks of life too. And yes, "Facebook" was around, but it wasn't even close to the giant it is today. In fact, it was around back then that I started my first FB account, I started it, and then didn't touch it for a couple years... I'll get back to that. Maybe.
Anyway, for most of us back then, it started with a little site called "Friendster". I'd first overheard my room mate, Scott talking about it. It had become the rage among the "who's who" in the main social circles in Santa Cruz, CA and was spreading like Ebola throughout the Bay Area, so much that it's servers were having trouble handling it's popularity! Rumor was, and I don't know if it was true or not, that you needed an invite from another member to join. I was hanging out with these two girls Christa and Lindsay pretty regularly at the time and Lindsay was on it and "secured our invites". Once I was in, my room mate Scott, showed me how to navigate it, and it was on! Not too long afterwards, I received my first message from my first "stranger", and it all took off from there. We would find our friends, or would just casually just "browse" peoples profiles that looked interesting, and if we liked what we saw or read, we'd send one another a friendly message, and often times got a friendly response in return! I cannot (for the record, I was sober, doing the 12 step thing, so memory's not in question) recall a time that I EVER got a negative response or got accused of being "creepy". I know these days, I'd likely get reported....
That's what I'm trying to say, back then, social networking sites and for those of us that used them, things were different, it wasn't what it is today, and I should also mention, they weren't dating sites like OKCupid or Match either (not that people didn't "hook up", that definitely happened!), it truly was a unique experience, which was why it was so appealing back then. Sadly, I don't think I can truly explain it to anyone who didn't experience it back then to truly understand, I'll probably just end up sounding "pervy" to your average Millennial Generation user the more I keep trying, so I'll just leave it at that. As I mentioned earlier, "Friendster" just wasn't able to handle it's popularity, it's servers couldn't take the load and it became just frustratingly slow. Then came "Myspace"...
"Myspace" came just as everyone was at their wits end and saved the day! I'd guess within a two month span, everyone on "Friendster", packed their shit and migrated over to "Myspace", whose servers not only could handle the load, making it much faster, but if you knew anything or anyone with some html. coding knowledge, you could do some pretty cool customization stuff to your page! It was still the whole fun, cool, way to meet new people thing that "Friendster" was, only better! I can honestly say that I still have a handful of friends left on my current "Facebook" page today that I met that way. I mentioned meeting more than a few women locally back then, also I even met two that actually purchased plane tickets and flew out to visit me, one them, I still keep in touch with today! And the messages I would get from women, although random, they weren't what I would call "weird" or "out there", They were usually just friendly, "Hello, I'm , _____ etc. etc." the "out there" stuff came later after I got to know them better, haha! but it was all good, we were adults, we were having fun with new technology and we weren't tripping out on it and taking shit WAY too seriously like what was to come... Basically, what I'm trying to say, is the first couple years of social networking sites were awesome! A lot of fun, and those of us that used them, naturally, we took what we had for granted, and like what happens to most good things, sooner or later, it was discovered by the Powers That Be as "a powerful marketing tool with enormous potential" (and they were right)and they introduced it to the masses, and worst of all, it was discovered by the "youngsters" and That. Ruined. Everything....
I'd guess around 2005, is when the high school age kids discovered "Myspace", that seems to be the year when the party seemed to end so-to-speak, at least from my recollection. That's when "Myspace" introduced the "private profile" option, and you started reading/hearing ridiculous stories in the news about "child predators on the social networking, "Myspace", which was completely overblown. What it actually was, in my opinion was the rise of the "Myspace Whore", which was basically a 13-16 girl (though her profile says she's older), with literally thousands of online "friends", that was constantly posting selfies of herself while scantily clad, in suggestive and provocative poses, while often times her loving parents being completely unaware of all this, or that their little angel even had a "Myspace" account, or that "Myspace" even existed! So you can imagine the chaos that erupted when the proverbial cat was let out of the bag... In just about all cases, the actual truth eventually was revealed but the damage was already and done, and the good old days were definitely over.
SO "Myspace" had it's reign for a few years, having it's technological hand in a little bit of everything, over-saturation in just about everything including music, videos, was even responsible for creating a few awful social media celebrities, it was fucking ridiculous! However, "Myspace", eventually got just to be too carried away with the html. coding and the customization, basically spreading itself much too thin, and I got to the point to where I couldn't stand to click on anything anymore, cause I got sick of having to turn off my computer speakers so I wouldn't have to listen to someone's shitty taste in music. I was officially "over" "Myspace". Then I remembered, that I had a "Facebook" account that I made back '04 that when I started it, was so basic, I wasn't even sure what to do with it so I just left it alone. I went and checked it out, and yep, still there where I left it! So I started filling out the profile info. I liked how nice, quiet and BASIC it was... Over the course of the next few weeks I started noticing activity on "Facebook". I was starting to get "friend requests" and other notifications, which lead me to suspect that I wasn't the only one who'd had about enough of "Myspace".
At this point, I've had a "Facebook" account for approximately twelve years now, although that original one, I disabled about a year and a half ago after going into "exile" (you can read about that in one of my earlier blogs if interested), My current on, I'm much more selective about who I add to it and follow and have really no interest in collecting the 900+ "friends" & personalities that I managed to acquire on my previous one. These days there's also no shortage of social networking sites out there on the web, they're a hot commodity these days, and there's one for just about everyone. At this point in my life, I'm not getting as much out of sites like "Facebook" as I used to, but I don't foresee myself getting rid of my account either, although I do have most of my less that 150 friends (at the present time) on "unfollow". I've noticed that I'm becoming more of a "Twitter" person lately, and I tend to gravitate more toward sites that none of my usual friends aren't on (yet) just cause they're more interesting, and it's not the same rambling nonsense about the same bands/politicians/"insert pop culture reference" you read or hear about constantly. Even for me, it's not the same, and just typing this line right at this very moment is sort of an epiphany when I realize how much my own attitudes have evolved on the subject over the course of the last 12 years, not to mention my original point when I first started putting this blog together, even more interesting than I originally thought! Go fucking figure...
