Getting Noticed On Facebook as a New-Be

  Have you ever thought about if the statuses and wall posts you post are getting seen by your friends on facebook when you are fairly new to the website? Well, in the article “Cracking the Facebook Code” by Thomas E. Weber it explains how new facebook users aren’t being noticed by their facebook friends because facebook doesn’t show new users posts as much as older users. Why is this? Well, Weber and a few colleagues decided to do an experiment to find out if it is true that facebook is biased against new users. During this experiment they tested if posting a large amount of times a week would get your posts in your friends news feeds. The outcome was it didn’t help.  They tested friends interacting with you and your posts; and if your post doesn’t show up on your friend’s feeds then they can’t interact with your posts. That was a no for the outcome also.  After testing interacting with posts, they made some friends interact with the posts and then the facebook posts started to show up in friend’s news feeds. When the posts were showing up they didn’t show up in the “most recent” posts. Apparently the “most recent” posts are censored. On facebook you can change the posts settings to where you can see more than what you normally see for “most recent” posts. You can also stalk your facebook friends to see more of their posts.

I can really relate to this. I’m probably a facebook addict. I’m on there more then I need to be. Facebook is another way for my friends and I to communicate with each other besides texting. I never knew that new facebook users posts were not shown on older users feeds. I was actually wondering why my friend’s posts were not showing up in my feeds. Now I know it is because he just got a facebook. Reading through this makes me think about facebook stalking my friends and maybe my crushes. Anyone can read this article and think; I wonder if  ‘so and so’ stalks my facebook and that’s why they show up so much in my feeds. So I think I wont stalk any of my friends or crushes anymore thanks to this article. By reading this article I learned ways I can get my new statuses and posts noticed much more.

A "Ray" of Sunshine

In the article "Another Gay Suicide" by Claire Howorth, it talks about how Raymond Chase, 19 years old, and a sophomore at Johnson and Whales college killed himself for no apparent reason, that anyone knows about, on September 29. "I like to laugh, I like to have fun and I'm gay," is clearly stated on Chase's facebook bio on his wall. According to the Providence, Rhode Island, police, there is no indication that Chase suffered at the hands of anything but his own demons. Chase's friends called him Ray because he was such a "ray" of sunshine. “Straight guys fist-bumped him. Everyone just wanted to be around him." Ivonne White, Chase's best friend, said. White doesnt want to lump Chase with the other four suicides that had recently just happened. Chase was not tourmented like the others apparently were but they all had one thing in common: they were all  homosexual.

Im not really sure how to feel about this article and this problem with these suicides. I think the main cause of these suicides were the gay jokes and how straight people make fun of gays. Im pretty sure if I was made fun of for what gender I would rather like I would most likely always be depressed and angry at the world. What I don't understand is why. Why did Chase commit suicide? Why did he wasnt to leave this world with no explanation? But then again, why do people make fun of gays? Why can't people just accept everyone for who they are and what gender they like?  This reminds me of a show on Fox called Glee. Glee is about this club where every type of person is accepted. In this club there are peppy cheerleaders, pregnant cheerleaders, a goth girl, a fat black girl, the schools most popular guy, the quater back, the girl who like to sing, the paralyzed dreamer, and last but not least, the gay kid. Yes, the other students in the show do make fun of the quater back for being in Glee club. They call him gay. They make fun of him. Even though he is being made fun of he still defends his friend, the gay. Even though he is gay, he is loved by so many people, JUST THE WAY HE IS! But what I really want to say is that we should really treat eachother the same way we treat everyone else. We should treat the most popular just like we treat the people that no one really knows about. We should also treat the straights the same as the gays. We should be all equal.