Unfriending: One key to a minimalist social experience

[Daniel E.]

Unfriending: One key to a minimalist social experience
by Leo Babauta
November 17, 2009

Although I can't claim to have mastered this technique yet, it's something I've been considering and I thought I'd throw it out there for discussion. The technique is "unfriending," which was the New Oxford American Dictionary's Word of the Year for 2009 (actually it was "unfriend").

Why is this important to a minimalist? Because some of us would like to participate in the emerging social web of Twitter, Facebook, blogging and the like, without being overwhelmed by the huge stream of information that's almost inevitably consumed when you participate.

The trend seems to be to follow or "friend" thousands of people, regardless of whether you know them or not. I'm guilty of this: when I signed up for a Facebook account, I began to automatically add people who made friend requests, and ended up with well over 1,000 friends -- most of whom I don't know. On Twitter, I began to do the same thing, but recently began to unfollow people I don't know, probably offending a few people in the process.

The trend of following lots of people has its pros and cons -- one of the pros is that you get to know more people than you normally would have. You also spread your influence and have your content spread more widely, if that's something you care about.

But the con is that it's hard to keep up with so much social information. Another con is that the relationships you do form become necessarily thin and superficial, because you can't form deep bonds with thousands and thousands of people.

And so, consider unfriending or unfollowing people you don't know. Or at least know of -- it's fine to follow someone whose content interests you, if you keep that within reasonable limits.

Here's what happens. When you unfollow or unfriend people, you might offend them. But you'll also greatly simplify your incoming stream of information, and be able to actually closely follow the updates of the people you are friends with.

And even better, you'll start to have some real conversations, and form real relationships.

I don't know what a good number of friends would be, but I'd guess it would be in the dozens -- definitely below 100. I'm not there yet, as I said, but it's something I've been considering.

Unfriending might offend people, but it's greatly liberating.

 

[Daniel E.]

From a related article in the New York Times:

As social networking becomes ubiquitous, people with an otherwise steady grip on social etiquette find themselves flummoxed by questions about “unfriending” people: how to do it, when to do it and how to get away with it quietly.

“If someone with more than 1,000 friends unfriends me, I get offended,” said Greg Atwan, an author of “The Facebook Book,” a satirical guide. “But if someone only has 100 friends, you understand they’re trying to limit it to their intimates.”

Mr. Atwan, a recent graduate of Harvard (where Facebook got its start), recommends culling your friend list once a year to remove total strangers and other hangers-on. Keeping your numbers down gives you more leeway to be selective about whom you approve in the first place, he said.

Too Many Online Friends? Time to delete

 

[SilentNinja]

i really really HATE social networking sites, people now seem to have the need to tell everyone what they are doing ALL the time, These sites make me very angry, i deleted everyone i know, and to be honest i would rather be alone now.