When you meet someone for the first time, whether it is in a club, in halls or on campus, I guarantee you that during some part of the conversation, the following statements will be discussed: "Are you on Facebook" or "I’ll add you yeah?" It renders the idea of acceptance, that you are interesting enough to have someone search for you, find you and then send you a friend request. Although it’s all quite artificial (just because you are friends on Facebook does not mean you are friends in real life), Facebook in itself has become a major cultural phenomenon along with the Harry Potter Series and low rise skinny jeans. Admittedly I was coerced into Facebook by a cousin who encouraged me to join in the summer before I started university, and thought it would only benefit me if I did so. I am aware of the benefits of such a system which has allowed me to reconnect with many people whom I had lost contact with, while also keeping in contact with new friends. It must be noted that Facebook comes with its own complications however, and for this reason I have thought of ways in order to tackle such problems:

Don’t you just hate it when you get a friend request from someone you really don’t know? You don’t have any mutual friends, you clearly don’t recognise the person and you’re sitting at your laptop thinking where did you come from. I always think to myself, seriously, how exactly did you find me? Did my name randomly appear in your head or did some higher being send you on a mission to come and find me? What do you want from me? I assure you there is nothing I can do for you. Except perhaps write an article in the Wessex Scene about how unnecessary you are to my life. In all cases, unless there is a hint of recognition, ignore the request. Do not feel that you have to accept every request you are sent, just so your friend list can increase.

Akin to returning phone calls, or replying to texts, I am useless at replying to messages written on my wall. I usually log in, read my messages and unless it is an urgent matter, I log out in the hope of replying later on in the day. Sometimes this means I won’t reply for days as I forget that people have written on my wall. If there has been about 4/5 days without a response being sent, then new ways of replying must be thought of. Try and start with, "I’m sorry I haven’t replied sooner but...", or "I’ve been so busy recently..." Now if you really don’t want to respond to the person, then just don’t (although this isn’t very nice, unless you have good reason to). Hopefully they will get the message sooner or later.

This shall be short. If you consider yourself a loyal, trustworthy and loving friend you WILL NOT tag friends in drunken/messy/embarrassing pictures. If you do, you clearly do not value your friendships. If you tag me in such pictures, you clearly do not value your life.

Some may disagree with me on this one. For the purposes of this article I clicked on the application while on my homepage. Although I did recognise some of the people profiled, I did also realize that there were people on there that I had never seen before in my life. Just because I have 14 mutual friends with someone does not mean that I know them. If I really want to find someone that I actually know, or have at least spoke to, then I will find them myself and add them. Simple really.

Let’s remember that Facebook is a fad, and take it for what it is. A clever idea, made by a clever American who is now very rich.