Social-Networking Etiquette 101

It’s been nearly a decade since I’ve felt the urge to write explicitly about etiquette. The last time was a humor piece for The Declaration (a UVA student pub.) about cell phones, which at the time were just becoming ubiquitous on campus. Probably the rant was motivated by jealousy – I didn’t get a cell till sometime in mid-2002 – but I still get pissed when people spend more time dealing with a machine than people in the room.

I resisted the cell phone craze, but have since experimented with most of the social-networking sites, at least since Myspace got big (personal account deleted). For the time being, I have narrowed it down to Facebook and Twitter, the yin and yang of social-networking.

These sites are constantly evolving, so it’s hard to pin down many rules of etiquette, but I feel the need to try. Polite people make things less awkward. With that in mind, what follows is a modernized lesson in basic correspondence etiquette, whether you need it or not. Thankfully, most of my friends don’t.

1. Use the formal form (Mrs., Mr., Ms. + surname) and formal conventions (space between address and body of message) when addressing someone for the first time in email, text, Facebook, whatever. This assumes you haven’t met in real life, in which case use discretion – addressing a doctor as Dr. might be smart, for example. After that, use their first name (assuming they give it to you) so as not to appear an overly formal person (unless you want to be perceived that way). If you exchange many messages with a person, you may address them or not.
2. When contacting someone for the first time, personalize your message (i.e., you’re adding a “friend” you’ve never met). Avoid too much flattery and ambiguous or sarcastic statements. I’m sometimes guilty of the latter.
3. Practice the golden rule when discerning what is appropriate to post, but realize people are different, and also practice forgiveness. Avoid going online under the influence, unless you are cooler and sexier that way.
4. The first time you untag a friend’s photo, delete his comment or post, or similar action, send a message of lighthearted apology, explaining this was done for reasons of image control, which is acceptable. Only apologize once (a hip friend turned me on to the fact I apologize too much). Feel free to unfriend people whose interactions constantly offend.
5. Use basic common sense.

I spend more time on Facebook, but one thing I like about Twitter is the concept of “following” someone (how one builds a network there). On Facebook this action is called “adding a friend.”

I know and respect an intelligent and very tech-savvy man who only adds friends on FB if they are a person he has met and would be pleasantly surprised to see at the grocery store.

I, on the opposite extreme, have added complete strangers, even when they have been mildly rude and not accompanied their friend request with a personalized message. I assume they are people whose names I forgot, fans, and/or online stalkers. I have blocked one person on Facebook and never heard from him again. He is dead to me in the cold, ethereal void of the internet, and I am well-armed and fearless here at my physical address, which I definitely do not post anywhere unsecure (i.e., Facebook). I don’t have my email address there, anymore. The internet is a strange mix of paranoia and openness. Maybe that’s just me.

Twitter is the polite alternative to Facebook because it eliminates the ambiguity surrounding different definitions of an online friend. It’s harder to offend people on Twitter by not accepting a friend request or saying the wrong thing on someone’s page. Following someone means you hope they will lead you with information and direction. This accurately describes most any online relationship. Neither is it a bad description of what I expect from those I know and love in all forms of life.

[Via http://brianvanreet.com]