FB Friends

So this is a thought. I was hanging out with some friends, and we were discussing people who had friended us on facebook. It goes something like this.

1. I get a friend request from a person I don't remember or recognize. Not the face. Not the name. Nothing is ringing a bell.
2. I see we have friends in common. Usually quite a few. Some of them included in the group that is now discussing FB friends.
3. I think to myself, I must know them. Right? I mean, we have all these friends in common, so I should be nice.
4. I accept their friend request. But I never check out their pages or profiles. I ignore their updates. I don't write anything on their walls.

So I usually only friend people I know and remember well. They are either people I am friends with currently...i.e., we keep in touch, we actually hang out, etc. Or they are people I used to do things with but time/circumstance drew us apart. And then, through the miracle that is FB, we reconnect. And once in a while we chat about something, send each other notes, or say hi. I'm really excited when I find these people or when they find me. Of course, there is a third category, family, which is obviously excluded from this discussion. Because family is family and you are friends with most members of your family for reasons we are not discussing here.

So then the question becomes this. Is it rude to ignore/deny friend requests from people who are somehow connected to you? I'm not talking about the random friend requests from total strangers in Australia. I mean, reject those, by all means. They are probably looking for ways to hack your account and spam all your friends. So no, I'm really talking about the ones who have fifty friends in common with you, but for the life of you, you just can't remember them.

OR...maybe it's just rude to friend people that you really never were friends with in the first place. It seems like such people really want numbers. Oh I have hundreds and sometimes even over a thousand friends. Hmmmm...really? I bet you really only care about a quarter of the friends you have on FB...especially when you are reaching numbers near one thousand.

The thing is, social media is going to be a permanent and very important part of our lives. It already is. But then I think FB runs the risk of two things. One, it becomes a means for marketing...so you have people reaching out just for business purposes. Or, worse, it becomes a meaningless way to connect with people because suddenly you're connected with all these people that you don't know at all. So you stop using it.

End conclusion? I think we are going to have to learn a level of social etiquette when it comes to social networking on these sites. If it is about friendship...which I think FB claims to be...then the proper etiquette is to friend those you are truly friends with. Just my position. Feel free to disagree.