Facebook Friendship = License to Cyber-stalk

I've been on Facebook for around four years now.  It's always been a big vacuum of time:  hours spent starting groups and cyber-stalking friends instead of studying or working on a paper that was due.  It's still a pretty big vacuum of time, and seems to becoming even more so as more people join and I gain more and more "friends".

I think it's because Facebook is like email on steroids.  Myspace is, by the way, like email on meth.  I don't use Myspace.  

Facebook allows you to not only message friends and family members, but to see what they're into, look at their photo albums, scroll through pictures that have been posted of them, write on their walls, read what others have written on their walls, see what they are doing right now, write a comment about what they are doing right now, read what others have said about what they are doing right now, join a group, make a group, see what groups your friends are in, invite friends to an event, look at events your friends are going to, look at events you went to in the past, post your own photos, tag yourself in other peoples' photos, post videos, notes, articles....  And then there are the applications.  You can rate your friends, you can take quizzes to see, for example, which State you are, you can operate a small farm, play games, pass drinks, give virtual gifts, maintain a virtual bookshelf, become a zombie...or a pirate...or a ninja.

Then, somewhere between hours three and four of cultivating your small farm, uploading some pictures of trees you took last weekend, and reading the walls of people you may have gone to grade school with you realize:  why do I care?  Why do I waste literally hours looking at pictures of people I don't even know that well or haven't bothered to talk to in years?  Why am I taking this quiz to see which cocktail I am?  Why do I obsessively change my status to reflect that I'm tired or bored or don't want to go to work?  

And that's when you realize:  Because you can.  And, because it's a more efficient way to share with everyone than those stupid surveys people used to mass email or post to Myspace.  Also, it's an easier way to share pictures than email or even Flickr.  Facebook offers something nothing else does:  a one-stop shop for all of your social networking needs.  

Just be careful, it is addictive.