Look At Us

Dear Authors Mendelson and Papacharissi,

This was quite an interesting piece of literature to read-- especially being a junior in college at this time in my life.  To tell you the truth, every instance you explained I have seen before on Facebook in many albums and probably have many pictures and comments on my own Facebook that are just the same.  By studying the relationships between same-sex and opposite-sex beings on Facebook, it is apparent that there are different physical and emotional gestures and facial expressions in pictures.  I definitely agree with you that those that are in serious relationships show more physical contact than those that are just friends.  Yet, I think sometimes the contact of individuals does not necessarily give the correct impression.  For example, on Facebook girls will kiss one another on the cheek or lips even though they are not actually in a love relationship with one another.  From my point of view, these pictures are for attention or for comments -- but whatever floats everyone's boat, right?  To continue my discussion on the article, I feel that your concept of time is correct.  When going through people's albums it is not always about ONE event but it is to display the pictures and memories from a certain time period.  In my opinion, pictures and photographs are irreplacable.  Pictures are truly great ways to remember certain times in one's life and give people the ability to share laughs with eachother.  Facebook allows for this to happen; however, I feel that Facebook takes these pictures to an entirely new level of projection.

Ever since MySpace and Facebook were created, people have definitely "abused" (and not in a physical way) their ability to post and share pictures over the internet.  It has turned into a competition like feature where many people post pictures just to show off their memories and try to look better than others.  One of my biggest pet peeves, which you mentioned in your article, are mirror pictures.  MySpace and Facebook are the epitomy of mirror pictures and many of them are just inappropriate and not needed.  (Especially when one's mirror is dirty...)  These pictures do not capture memories, good times, or valuable moments.  I can understand a self portrait or someone taking a photo of you for your profile picture, but mirror pictures are so unprofessional and immature looking.  Everyone has his/her own feelings about photos so I do not say any of this to bash anyone's profiles or preferences of the way pictures are taken. 

 

One thing that was not mentioned much in the article which I think about a great deal when posting pictures on Facebook is the way companies or jobs can look at your profile and capture information about a person in this way.  Just because someone has a beer in a picture does not mean they are irresponsible or an alcoholic, yet, many of these "college" photos can give off these impressions.  It is extremely important to make sure that if one is looking for a job or working for a company he/she is aware of the pictures they post that their friends or the public can see.  Do not get me wrong I do value the ability to share my memories over Facebook with friends and get tagged in photos from other people's cameras to remember my days here at school or at certain events in my life; however, I think that Facebook has kind of taken away from the special moments by broadcasting these pictures for practically the world to see.  After reading this, it is obvious that many college albums are so typical.  In the future, I think I would like to make my photos private to only the people who are involved in them so that it is a more special experience for all of us. 

Thank you,
Loralyn Sortino