facebook etiquette - the unwritten rules

As many of you may already know, i have been spending a lot of time on facebook lately. Most of you think that i am just killing away precious time, but on the contrary, I have been working on a complex research about the unwritten rules of facebook. After reading this, some of you will be shocked to see how most of them are blatantly flouted, and some of you may even realize that you yourself have broken many of these rules, but fear not, because it's not too late to change your erroneous ways. Now that you understand the purpose of this post, you can go on to read the much awaited rules.

1) Thou shall not like thy own status: This is the most common mistake that the uninitiated make. Liking your own status is the real world equivalent of laughing at your own bad joke which no one else gets. The situation gets even worse if you like your own status and no one else comments or likes it after that. It would leave you feeling like a stage performer who takes a bow after a performance that they thought was good, only to realize that the audience had left a long time back.

2) Thou shalt not be the first person to comment on thy status: Commenting on your own status is perfectly fine, but being the first person to comment on your status is not. The reason no one else commented on your status is probably because it just wasn't interesting enough. In this case, commenting on it yourself is probably the most pathetic thing you could do. In real world terms, it's best to walk away and not look back. Forget that it ever happened. However, there is an exception to this rule. If you later relaize that your status update could be misinterpreted in a way that would embarass you or the people trying to comment, then you should be the first person to comment and correct it, or better yet, delete it.

3) Thou shall not post a message that makes sense only to one person in your friends list: This behavior is normally observed in people whose relationship status is not single. While it might seem "cute" to you and the person the message was intended for, in the real world, this is almost similar to public display of affection. For lack of a better term, I will henceforth refer to this is FBA (facebook display of affection). This gets even worse if the person your message was dedicated to does not even have a facebook account.

4) Thou shall not post more than one status update per day: This rule might seem a little harsh at first, but let me explain it. Note that i said one status update per day. you are allowed to post multiple links, multiple photos, or multiple videos. But posting more than one status update per day should be avoided. Any experienced facebook user would know that there are times when the ideas keep flowing and you are tempted to post, and then there are dry spells also known as "facebookers block". Like the rule above, this rule has exceptions too. If the update you just thought of is time sensitive (makes sense only at the particular time) and could be out of context if delayed, then it is ok to post it. These updates will henceforth be called "perishable" status updates. If the new update is really really good and you are sure it will crack people up, then too you may post it on the same day. However, if it is a "non-perishable" update, then it makes sense to make a note of it somewhere, and save it for one of those days when you suffer from facebookers block.

5) Thou shall not tag themselves in their own pictures: So facebook added a feature of tagging people in pictures, and it also does half the work for you by identifying faces in the pictures, but that does not mean you tag yourself in the pictures that you have uploaded. Tagging is necessary only when the pictures reside in someone else's profile and may not be seen by people who are not common friends. The tagging feature although fun, must be used judiciously.

6) Thou shall not post updates of a live sporting event every few minutes: While posting updates of a match might seem "cool", the underlying reason is most often to show others that you are watching the game. That can be acheived by a single status update which could be as simple as "I am watching the xyz game". Posting updates every few minutes is completely unnecessary and after a while it gets plain irritating. We get it that you are watching the game, and most of us are watching the game too. That's no reason for you to post your version of the commentary on facebook. Posting the updates also makes others wonder if you go running to your computer everytime someone scores or something big happens. This also violates rule #4.

That's all i have for now, if this post manages to educate even one person about proper facebook etiquette, my job is done. I may have missed a few points here, so if you have any rules that you think need to be added to this list, please do post a comment.