"Can I say you're my girlfriend on Facebook?"

ive been told to make friends with Rig0bert Lalo. but i don't know Rig0bert Lalo. who is rig0bert Lalo??

Mine seems to prefer to suggest a) a lot of rock critics b) fashion people c) high school/college alums d) ILXors.

The whole relationship status thing on facebook sucks. Unless you (wisely) remove it from your screen, along with your ladyfriend, it impacts everything.

For instance, if like in my last relationship, your significant other is "not ready" to commit to you, her "single" status attracts all sorts of undesirables while you sit there wanting to wave your hand and go "UH, SHE'S WITH ME, SORTA, K THX".

Likewise, you truly have to have the completely silly conversation hinted at in the title, because if you change your status to In a Relationship with someone specific, and they decline, your status still says "In a Relationship" and theirs doesn't, and you look stupid like you're dating yourself.

Not to mention with some people, it ruins the relationship. No sooner than my last girl and I changed our statuses online, a month later we broke up! All of a sudden the slow pace we were going at, she suddenly wanted us to be at this level that we couldn't possibly have been at (largely due to her inhibitions, but I gave up on the idea that anything she ever did was wrong, everything was always my fault).

Then, two days later, we get back together, but we never updated our statuses on fb again, so our friends were all confused and thought we weren't dating when we were, and then when they finally figured it out, we were broken up, some of my friends didn't find out for a while cuz me and her still hung out for a while (and had sex, which was really stupid of me).

She was dating you but wasn't willing to commit on facebook to a relationship status? What?

And finally the thread title is completely apt!

looooooong story. basically, she had just been dumped by a guy she thought she was gonna get married to two weeks earlier, and had an eye for me, as I did for her, so we hooked up and she wasn't ready to make it 'official'. yet it was kind of dumb - she didn't see anybody else (that I know of,at least).

It was 3 months before she finally changed her status. we dated 8 months but according to facebook, we dated 1. it was ridiculous.

that said, no animosity against her, but just pointing out how facebook messed with us bigtime.

ayo i don't think it's facebook's fault dude

IT HAS A GRIP ON HUMANITY THAT PENETRATES FREE WILL. FREEMASONS ILLUMINATI OH OH OH

The real solution to this "problem" is to not set your relationship status to anything, because the majority of your FB "friends" are probably people you barely care about, and thus they don't really need to know about the vicissitudes of your life life, while your actual friends will presumably be updated on whatever you want them to be updated on about your life when you actually talk to them.

life life --> love life

being that i was a busy guy for much of last year,as was she, we went long periods of time without seeing certain friends on fb, despite the fact that they were our 'good' friends.

everybody knew about her the first go around. not as many people knew as much about the 'get back together' and even lesser knew of the breakup mostly cuz it was around the holidays

life life >>>> love life

80085, the dude probably had YOUR email address in his email account, so that's how FB figured out the connection.

someone accepts my friend request after we had a good chat at a party on friday, then by the time i get round to checking their profile half an hour later they've already defriended me o_O

it's like that song about living in the fast lane, by the eagles

happened to me too,it's annoying, but fuck him/her
xpost

surely no-one's that much of a douche?
xpost guess they are :(

...or maybe you can't do that now..
xpost to myself

You sure they defriended you and didnt just stick you on a limited profile LJ?

(cos for some reason - unless I'm Doin It Rong - you dont seem to be able to tag someone new to a filter as you accept their request, you have to do it *after*, which gives them a short window where they see your entire feed. Sigh.)

They weren't my friend, period. The notification on my wall was gone and the 'Add As Friend' button was active. Very, very strange. Maybe they fucking hate Cardiacs, Irreversible, or really, really long Favourite Quotes

Ah right. Yeah, weird.

not inconceivable.

was it a flirt?

no! was a girl but definitely keepin' it platonic. anyway, some things can't be explained, rich tapestry of life imo

never facebook-friend someone you've met only once imo

wait eight weeks and text her "what's crackin"

never friend request - so if you get one you know they really mean it

actually never facebook-friend someone until they're actually someone reliable in your life imo (or an old schoolmate or a close co-worker)

^^^this is probably gonna be observed from now on, omar's a wise dude xposts and not xposts

dyao that is my normal policy!! except that when i selfbanned i suddenly felt the urge to find+friend a load of ilxors ;) and clearly the impulse hadn't died. plus we can't ALL be the cool ones waiting to be added

what can I say, worked for me!

^^^is clearly not that aloof irl, also plz can everyone bomb him with rq's

people to not facebook friend (beyond the obvious "people i don't actually know")

- girls you met twice
- dudes you met once
- non-immediate family relatives with vastly different takes on politics and society
- co-workers who are at your level or above
- the significant others of friends (unless they add you first...but in that event don't talk to them more on facebook than you talk to your friend...in fact, don't talk to them at all unless it's through your friend)
- old teachers or professors
- bartenders or baristas at bars or coffeeshops you go to, unless they're your friend

people you should consider facebook friending:

- enemies (you can use their status updates against them)
- friends' parents (specifically friends' mothers)
- your significant other's good friends

- co-workers who are at your level or above

This one most important of all. Will never ever ever add current-job workmates of any stripe to FB. Ex-work? Sure, if they became/stayed friends. Workmates, noooo.

everyone at my work facebooks with each other and my super gay boss is always like "did you see my status update last night." i'm not his friend yet though.

ugh, I waited til I left my last job to add the guys I liked. I peeked at a colleague's profile once and they were FB friends with like the whole office, even though they hardly spoke to them in real life. So I thought even if I added the cool ones then others that I don't want to be friends with might start friend-requesting me YES I AM THAT AWESOME

i have friended 2 people. if i don't like someone but have to friend to avoid hurt feelings (or they are olds) i don't mind just putting them on limited. i guess it depends what kind of workplace or what job it is.

This is true I guess. My old workplace, everyone is adding everyone else. Its like some nostalgia trip. 3/4 of them havent worked there in at least 2-4 years, but we somehow all became such a tight knit community everyone's stayed in touch (very odd for a large national telco).

my mom wants me to "teach her about 'social media' like facebook and the twitter" because it might be worthwhile for her nascent landscaping business

UH.jpg

i have to admit once a while ago that I was having a time getting over an ex, and I was just starting to come to terms with things, but hadn't got to the "I'm ready to handle seeing you with other people stage", when I found out there might be a prospective guy.

in a weak moment, i created a fake profile, fake name, said I went to the dude's school, and friend requested him and a buncha other people that went to the school, and I added some anti-Bush pic as my profile pic as bait. like a schlep, he added me, and then I found out what I needed to know.

then I met him for real 2 days later MAKING ALL OF THAT IRRELEVANT. I suck.

I thought you had to have a school's email address to show up in that network, or did you just write in the info page that you went there

Another weird thing here is that I added 3 of them as friends after having a good chat with all 3. One in particular I got on well with (again, platonically). They were all serious, principled, communicative people. 2 of them haven't responded *at all*. I'm beginning to suspect that one of them was sent in on some sort of weird reconnaisance mission, and reported me unworthy. Have never been a paranoid person but Facebook's capable of all sorts.

*reconnaissance, if we're in the business of spelling pedantry

kinda reminds me of the plight of a certain Grant Singer

It's not really plight, just very weird!

never facebook-friend someone you've met only once imo

when I like people whom I've met once, I have no problem friending them. usually it leads to nothing, sometimes it leads to real friendships. nothing to lose imo.

w/r/t women. this has nothing to do with the above except in small part:

- be pleasant and respectful and interested in what they have to say (but actually BE interested, assuming it's interesting...don't fake it, life's too short and you don't want to waste their time or yours)
- don't be a cocky bro, that shit might work to some extent but you're implicitly acting like you own them and if you want to actually respect them you won't do that. cf don't "run game"
- don't be eager, and don't be afraid of being a "nice guy" b/c you can be nice without being a pushover. girls don't mind nice guys, but they do they mind pushovers. you can be nice and charming and that will go a long way
- again, approach them as equals and talk to them like the regular folks they are (with a *conservative* dose of effortless and pressureless flirting) and you will find yourself not worrying about the politics of male/female interactions

regarding this situation:

- leave yourself a little mysterious without being all "I am Mystery", cf. don't add them on facebook after a casual conversation. and if you have a conversation with 3 girls and add all three, it looks weird, like you're a collector. adding just one looks weird because then the one girl feels like she's being targeted for a hookup. adding two looks weird because one will feel insulted. don't add any of them, they all know each other (presumably?) and they don't know you, so best to let the next meeting, should it occur, happen organically rather than via the internet. i would leave it with a handshake and a pleasant, "i hope to see you guys around again" or something similar. i think that adding them as friends on a social networking site just kinda adds them to a very large pile and while you are now connected to them, it's kinda impersonal.

I love when a guy gives me a handshake. It's never awkward.

handshakes are underrated