Your Facebook status update can speak volumes about you!

‘I like it on the couch’, ‘ I like it on the desk’, ‘I like it on the table’!

Whoa! That sounds something which you have always heard of, right? Your mind is going the other way right? Awww! But sadly this isn’t what you and I think. Sad? Interestingly these were status updates on Facebook a couple of months back.

These were status updates? Are people crazy and stupid to post such nonsense stuff? Don’t people know how to communicate on a social network? Are all these questions running in your mind? If yes, then this is a trailer, because as you go on, your mouth and eyes will just remain split wide open.

As the recent movie “The Social Network” showed us, Facebook was started to do just that, be a book wherein one could see and compare others faces. But over time a lot more interesting stuff has begun to happen with the onset of the News Feed, applications ranging from “How sexy you are” to “When will you marry” and many other things.

The status updates option was started off for people to post updates about what they were doing currently. But today, status updates have evolved into something of a status symbol for Facebook users.

The “I like it….” status update which became viral all over the world was about nothing else but a PURSE! An update about a purse? Are people out of their minds? NO! This is not all. The update was for building awareness about breast cancer. Now isn’t that an unusual or rather plain stupid way of building awareness about a dreaded disease? But this wasn’t it.

This campaign was preceded by another campaign a couple of months back where females posted their status updates as colours. On closer look people realised that it’s the colour of their bra. Weird? Nonsensical? Dumb?

Like you even I was left wondering on this peculiar way of generating interest by titillating the audiences? I really wonder whether this managed to generate any interest in the real issue. But one thing is sure, it did make all the guys keep checking Facebook for all the latest status updates from their female friends.

Want to grab some attention of your friends? Want to be the talk of ‘Facebook’? Very shy in real life but can write and communicate really well online? I have a simple solution. Post an amazing, fantastic, outrageous, horrific link, photo, status update of anything you have done or seen happening around which people wouldn’t have thought of. And see the likes and comments increase manifold. If your update is good, it would also go viral as your friends keep sharing it on their profiles. If that boosts your ego, you keep doing it again and again. And the end result? You have become the most followed guy among your classmates on Facebook even though in real life you may have not uttered one word in class to your friends.

But then as is the rule of the market says, too much of anything becomes really boring. The recent Rajni updates across Facebook and Twitter after “Robot” became such a phenomenon that after a point in time, it became very dreary and dull. Everyone was posting the same old jokes or converting Chuck Norris jokes directly into Rajnikant ones.

Research and Development on status updates anyone? What the hell are you talking about? Why will anyone research people’s status updates? Are they jobless? Yeah probably some people really are.

According to an article I read, people are categorized into three according to their status updates: – (Source: http://www.revelife.com/725012719/what-do-your-status-updates-say-about-you/)
• If someone continuously updates status throughout the day, they are seeking attention
• If someone constantly shares about the good things they are doing or the fun they are having, they are miserable
• While if someone constantly talks about a higher entity / being (God), they are insecure about their relationship

Ok for that matter I should be miserable and a lot of them who are already pretty good at what they do would be seeking attention.

Then there is Dave McCandless, a British journalist who analysed over 10,000 status updates where Facebook users announced their breakups. The analysis led him to create an infographic showing that the most breakups happen soon after Valentines Day or just before Christmas. He is a journalist? Why would he be doing something of this sort?

The above two examples are nothing but a show of how status updates are indirectly giving jobs to people. Jobs? Yeah, jobs of researching status updates. Doesn’t that sound amazingly exciting?

But on a more serious note as the status update culture has become a phenomenon, a lot more people be it researchers, marketers, companies everyone will look at your status message to see what you really are. Yeah, companies and colleges have suspended people from their jobs for posting status updates which weren’t too kind with their language on their respective companies and colleges.

If we take a closer and deeper look at the way the person has characterised people on the basis of their status updates, though it may seem useless, it does make SOME sense. Social networking sites like Facebook are regarded as places where people are mostly true to the world whether it is posting pics of them drinking or giving updates about a project they have bagged from a company. And this reason alone would make others interested to look at your updates over a period of time to understand the real you.

So is your mouth still SPLIT WIDE OPEN, GAPING AT THE SCREEN? I am sure after today, you will make sure that you are very careful when posting your next status update on Facebook.

BECAUSE THERE’S SOMEONE ALWAYS WATCHING YOU!