The community world as we know it is a strange place sometimes. One thing that people do on Twitter for instance, is that they “follow” you – ONLY to see if you will follow back. No other reason.

I’m sorry, but that just pisses me off. If that’s the reason why you’re following my Twitter-thing, then don’t even bother. 
It took me a while to realize that it was a common thing. I had no idea at first. I was under the impression that you followed people or bands or whatever – because you’re acually interested in their updates and news?!?!

Twitter is this neverending, constantly updated stream of information, it just drowns you with info like the Niagara Falls of tweets… New ones every fucking second. The only reason for me to follow anyone or anything, is because I actually want to know what they have to say.

I’m following bands/artists I like to learn about their tours, new YouTube-uploads, interviews… All that. I follow bands or sometimes people I don’t even know so well, because they have funny or interesting tweets.

But it would drive me crazy to have hundreds of accounts on there, because I would miss the few things I REALLY give a shit about. 

In short: If you’re just trying to promote your band by adding hundreds of random accounts as “re-followers”, just walk on by. Not interested.

I can even tell right away when somebody suddenly starts following me, that they will be gone the minute I post something – without having re-followed them first. It always leads to a “minus one” follower. How predictable and how utterly ridiculous.

Secondly – the goddamn Facebook thing. Those who know me also know that I’ve been anything but a fan of that place since it took over after MySpace. It just makes me nervous. Your whole personal life is out there for the world to see in a way that I’m not comfortable with at all.

Back in the day, you could use any nickname you wanted (I was just “Lita77” on MySpace) and it wasn’t as obvious or as easy to find you if you didn’t want to be found. You could even use a fake e-mail addy to avoid being searched. The Facebook-thing says that it’s private, but really – every time I post something for my friends, and they like or comment on it, it’s there for THEIR friends to see and so on. It’s beyond control, and it’s way too complicated to understand how to prevent the spreading of info. I’m sure it’s possible, but that should be by default, not something I have to search for.

Anyway, I have a locked and private account under a different name because I don’t want people on there, basically. The few that I do have on there, are on it for various reasons, but mostly because it’s the only (simple) way to get in touch with people who are either “road people” (crews, band members and similar) or people with common interests that are somewhere abroad. Or people that I didn’t call to say hello to before either, but kept in touch with via MySpace (or whatever was used six-seven years ago).

I don’t have some of my best friends on Facebook, because it tricks people to believe that they know what their friends are up to – through FB. They think that they are “staying in touch”. But it’s mainly just an ego-trip, and I’m guilty of it myself. Because you think that you’re following your friends’ lives, you don’t pick up the phone as much anymore. Right? 
You saw your friends on Facebook this morning and they seem to be doing great. Why bother picking up the phone when you “see” them every day?

That’s all just fake and bullshit. Most of us don’t advertise if or when we’re feeling bad. Everything on Facebook is about posting funny shit, little anecdotes, videos, pics, news… But apart from the occasional drama-queens who don’t have ANY sense of privacy whatsoever (I don’t even have any people like that among my friends thank god) nobody will write what they’re really thinking in public.

One of my best friends asked me last year if we shouldn’t be friends on Facebook. No, I don’t want that. It just edulcorates the friendship, you get the wrong picture of their lives and thoughts.

I’d rather just talk with her on the phone, even if it’s just once a month or less, or I’d like to hang with her in person when we get a chance. But no – I don’t want the Facebook thing. 

People don’t call eachother as much anymore, because they don’t have to. Or they THINK that they don’t.

And this morning, I got a friend request from a person who really disappointed me a few months ago. I thought it was a friend, but he acted to fucking fake towards me at one of the festivals earlier this summer. “Oh hey…!” and then he just took off like he had a firecracker up his ass.

I was sitting alone backstage when he walked in, and he just nodded when he passed me – to go and sit at another table. WTF?!?! I’m pretty sure that I showered that morning. Yes, I’m being sarcastic…

After that I just thought, well – people always show their true self sooner or later. It wasn’t a close friend per se, so I didn’t care particularly. Imagine my surprise when that same person sent me a friend request on Facebook this morning.

Either he doesn’t know who I am, as I’m there under a fake name, or he does know, but thinks that I didn’t understand that he dissed me. Make no mistake, just because I didn’t bitch about it, doesn’t mean that I didn’t GET it. It just wasn’t worth losing any sleep over. Piss off.

I don’t want to collect friends on Facebook. I have less than 50 people on it, and I want to keep it that way. And the 50 people include artists that I followed before they had “professional” pages. Many of the “smaller” artists only had personal pages before, so they aren’t even “real” friends, only people whose careers I wanted to follow.

It’s the same thing there – with the constant flow of information and updates, it would make my head spin having hundreds of people to keep track of. I’d rather follow the few chosen people who I added myself, than have hundreds of strangers clogging up my newsfeed 24-7.

But it is scary sometimes how we have changed from calling our friends reguarly, or dropping an e-mail to say hi how are ya – to updating our OWN statuses, hoping that others will see them.

It’s no longer a question about contacting somebody else, it’s about indirectly “contacting” people through a newsfeed saying “hey – here I am! If you can see me…”.

That’s not the way things should be.