A little bird told me...

The youth of my generation have been enthralled by social networking since Myspace really exploded, and possibly even before with AIM Buddy Profiles (does anyone remember those?). Facebook seems to really have taken center stage and stolen the show.

Does this site really live up to all of the praise? The answer varies from person to person. I think that there would, at the very least, be an overwhelming agreement that whoever has it would have great difficulty parting with it. It has become somewhat of a scrapbook; pictures, posts, and videos from several years can be accessed at ease for a trip down memory lane.

Aside from the the memories and friendships that are preserved, Facebook is just a virtual breeding ground for opinions, gossip, and trouble. There are things posted on Facebook that bring out the ugliness in people we call "friends." Most recently, teen girls from Pennsylvania were tagged in a video of a fight that landed them in court. When CBS reported the story, they cleverly began it with "Be careful what you put on Facebook...in case you hadn't noticed!"

But social networking isn't all mirror shots and indirect attacks on "friends." There's a refuge for people simply looking to learn, share, and connect. That place is Twitter.

photo credit: chaaps.com

I've once saw a tweet in my timeline that said "Facebook makes you hate people you know and Twitter makes you love people you don't know." How very true this has become, especially for me. I have found that people who I thought I needed to stay in contact with from high school, via Facebook, are people I contemplate deleting contact with. I don't have quite an interest in browsing through pages of similar-looking photos with insignificant poses.

Twitter is a different territory. With people to follow like Perez Hilton to dish all the juicy Hollywood details, CNN breaking news to give you real-time news updates as they're released, and Lady Gaga who tweets straight from her personal Blackberry to all her little monster fans, you can't help but to re-tweet and reply to the abundance of great chatter that's "tweeted." Well, at least I can't.

Still, Facebook remains a charming site that everyone wants to waste value homework time on. Personally, I'd rather the little Twitter bird keep me posted with trending topics that sometimes tip me off to new events I would have otherwise missed and follow people that are innocently looking for an audience. I'm still building my own audience up, but rather than friend requesting acquaintances, I'd rather have followers interested in what I tweet.