<p>As a former facebook user, I understand the appeal of the site: you can stay in touch with friends, keep up with what everyone is doing,etc. I deleted my facebook for a variety of reasons. Mainly, though, it was because I was sick of the blurry line between facebook friends and real friends. I mean, I was facebook friends with people that I could barely recognize or wouldnt feel comfortable talking to in person. I figured that I'd keep in touch with the people that I really care about anyway, and if I needed a social networking site to make the relationship work, then it really wasn't worth it. I've been facebook free for about a year now and its been fine for me. I'm curious as to whether I should reactivate my facebook when I go to college in a year. Is facebook really necessary for college. I'm not a hermit; I want to make friends; I want to be involved in a lot of activities. Does that mean that I should have facebook? So far the response I've been getting is yes, facebook is definately a necessity. I just want to know what you guys think. Preferably, I'd like to hear from current college students that are pretty involved in extracurricular activites, maintain a relatively challenging course load with good grades, have friends, etc.</p>
<p>I think you’re sort of overthinking things. If you just think of facebook as basically an extra email account where you can throw up some pictures and a little blurb about yourself you’ll be fine.</p>
<p>It isn’t really necessary, but a lot of my friends use it to announce parties and things like that. They also usually tell you in person, but sometimes either you don’t see them or it slips their mind or they do tell you and you just forget, and it’s nice to have everything in one place. Most people communicate through email for projects and everything, so it’s not as vital there. </p>
<p>If I were you I’d reactivate it and just not worry about it. Don’t stress out about who your facebook friends are and aren’t, and just use it like a planner/communication device.</p>
<p>Wow, the above poster said everything I was going to say.</p>
<p>Yeah, I also think your overthinking things. It’s just a website and won’t make or break your social life. It’s a good organizer, but its not like you won’t hear about an activity because you don’t have a Facebook.</p>
<p>Why does the “blurry line” matter so much anyway? It’s pretty easy to ignore those that aren’t really your friends. Again - don’t think too hard about it?</p>
<p>Time Magazine says Facebook in college causes a big drop in GPA:</p>
<p>[What</a> Facebook Users Share: Lower Grades - TIME](<a href=“http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1891111,00.html?imw=Y]What”>http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1891111,00.html?imw=Y)</p>
<p>Isn’t the internet great? It allows other student’s parents to tell you what not to do ;-)</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies.</p>
<p>My main concern is basically will I be able to keep up socially without facebook. I mean, I plan on joining forensics, dance team, etc. and if not having facebook means not knowing when practice is, etc. then I’d probably get one. </p>
<p>Another thing is early in high school I had facebook but it was “behind my parents back” and when they found out they got angry. I don’t know if they’d care anymore but I think I’ll talk to them about it.</p>
<p>I don’t think that it is a necessity, but it is nice to have. I also find it faster to get answers about things from my college on facebook because they have an official group and it makes it less awkward than emailing them asking about dorms, cars, etc.</p>
<p>Most activities that you’ll do will have email listservs, so a facebook isn’t really necessary. You should be able to keep up without one if you think having one is going to be that much of a bother.</p>
<p>I know plenty of people who do well enough without it, but many of my party invitations come from facebook, so you might be kept slightly out of the loop if you don’t join. Several of the clubs I’m in mainly use facebook to notify students of random activities as well. It’s also a nice way to keep in touch with those casual friends you meet during class. It has helped me keep in touch with friends who would normally drift off after the semester is over–so I would say that, while it probably has helped my social life slightly, it doesn’t make enough of a difference to matter much.</p>
<p>The easiest thing to do is to only add people you WOULD want to talk to… I think facebook just makes it easier to get in contact with people</p>
<p>One of my friends teachers actually required the students to have a facebook because they had a group for the class where they would have discussions. Strange, but true.</p>
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<p>Well,if Time Magazine says it, it must be true.</p>
<p>I think that’s ridiculous. Everyone I know has done just fine. And besides. If you spend overly large amounts of time doing ANYTHING when you should be studying, your grades are going to drop. Not just Facebook.</p>
<p>If you control the amount of time you spend on facebook, it should be fine. Facebook is most definitely not a neccessity, but it’s useful for keeping in touch with people. </p>
<p>My facebook friends are just people I know, some I know very well and see them everyday, others are simply classmates and others are people from summer camps who I may never see again and others are family and cousins and etc. So I dont really see it as a friends list, its just if I know them and know who they are, then it would be nice to have some way of communicating with them if I ever need to. </p>
<p>I think Facebook is useful for college, you cant really see or call your high school friends all the time, right. Plus its good for photo albums and invitations.</p>
<p>I don’t think Facebook is required to be social.</p>
<p>What did students do before Myspace and Facebook? Just sit in the corner and knit by themselves? If you’re a naturally social person, you’ll likely remain social with our without FB.</p>
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<p>I’d probably include myself and most of my friends in this category, and we all use Facebook to raise awareness about all the events our various organizations sponsor. It’s so nice to be able to make a Facebook event and invite everyone you know (and then send out a reminder message to everyone attending on the actual day). Also I usually post a reminder on my status about events that are coming up.</p>
<p>This has worked really well in the past for events like I Love Female Orgasm and our Planned Parenthood Sex Toy Party–fun, kind of weird things that people want to attend but won’t necessarily know about if they don’t see a flyer.</p>
<p>I have a 3.51 gpa, friends, and a facebook account.</p>
<p>I honestly don’t go on it much, maybe around 10 minutes a day. Its nice to have, a lot of people I don’t actually care about, but its nice to see about certain events, and statuses about people that I am casual friends with… that way I won’t go “How are you and your bf? You’re so great together” when they just broke up. ;P</p>
<p>I don’t think its necessary though. My friend at Dartmouth doesn’t have one. She has friends and does well… but she still procrastinates. As do I. I just don’t procrastinate with facebook. I don’t think facebook lowers grades… but rather procrastination. </p>
<p>I mean my 3.51 is borderline in the article, but I don’t think facebook has to do with my gpa. I’m simply not on it enough for it to change anything… The internet in general does probably lower my grades though. :P</p>
<p>Also if you want to contact someone in one of your classes about an assignment or something & you don’t have their email address, you can find them on Facebook and send a quick message. It’s likely you’ll get a fast response because everyone uses Facebook so much.</p>
<p>No it will not ruin your social life. I don’t use facebook, myspace, text messages, or email to communicate with my friends yet I somehow have an active social life using good old fashion phone conversations.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s a good idea to rely on social networking because once you get out of college, most people find it easier to communicate through face to face conversations or directly over the phone/text. Most of my friends are out of college and over half of them don’t have a facebook account.</p>
<p>Sending alerts via facebook doesn’t sound like a good idea because it isolates those that choose not to participate in internet interaction. I’d say that’s a bad call on the club you’re involved in if their primary means of alerting people is through a website that not everyone has. Email would be more appropriate to be honest. All my extra curriculars communicate through email.</p>
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<p>Obviously we send updates over email as well, but not everyone is subscribed to our listserv. Turnout would be extremely limited if we didn’t advertise on Facebook because we’d limit our audience to only those who have expressed interest in the past. Also, the big flaw in your statement that it’s a “bad call” to alert over Facebook because “not everyone has it” is that yes, they do, actually. You just don’t. haha</p>
<p>“Time Magazine says Facebook in college causes a big drop in GPA:”</p>
<p>obviously, someone (including the people at Time) didn’t take statistics. </p>
<p>It is basically SINFUL to claim a cause-and-effect relationship when using an observational study. Claiming that “having a facebook account lowers your grades” is impossible to conclude from that study. However, it could easily be claimed that the “types of people” that are likely to have a facebook, generally have lower GPAs. big difference.</p>
<p>^^ Hmmmm and obviously I didn’t read the article until after i wrote that… </p>
<p>anyways. seems like the people at Time took statistics. but some others haven’t…</p>
<p>my bad haha</p>