Onlinemania (facebookmania), {Facebook, twitter haaye rabba}

"You have to write the next article for my blog...."
"No, why would I? You do, I don't have time...."
"please.....yaar.......can't you do that for me...?"
after about ten minutes of my pleading, she finally agreed and believe me, I just loved that conversation very much(by the way, I love each and every single conversation with her). So here it is, the best article till now on my blog from the very loveliest friend of mine....enjoy blog writing at its best and I'm damn sure that you're gonna feel the catapult towards a different and amazing tone and style of writing instead of that boring type of mine.!!!

Imagine yourself sitting in your home wishing to talk to a person who is somewhere in a corner of the world miles away from you...The situation seemed practically impossible if we were living in early-man ages why early man let it be few hundred years ago. But today, in this age, where man calls himself as 'civilized' and 'socialized', this situation is not only possible but is as easy as bribing any government officer for getting a legal certificate for your illegal work. So let's thank the one that made this possible and revolutionized our life by creating an entirely different world i.e.,world of virtualism, "The Virtual World", the sole creator and founder of this world, "Internet". It would not be a big deal if I call Internet as God of virtual world.

Well, we all are very well aware of the contribution that Internet has made in our life. It has reduced the distance of miles to a single click of mouse. Everything you want is available on Internet, what you need to do is a single click so there is a long list of advantages and importance of Internet but today our concern is the socializing done through it.

So friends, "Welcome to the socializing in this virtual world in 2012 style". Let's take the case of a 10 year old child and ask him to name the President of our country, 8 in 10 will do it but ask him his favourite cartoon character, he will give you a long list. He would be able to enlist all the social networking sites but if asked about the fundamental rights, he may doubt. The reason is obvious i.e., increasing popularity of these social networking sites. Today even a 10 year old child will be having his account on these sites. Some of the popular social networking sites are Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Google etc. People of all age groups from a 10 year old child to a 60 year old man are on these sites claiming to be a part of this so called virtual world and considering themselves as socially sound.

The sole intention behind the invention of these social networking sites was to act as a medium to stay in virtual touch with friends and family by "occasionally" sharing photos and news about your well being. But with time, this has taken a new dimension, the word "occasionally" has changed into "regularly" and news about well being into "copy paste monstrosity". Now-a-days, people are so used to these sites, that they even can't imagine their lives without it. Here is a technical term for such kind of people i.e.,"online maniac" and the disease with which they are suffering is "online mania".
Online culture is now so much popular that it has taken a verb form. Ask a person about his routine and 90% chance is there that his routine includes atleast one hour of "facebooking", yes facebooking, the word facebook has changed into facebooking, ask a person what he does in free time, he will answer 'facebooking'. The effect of this online mania can be realized by this. People don't find time to pursue their hobbies and when asked , here comes the prompt reply"where is the time?" They are so damn busy with their work that they can't give atleast 5 minutes to their hobby but somehow manages to spare an hour from their busy schedule for facebooking and tweeting--strange but true!!!!!

People are spending hours and hours on these social networking sites doing nothing. It is like a competition that a person having more number of friends on facebook is socially more sound or more popular i.e., it has turned into a status symbol. Here I wanna share a joke which is best suited in this situation.
A teacher asked a 5th standard studying student that what does the green dot on Parle-G Biscuits' packet signify? The student answered that it signifies that Parle-G is online.

People are now so much obsessed with these sites that they are spending thousands of money to get the photo clicked for the profile or dp. They are going to professional photographers and don't mind to spend half a lakh just for the profile pic, then they upload it and check in every 5 minutes that how many likes and comments they got. The popularity is directly proportional to the number of comments or likes, more number of comments means assurance that you are most looked personality on facebook, which in turn means another 50 thousand rupees for the next photo-shoot. :P

Height of status update is that people post status @five per minute forcing others to like or comment on their updates and if that person don't like or comment on his status, then here comes the tit-for-tat , 'If you don't comment on my status, why should I?' Sharing and uploading photos trend  has become so popular that people now upload photos of anything or everything without considering the security factor in mind. What they want is just fame in this virtual world. Imagine a real life situation if facebook has no existence, then people will roam around with their pics requesting everyone,"hey please like my picture".

Now about friends' list, it follows a scientific law, "Rate of your popularity is directly proportional to the number of friends you have in your list keeping other parameters constant". Some people add as many friends as they can whether they know them or not, doesn't matter! What matters is the number. They send request to strangers and if they don't accept it, then they send incrudelity message saying why don't they accept friend request . When asked about number of friends, they proudly say,"I have 700 friends", "I have 1000 friends" and if a person doesn't have long list of friends, then he is considered socially backward. But dude, what's the point in keeping so many friends if you don't know them, why to waste time in reading copy paste status updates of those persons whom you don't know. Ok, you have thousand friends but how many of them will actually be there when you need some help or you are in trouble? The answer is no one. The only one who's gonna help you is your family and your small set of crazy friends or to be more precise, your buddies. It is how strange that you can name the person who is miles away from you and can give his details but can't name your neighbour and what he does. But in reality, only your neighbour will help you if there is some emergency, not a person sitting miles away from you. Its good to be socialized and to know different people form different corners of the world but then to be connected with them only ignoring your near ones seriously can lead you into trouble. I wonder if someday a stranger knocks the door of my home and say, "we have 10 mutual friends on facebook, can I come in...?"

Now about status update. Some people keep changing their status update in every five minutes, status goes like this,"Going for a vacation next week for one month". By writing this as your status , you are doing nothing but just giving open invitation to the thieves that our home is free for 1 month, you are cordially invited and take whatever you want. Some status updates which I found personally very stupid are senti songs or heartbroken songs and even more stupid is the hundreds of comments that follows it. If you have a problem in your love life, then face them or better talk to that person....why facebook them? By doing this nonsense, are you getting something positive? Here comes another type of status update, "Hey its raining", "Awesome mausam". Dude, if its raining, and you love it, then go and enjoy the rains, why post it as a status. Everyone knows that its raining and the rain wouldn't stop if you don't post it as your status. Seriously, don't be a weather forecaster by posting such kind of things. Another kind of status updates is the motivational speech which is just a copy paste, if you are so much inspired by that, then implement it in your life, not in your profile and some people even post the problems which they are going through(emotional). But dude, just tell me, are you gonna find any solution by facebooking it? It would be better if you try to solve them by talking with that person and I want to say something to those people,"Be selective with persons whom you share your problems, because few cares, others are just curious" so never advertise your emotions. There is a saying that "Neki kar, dariya me daal", now it goes like this,"Kuch bhi kar, facebook par dall". Here I have just one word to say that don't be a facebook status criminal by posting such kinds of status.

At last, I just wanna say that its good to be socialized, use these sites but don't get addicted to them as it is always said, "excess of anything is harmful". Find time for your near and dear ones, go out with them, spend some quality time with them, don't confine your romance within that stupid laptop doing online dating, go out explore something new, spend a day without laptop, mobile and trust me, you will find real peace of mind because you can become the king of virtual world but at the end, you have to live in this real world with real people because whenever you will be in some mental trauma or some serious problem, then comments and likes won't make you feel good but what you will need at that time is the hug, love and support of your dear ones. Here, I'm not criticizing these sites, remeber, If someone write abusive words in a notebook or a paper, then the fault is not of the paper or notebook, the fault is of the person who had written that. So, don't blame these sites instead have a self control and use these sites only for the purpose for which they are created.