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Dear Facebook/Mark Zuckerberg/The Facebook Powers That Be,

I can see straight through your PR spin of “building the social web together” when the new Facebook platform was announced. I don’t need new ways for my online experience to be personalized, because essentially that’s just another tool to divulge more personal information about me and my dis/likes for everyone to see across the World Wide Web. I don’t even bother reading the stuff that my friends choose to “Like” on Facebook because more often than not it’s stupid stuff like “Why do I even miss you?” or “If you ask me to hold your drink, I will drink it”¹. So why would I want to be privy to this kind of stuff all across the web? Do I really have to know what specific type of Levi’s jeans my friend chose to “like” on the Levi’s website? No, not really. If I really wanted to know, I could just, you know, do it the old school way and ask him or her instead.

I already have enough qualms about how addicted to Facebook my generation has become over the last few years and how much Facebook has permeated society and created various societal norms that are continually reinforced². This is especially disconcerting when considering that much of Facebook’s recent changes to the platform eliminates previously established privacy settings. Despite Facebook’s claims to the contrary, Facebook is more public now than it ever was before and users need to check through each and every single setting under the “Privacy” tab of their account to make sure they’re not sharing private information with strangers.

I also have a problem with how this new “Instant Personalization Pilot Program” and how all users are automatically opted into sharing personal public information with third party websites such as Microsoft Docs.com, Pandora and Yelp. Sure, public information is fair game, but when your relatively recent privacy changes affected which personal information became public, a lot of users are going to end up sharing information they thought was private. Even if I uncheck the box that says “Allow select partners to instantly personalize their features with my public information when I first arrive on their websites” I’m told that my friends that participate in this personalization program can still share my public information. So then I have to individually block the applications for the third party websites involved in the personalization program to ensure that my personal information remains, well, personal. Even then I’m not sure I’ve wholly prevented third party websites from accessing my information.

I’m not the only one that thinks the new platform and the personalization program sucks. While I don’t realistically think Senators asking Facebook to reconsider the way they divulge user information to third party websites is going to do anything, it’s definitely a sign that something is amiss when it comes to Facebook’s new features.

1. Both of these are taken directly from what’s currently on my news feed. I’m not making this stuff up. [↩]
2. Wow, my professor was totally right when she said the theories and communication models we studied this semester would be relevant in every day life. Props to her. [↩]

Smoking is something that has absolutely never interested me, unlike some other aspects of college life. There are a multitude of reasons why, but in the end, it all amounts to this: it’s just something I choose not to do. It doesn’t matter to me whether others do it, but it’s not something I personally am interested in. Needless to say, the “holiday” that is 4/20 is something I find stupid, but since it’s all part of a counterculture I’m not a part of, I do my best to refrain from judging and go about my own business the way I would any other day.

However, when those who “observe” 4/20 start smoking in the godforsaken early hours of the morning and set off the fire alarm at 8:27a.m., I will totally hardcore judge. I don’t care if they smoke; they can do what they want. But when they are stupid enough to smoke in the dorms and set off the fire alarm and the sprinklers on the floor, then they are dumbasses, regardless of whether or not today is 4/20. When the sprinklers are involved, it’s not even about how the fire alarm disturbed the sleep of so many students anymore. It’s about damaged property that the school won’t cover unless a specific type of insurance has already been purchased prior to the incident.

Also, I just got an email from the District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority telling me not to use tap water until further notice because of an unsafe spike in the amount of chlorine in the water. According to the email, “water with excess chlorine may have… taste and odor problems… the chlorine may also cause a reaction in individuals with sensitive skin.” I washed my face and brushed my teeth with tap water this morning, does this mean my face and/or the inside of my mouth is going to react from the chlorine?

Dear Birds Chirping Outside My Window,

I am happy spring has finally sprung. I love that the skies are an endless blue with a bright burning yellow sun, I love that I can wear skirts and flip flops, I love that (if I had the free time) I could lay outside all day and soak up the sun. I love the flowers blooming all over campus, I love the arrival of the cherry blossoms, I love the elated happiness I get every time I realize winter is finally over and spring is here.

I know that you birds like spring, too. After all, spring means you guys can emerge from torpor and go about your daily lives, often starting little birdie families. All the more power to you for enjoying spring to the fullest, really. But do you really have to chirp at each other incessantly from 1am to 4am right outside my window?

I tried closing my window last night to give you guys some privacy, but your chips were so loud that a closed window made no difference. I also was trying to get to sleep, since I had spent all day doing homework and wanted to get a good night’s sleep to continue working away the next day (today). That didn’t happen. I did manage to finish my paper for my lit class, but whether or not I managed to write a persuasive argument at 3am fueled by nothing but frustration at your chirping remains to be seen.

How about a compromise? You guys can chirp all you want during the day, and then shut up at night so I can go to sleep. I think that’s fair, right? That way, you can still chirp away but it won’t interfere with my sleeping schedule. I most definitely do not want to go all Zooey Deschanel from Failure to Launch on you¹… I think that would be a very unfortunate way to end this saga, don’t you?

1. Zooey’s character shot a bird that would not stop chirping outside her window. [↩]