The Little Mermaid gives advice to young girls

Advice from the Little Mermaid

Okay, a bit of a kvetch.

I'm posting this here because I don't think I should post it to Facebook.

On Facebook, I have friends who are 12-year-old girls (my cousins children) who might not appreciate the humor of this video.  More importantly, I really doubt that their mothers would see the humor of this video or of their daughters watching this video.  Not that the video is horribly dirty or even risque, really, but I can easily see it pissing off my cousins.

So Facebook really should consider providing some kind of filter that let's you restrict individual postings to be visible to only a specified subset of your friends.

Yes, I could start a second profile for grown-ups only, but that would take a lot of time and a lot of explaining.  And, besides, I believe that FB frowns on people having multiple accounts.  So until they lighten up on the multiple accounts front, they should come up with some filters.

Oh, yeah.  And the video's pretty funny, too....

Facebook memes

Is it just me, or are these Facebook memes getting just a little too personal?


Support Your Local Identity Thief

(1) PORN NAME (Your middle name and the city where you were born)

(2) ROCK STAR NAME (Your pet's name and the state in which your driver's license was issued)

(3) SECRET AGENT NAME (Your father's middle name, your mother's maiden name, plus your Social Security number)

(4) ARMED SERVICES NAME AND SERIAL NUMBER (Your middle name, the brand of your microwave, plus your driver's license number)

(5) SCIENCE FICTION DEHUMANIZED-WORLD-OF-THE-FUTURE NAME (The full account number of your credit card with the highest available credit line)

(6) EXTRA CREDIT - I'm tired of making up reasons for you to give me stuff, so just go ahead and give me the account numbers for all your bank accounts, the name of the bank and the routing number (it's just to the left of your account number at the bottom of your checks)

Instructions: Fill out your answers to these questions and e-mail them directly to me. Then change all your life insurance policies so that I am the beneficiary. Tag all your friends and tell them that if they don't fill in the answers and send them to me, they'll get seven years of bad luck and all their hair will fall out. Make sure they understand that if any of them call the cops, I will cut them.

The name game

So, just for fun, I created a Facebook group for people name William Green (or Greene) or variants thereof.

I have described it this way:

"According to http://ww2.howmanyofme.com/, the most recent census shows that the USA is home to approximately:

"8,869 people named William Green (or Greene)
"65 people named Will Green(e)
"1,439 people named Willie Green(e)
"18 people named Willy Green(e)
"404 people named Bill Green(e)
"909 people named Billy Green(e) and
"40 people named Wiley Green(e).

"That's 11,744 of us who get each other's mail, phone messages and attempts at debt collection. And some of us are probably related to each other.

"A Facebook search on the name, 'Bill Green,' produces what it refers to only as 'over 500 results.'

"Membership in this group is limited to people named William Green (or Greene) or some variation. No other qualifications."

So pass this info along to anyone you know who qualifies.

Facebook etiquette

Oh, what deep and wide moral dilemmas arise on Facebook.

Or maybe it's just a sign of my being a social doormat.

Let me explain.

Shortly after I joined Facebook, someone sent me a friend request. I didn't recognize the name, I didn't recognize the face. But we had something like six friends in common. Based on who those common friends were, I reasoned it must be someone I knew (or at least should know) from the Cosmique Krewe of Colour, so I accepted the friend request.

About a month ago, I received a similar friend request. I didn't recognize the name, I didn't recognize the face. But his profile was viewable by everyone in the San Francisco network, so I was able to see that he seemed harmless enough -- he's recently married, so probably not someone looking for dates; there isn't a ton of activity on his wall, so he's not likely to become a pest; what activity is on his wall is generally links to articles that I already agree with (like "No on 8"); the two friends we have in common are Mark Leno and New Conservatory Theater (i.e., not close personal friends, but people I support). I accepted that friend request, and I seem to have been pretty much correct -- no poking, not really much interaction at all, really. It turned out to be as harmless a thing to accept as I guessed it would be.

This morning, I received a friend recommendation from another friend. The person being recommended is someone whose name I don't recognize and whose face I don't recognize. This person's profile can only be viewed by their friends, so I couldn't really see anything other than their friend list and the fact that they live in the East Bay. We have no friends in common other than the person making the recommendation.

So here's the dilemma: If I write to my friend and say, "Who is this person you're recommending and why do you think we should be Facebook friends?" I'm afraid that I'll sound paranoid or untrusting or just a plain old jerk. But if I just ignore the friend recommendation, I fear that I might still come off looking like a jerk.

For now, I have opted to ignore the friend recommendation and just keep my mouth shut.

But on sites like Facebook, what's the standard etiquette when someone you don't know sends a friend request or when someone sends you a friend recommendation for someone you don't know?

Enquiring minds want to know.