Let's admit it, social networks like Facebook are great. You can keep in touch with friends, make new "friends", chat, and not to mention all the applications such as FarmVille (which we all know is the greatest of them all).
However, Facebook does harm in the fact that it skewers the meaning of friendship. In reality, a "friend" is someone you get along with. The friendship may be close, like someone you can tell a secret to and trust they won't spread it around, or it may be a rather distant relationship, like someone you may just greet for a moment whenever you walk past each other. Regardless, they are still considered a "friend".
However, a Facebook "friend" can be someone you do not know at all or someone whose name you have heard of but have never actually met or talked to. People who use Facebook have a tendency to make friend requests to people as long as the person they are requesting has "mutual friends" (at least that's what we do). The person who receives the friend request sees that the two have "30 mutual friends", and will accept the friend request regardless if he knows the guy or not (at least that's what we do). In this way, Facebook broadens the definition of a friend, meaning that a "friend" on Facebook may not even know you, but is your "friend" because the two of you have mutual friends. It is interesting to note, however, that younger people tend to use Facebook in this way while older people almost always tend to use Facebook in a different way--to keep in touch with close friends and family only.
EЯika WЯight
35 people are mutual friends. You both go to Panther Creek High School.
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It is hard to draw a conclusion as to whether Facebook hurts social capital or benefits it- it really just depends on how you use it. There are many different people who use social network sites like Facebook. There are the pointless ones who just have an account because their friends told them to get one but they never use it, thus it exerts no influence over their social capital. There are responsible ones who use Facebook to keep in touch with friends and family and introduce themselves to new friends (unfortunately, the number of those kinds of people are very low, and again, almost nobody in the younger generation is like that), thus increasing their connectivity with society. There are the hardcore gamers who use Facebook exclusively for games and compete against their friends, which lowers their social capital, seeing as it's not very fun to be friends with a person who spends his/her life playing Facebook games, and who would want to be friends with a guy who spends his life on Facebook games anyway? Of course, there are people who use Facebook in a combination of ways. They may keep in touch with friends and family as well as play Facebook games (such as FarmVille) Sadly, there are also people who use Facebook to stalk people. Facebook has made it relatively easily to creep on someone. Simply friend them, and BAM you can look at all their pictures, videos, and personal information that they choose to put on their profile. I'm not sure whether this would increase or decrease social capital (I mean, you do get to know people better, which in essence connects you more to society).
Facebook can help increase social capital in the way that you can form groups or "Causes". Groups like "Stop Animal Abuse", "Wake Arts Equity Organization", and "Official Petition for No School on Chinese New Year" may render someone even more connected with society and his/her community, thus increasing social capital.
Facebook, in my life, keeps me more connected to my community (sorry, MySpace is just...bad). I keep in touch with my childhood friends who have long moved away and are busy in their own lives, and it's nice to be able to talk to those friends and see how they're keeping up. Of course, I do have the occasional "fun" application (because everyone loves FarmVille and Poker and etc. etc.). Basically, Facebook keeps me connected, like it was made to do.
Conclusively, social networking sites do not determine someone's social capital. It all depends on how he/she uses these sites- to their detriment or to their advantage.
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