Laura and Lauren

Keep your friends close and your enemies on a list

If you have enemies, do you need to write them down on a list? I think Sheldon Cooper would very much like this…

‘It used to be that only presidents had a list of their enemies, and if you were on it, it was a kind of a badge of honor - as long as you didn’t mind having your tax returns regularly audited.

Newsman Daniel Schorr was reading President Richard Nixon’s enemies list during a live broadcast when he came across his own name. Actor Paul Newman said he considered his inclusion on that list one of his greatest achievements.

“If you don’t have enemies, you don’t have character,” Newman said at the time.

Now everybody can join in the fun of making enemies.

A new Facebook plug-in called EnemyGraph allows you to keep a list of your “enemies” along with a list of your “friends.” Both terms are badly abused by the social network site, but they are easier for the simple folk to understand than “dissonances” and “affinities.”

The application was developed by a researcher and two of his students at the University of Texas at Dallas, and it already has many thousands of users. Its motto is, “What are you waiting for? Go make some enemies!”

“We give them (Facebook) a couple of weeks at best before they shut us down,” said the professor, Dean Terry, in a post online. He said they were simply looking for a way to “broaden the conversation.”

If, for example, a Facebook friend has made an enemy of your favorite band, you will receive an alert. At which point, I supposed, you either have a good laugh together or you toilet-paper his house. Your choice.’

Flakey Friends App Publicly Tags Unreliable Friends

Oooo - harsh or just a bit of fun?

Flakey Friends, a new mobile application that allows users to publically tag friends who “flake” on them, has officially launched in the iTunes App Store. This unique social app integrates another part of users’ social lives in a fun way by allowing users to openly and publicly tag friends that flake on them for any reason. Jerome Payelle, entrepreneur and Flakey Friends app creator, grew tired of unreliable friends who were frequently late, if they showed up at all. His frustration with his own flakey friends, coupled with his technical knowledge, led him to create Flakey Friends.

“I wanted to create a fun, interactive app that would utilize social media to hold friends accountable,” said Payelle. “Everybody has at least one friend that falls into the flake category, and with the Flakey Friends app, we believe users will not only enjoy tagging their own flakey friends, but will have fun avoiding getting tagged themselves. Flakey Friends is a lighthearted, fun app that also serves a purpose.”

Flakey Friends allows users to sign in on two different social networking sites: Facebook and Twitter. The app will then prompt users to type in a message, or select a pre-populated message such as “did not show up” or “flaked on me at the last minute!” by tapping the “comments” button.

When users are done typing their message, they are then able to select a flakey friend to add from their contacts list and report them. Reporting a flakey friend posts a status update to Facebook and/or Twitter that includes the message, along with the flaking friends’ name.

“Flakey Friends is not only fun, but it’s an incredibly simple app to use,” said Payelle. “With a touch of a button you can tag flakey friends and hopefully encourage them to be less flakey in the future.”

Flakey Friends is currently available for download on iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch in the iTunes App Store for $0.99.

Why real friendships are so precious

An article in The Express today discusses how different real friendships are to those developed only through social networking - something that we are all becoming much more aware of. Here are a few chunks, but click the link to read the whole article:

‘I’m too busy to spend time with the friends I’ve known and loved for 20 years or more. I’m beginning to think we’re all in danger of becoming friend-blind to the point where we can no longer tell intimates from acquaintances and colleagues from our confidantes.’

‘Once “friends” numbered the small group of people you’d known for years. They were those who could recall the day you fell out of a tree, aged nine, or how you cried all night over the class Casanova when you were 14. True mates have seen you through university or first jobs, heartbreak, weddings and childbirth.’

‘The rules of intimacy have also altered dramatically. Now 300 people can “like” the scan of your unborn baby whereas 10 years ago you’d have shared it with maybe two close friends and your mum.’ 

‘They don’t know us and we don’t know them, so this kind of fragile “friendship” can be derailed by the slightest knock…It’s friendly but it’s not friendship.’

‘While social networking is fun, colleagues can be kind and acquaintances are entertaining don’t confuse them with the real deal. It takes years to make a genuine friend and while we may occasionally be irritated by each others’ flaws we’ll never be shocked or disappointed by an online revelation because we know it all already.

Most importantly, in true friendships there’s never any need for a “block” button.’

Top 10 ways to ditch that annoying friend

Just in case you need a few new techniques to dumping the ‘Flabby Friends’, here are some thoughts from DNA India…I do think these are really, really mean and should probably only be used in very dire circumstances…

Laura

1 The royal ignore: Look through him/her whenever he/she comes towards you. Chances are he/she might just stop bugging you after all.

2 Play their game: Find out the pet peeves of the person you want to get rid of and live up to them! Give them a dose of their own medicine. Be sure to annoy the daylights out of them and pretty soon they’ll be wanting to get rid of you.

3 Stop communicating: Block the friend on your chat. Stop replying to his/her texts, mails or answering calls. Be incommunicado. If you bump into him/her, say you never got those calls. It will drive the point home.

4 Flirt: Hit on his/her partner in front of him/her and flirt openly. Your friend will see green. Trust us, this always works. He/she will never want you to tag along when partying or otherwise.

5 Steal the thunder: Be the centre of attention when you’re with his/her friends. Steal the show, make him/her envy you. An easy way to rid of anyone.

6 Gossip: Say mean things about the person behind his/her back and tell all of that to people who will pass on the message to the friend eventually. You’ll be the bitch, but the trick would work anyway.

7 Rule his/her life: Take over his/her life — decide what your friend should wear, who he/she should date, how he/she should behave in public, walk, talk etc. Annoy the hell out of him/her.

8 Ridicule: Whenever you guys are in a group, make fun of him/her. Always. Make it a routine. If you do it every day, the person will know you have an agenda and avoid you.

9 Find a friend: Hang out with other friends together. The person may become friends with the people you hang out with or will just leave you alone. Either way, you win.

10 Be upfront: Just let it out. Say you guys can’t be friends because your sensibilities don’t match, so it’s time to call it quits.

Facebook tool demotes ‘Friends’ to just being ‘acquaintances’ - and it even suggests who might be ripe for the chop

So it looks like Facebook might be a little bit mean…
This new tool helps you to sort out people into an Acquaintance list by making suggestions of people you would like to hear less from. Some are saying that this is Facebook’s way of trying to prevent the Unfriending Trend we mentioned earlier on the blog, but I just think, if you don’t want to hear from someone, why stay ‘friends’ with them at all?

I also like the way The Daily Mail likes to brand the people being added to the list as ‘victims’ - seems like quite a dramatic word really when they won’t have a clue… ignorance is bliss and all that.

Oh well, another morally complex addition to the world of Facebook - what are your thoughts? Below is the article.

Laura

Site now suggests friends to ‘demote’
Users see fewer posts from ‘acquaintances’
Victims will never know their new status, says Facebook

Facebook has unveiled a new tool which lets you demote ‘friends’ to just being ‘acquaintances’. The tool actually suggests friends who might be ripe for the chop - based on people who you haven’t messaged or interacted with for a while.

Once a friend has been ‘demoted’, you see fewer of their posts in your news feed - but they’ll never know of their new, lower status.

‘Last autumn, we introduced the Close Friends and Acquaintances lists to help you see more posts in news feed from your close friends, and fewer from acquaintances you don’t know as well,’ says Facebook engineer Jonathan Coens.‘Today we’re announcing a tool to make it easier to add friends to your Acquaintances list.’

The tool works like a negative version of the ‘suggested Friends’ the site occasionally offers.

When you visit your Acquaintances list (next to your Friends list) a new option pops up - ‘See All Suggestions’. The friends on the list are people who Facebook suggests might belong among your acquaintances instead. 

Coens is keen to emphasise that the victims will never know what’s happened. ‘When you add friends to your Acquaintances list they won’t be unfriended or notified. You’ll just see fewer of their posts in news feed.

Schools ban children making best friends

Oh dear. No more Best Friends at school. Silly or a good way to protect children’s feelings?

TEACHERS are banning schoolkids from having best pals — so they don’t get upset by fall-outs.

Instead, the primary pupils are being encouraged to play in large groups.

Educational psychologist Gaynor Sbuttoni said the policy has been used at schools in Kingston, South West London, and Surrey.

She added: “I have noticed that teachers tell children they shouldn’t have a best friend and that everyone should play together.

“They are doing it because they want to save the child the pain of splitting up from their best friend. But it is natural for some children to want a best friend. If they break up, they have to feel the pain because they’re learning to deal with it.”

Read the rest of the article here.

Have a lot of Facebook friends? You are probably up yourself

Something we probably all suspected but now it’s official! So how many Facebook friends do you have?!

CONFIRMING the suspicions of many social media sceptics, researchers have established a direct link between the number of friends a person has on Facebook and the degree to which they are a narcissist.

A study published in the journal, Personality and Individual Differences, found people who scored highly on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory questionnaire had more friends on Facebook, tagged themselves more often and updated their newsfeeds more regularly.

The study also found narcissists were more likely to take offence to derogatory comments about them and also changed their profile picture more often.

A number of previous studies have linked narcissism with Facebook use, but this is some of the first evidence of a direct relationship between Facebook friends and the most “toxic” elements of narcissistic personality disorder.

The research comes amid growing evidence that young people are becoming increasingly narcissistic and obsessed with self-image.

The researchers, from Western Illinois University, discovered two social factors of narcissism - grandiose exhibitionism and entitlement/exploitativeness.

Grandiose exhibitionism (GE) is characterised by ”self-absorption, vanity, superiority, and exhibitionistic tendencies” and people who score high on this aspect of narcissism need to be constantly at the centre of attention.

The entitlement/exploitativeness (EE) aspect includes “a sense of deserving respect and a willingness to manipulate and take advantage of others”.

The research found the higher someone was to score on aspects of GE and EE, the greater the number of friends they had and the more likely they were to accept friend requests from strangers and seek social support.

Better Friends Please

I don’t know about you, but my life feels rather hectic at the moment. I always seem to have a million and one things on my mind so am beginning to wonder why am I on the quest for more friends. If you have more friends, does that make you a more interesting person?

Well, I really hope not.

Being by myself I don’t mind so much, I quite like my own company and am not desperate to spend every spare minute with another person. But when I am with other people i’d rather they be people I like and ones I can have a decent conversation with. Superficial friendships do not interest me, they are a waste of time and more often that not just generally frustrating. So I see no point to them. I don’t believe that a meaningful friendship will spring from a superficial groundwork. I’m sure I have a few of these lurking around already, most of us probably do, I just want to try my best to not actively encourage new ones. 

I understand that deeper, more meaningful friendships are hard to find to come by, they are no different from romantic relationships in that sense. Both the people have to be in the same place at the same time which is rarer to come by as people get older, as situations are so varied and people’s time comes at a premium. A lot of my friends that I still have are from school, and the reason they developed in the first place are because we were all at school and all needed friends to be accepted as some form of normal, I suppose these types of friendships are built on necessity. Obviously the friendships that have survived are down to a number of more complicated and pleasant reasons (ie, we actually like each other!), but they were able to be cultivated because we were all in the same place, both physically and mentally, for a long period of time.

Looking backwards rather than wandering blind into the realm of future friendship possibilities might be better for me. One of my only measurable successes of the Friend Project so far was getting back in touch with an old friend who I had lost contact with for a good five years, turns out we still get on really well and now meet up regularly. So just thinking about people that I regret losing touch with, or those that I don’t take enough time to connect with anymore I probably don’t have enough time to pursue any new friendships anyway! I’m sure I am not the best friend I could be, but getting out there and reconnecting with people feels like half the battle, letting go and allowing yourself to have fun with them is really important too. We’re all growing up, and it seems to be happening at lightening speed at the moment, but remembering that people evolving, changing and moving on is normal, but it’s also worth realizing that those who are growing and changing with you are special and worth paying extra attention to.

Lauren

Well we’re not at the Tate

So today we were hoping to meet 3 new people through our work Friend Date. Anyone could sign up to come and meet us for an hours worth of nattering at the Tate Modern.

Total Friend Dates booked = 0

Whilst we admit it’s not the most exciting of concepts, we thought we might have been able to tempt at least one person.

But alas, no bookings. But we shall try again next month.

Instead, we are sobbing into our tea wondering why we are so unappealing…

We’d like to know why we’ve been unsuccessful this time round. Please pop to our Facebook page and take our poll so we can understand how we might be able to tempt you more next time.

http://www.facebook.com/ilikelauraandlauren

Laura and Lauren