Social Boon, or Social Bane?

Facebook is a strange creation. It's a website for you, about you, by you. It has also been a gargantuan success. So now, with all this success, and the attention that follows, people have been lining up to analyze, accuse and otherwise question the new online social networking sensation.

A quick look at recent news about the website (c.o. Google News Search for "facebook") reveals a wealth of articles. The content of which ranges from the personal drama of the creators and owners of the site, to theories about the implications of the personal drama between users of the site. Frankly, I don't much care about the legal woes, etc. of the multimillionaire creator of facebook. But as a member of the site, I do care about the effects and implications of this particular type of social networking.

I'm not one to bash online socializing - or social networking - as the end of "natural", "healthy" socializing. Nor am I going to write a long piece yearning for the golden days when people just talked face to face, or just talked on the phone, or just didn't use facebook.

However, watching the first generation of online communicators raises certain questions in my mind. The specific concern (question?) I would like to raise today is about self-perception, and the effects facebook may, or may not have upon that.

Facebook is laid out like a combination between older social networking sites, and CNN. Your home page is a news feed, displaying up to the minute stories about you and your friends. Or should I say "friends"? Regardless, no generation in history has had this much access to this much information about the goings on of their friends and acquaintances so easily. And never before has it been presented in this way. Except, perhaps, in the most eccentric of small towns.

I can't help but wonder what impact this presentation has on people. A recent bout of online drama made me wonder if it doesn't inflate the ego; make everything seem like it has more meaning and more importance than it actually does. We're not used to seeing personal information displayed this way. But we are used to seeing important news in a similar way - on the web and with a similar layout.

I don't think that this changes our conscious perception, but rather I wonder if constantly seeing personal information this way gradually leads you to view yourself as some sort of celebrity. Perhaps that gives it more power than it actually has, but it makes the point. People are constantly managing their image, through the profile picture they choose, the applications they add and the status they display. And all this image managing, showing the world only what you want them to see can (at least in the theory I'm proposing) lead you to believe your own facebook press.

Here I think the celebrity analogy is more fitting. When people make Chuck Norris jokes, making Chuck Norris seem awesome, it's funny. Cute even. Bad ass perhaps. Maybe a bit of all three. But when Chuck Norris does it, everyone looks at him and goes, "Shit, he actually believes his own press." I wonder if facebook does the same thing.

I don't have an answer, because I'm not a psychologist (hell, I didn't even take psych courses in university). But the question remains. Does facebook over-inflate our sense of self-importance?

Or am I just a semi-self-aware narcissist with similarly self-centered friends?

Maybe both. Regardless, it probably won't be an issue in the future for one of two reasons. Either facebook and similar sites are a passing fad. Or the next generation will grow up with them, and their expectations will be adjusted accordingly (instead of seeing what was once reserved for the rich and famous, now applying to you and your pals).