Daily Dose of Common Sense

Bill Gates recently quit Facebook because he had too many friends. He had trouble keeping track of who he actually knew and which friend requests were from strangers. Although you aren’t Bill Gates, you may still have a little dead weight in your Facebook friend list. Here are some ideas on how to annoy those connected to you and potentially lose some friends.

Mundane Status Updates
“Joe Smith is tired.” Yeah, we’re all tired, Joe. Is that the best you can do? Continually updating your friends on all the mundane tasks in your life just may cause a few folks to de-friend you. So, keep it up with such snooze-alerts as “is bored” and “is going to the gym.”

Talk Politics and/or Religion
Politics and religion are two touchy subjects. People have their own opinions and it’s very hard to convince them to change sides. Talking about your views is a possible way to offend a few Facebook friends who don’t agree, especially if you trash the other side.

Take Every Quiz and Share Results
There are thousands of Facebook quizzes, and some are even entertaining. However, your friends don’t want to know which “Sex and the City” character you are or your Simpsons IQ score. If you want to lose friends, then take all the quizzes you can and publish the results each time.

Keep Sending Invitations
Mafia Wars and Vampires may be fun to you, but receiving invitations to them over and over again is just annoying. We realize that getting more people to play helps your score. And, we don’t care. Lil’ Green Patch may be a good cause, but we’re tired of it. So, if you want to annoy your connections, keep kidnapping people and passing drinks around.

Be an Over-Poster
Everyone has at least one or two over-posters on their friend list. These are people who update their status WAY too often and share links and photos galore. Appearing too frequently in your network’s News Feed is a good way to cause “friend fatigue” and get yourself de-friended.

Tag Friends in Unappealing Photos
Dig up those dusty old photos and crank up your scanner. Horrify your friends! Embarrass your family! It is especially helpful to find pictures where your targets have bad hair days, closed eyes, or strange expressions. And, make sure to tag the photos so everyone can recognize each other.

There are many other ways to annoy on Facebook (like over-punctuating your updates), so feel free to suggest some of your own pet peeves.

Photo courtesy of Flickr: jurvetson

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 28th, 2009 at 9:43 am and is filed under Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.