Facebook Musings

Now that Facebook has entered the lexicon in the same breath as myspace and friendster, it seems that the mainstream media has taken to publishing stories about it. A Columbia University journalist recently published a story about a NY Times reporter who used the Facebook to identify students in a group called "Adderall, You're Breaking My Heart," which was used to discuss the drug's use on college campuses. Penn State's administration used pictures on the Facebook to identify kids who stormed the field and tore down the goalposts during one football game this fall. So that raises the issue of what is private and what should the public have access to. I personally don't think the school or the government should be able to access anyone's facebook page even to find kids who were underage drinking, smoking pot, or running on to football fields. There must exist a difference between sites that exist for a specific community (e.g. Facebook for a specific school) and public sites with no password protection.

And then there is the story of the students who planned a "beer bash" and publicized it on the facebook. The campus safety took notice and crashed the party only to find ....

40 students and a table of cake and cookies, all decorated with the word ''beer.'' ''We even set up a cake-pong table,'' a twist on the beer-pong drinking game, he says. ''The look on the faces of the cops was priceless.'' As the coup de grace, he posted photographs of the party on Facebook, including a portrait of one nonplussed officer.