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Q&A: Why you have fewer friends than your friends do on Facebook

Your real-world friends are counted on the fingers on your hand, not on Facebook which is full of faux-friends, and a corporation that will sell your granny to grub a penny on a deal.

But keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better.
Absolutes are almost Always wrong.

"Absolutes are almost Always wrong"

Absolutely

Hope you are happy with your 10,000 sham friends on Facebook.

Agree 100%.
FB is not about "friends"; it's about an advertising vector.
Capiche?

I agree with Neil. I dropped facebook a few months ago after reading about some of there policies concerning privacy and them using my private information. If more people knew what was going on behind the scenes facebook and others like it would never reach a billion.

Just two comments, how sad a society when popularity or whatever is measured by imaginary friends by folks so desperate to be noticed. How dangerous is this massive collection of data to us all?

I was most amused with Microsoft buying into Klout - Trash Mag popularity bottom grubbing rubbish. Justin Beiber has more Klout than Barak Obama - really !!!

Do you have more data or a link to that data?

and honestly I don't give a damn. I'm an introvert primarily. I agree with neil.postlethwaite above... The real-world friends you have can likely be counted on the fingers of one hand, maybe two. If you TRULY have more... Then you are blessed and be happy. But I doubt that one of those people who is is really going to decry neil's comment.

The majority of the mass-amounts of 'friends' on FB probably don't really even know or care you exist. You're nothing but a picture and a name that they can bolster a game with, or maybe once put up a cool photo. Facebook promotes the 'look at me' mentality that many people should have gotten over as kids (barring of course those who go in to theater, or politics), and so the more people looking at us, the better. But saying that all of those 'friends' on facebook are TRUE and REAL friends, would be like a self-involved actor who thinks that EVERYONE in the theater of every show knows and cares about him or her personally. They don't.

Oh, and as to my having fewer friends on FB than my friends. VERY true. I don't use that social media brain-waster.

First of all, nobody gets friended by me unless I actually know them.
Which means I don't have a single unknown-faced sycophant in the bunch.
Just because you made a comment on a public posting doesn't mean you're my friend; just that you're an information customer of mine. "Thank you very much for your comments, kind or otherwise."
Secondly, I never friend someone unless I want to talk to them. I've gotten more than my share of friend requests from people who have nothing I want to hear from or talk to. Paying for college bills for two boys certainly doesn't leave any extra for me to be a "sugar daddy". even supposing my wife would let me. lol.

I agree. I only friend people I know personally and like. The only complaint I have is that I would like to section them off into groups like Google+ does with its circles. But if I don't know and like you, I will not friend you on Facebook.

Please ask your editor to check your grammar before posting.

I notice you only typed a short sentence. Afraid you'll make a mistake SOB?

Such nastiness is uncalled for. pnylund@... has a valid point. And he was polite with his request. Grammar mistakes can be forgiven in the comments section, but the author should have the article proofread and grammar and spelling mistakes corrected. After all, she (in this case) is supposed to be a professional.

Lord knows, I make grammar and spelling mistakes too. I try to proofread my comments before hitting "submit", but sometimes they still get through. I'm pretty good at fat-fingering, too.

The word "friend" has been so cheapened in this modern age. Even more so with Facebook and other similar sites.

A friend is someone you go hunting with. Someone you go fishing and camping with. Someone you spend time with (outside of work and offline). Someone you go to the park with, etc. I suppose you can develop a long-distance relationship (not necessarily romantic), but it won't realize it's full potential until you actually meet in person.

You will most likely have only a few friends in your life. You will have many acquaintances. Most of the "friends" on Facebook fall into that second category. Nothing wrong with that, that's just the way it is.

I suppose an "acquaintance" request just doesn't sound as social.

neil.postlethwaite@... is correct.

The very premise of this article makes no sense to me. Say you are my "friend" on Facebook. That means you have more "friends" than I. I am also your "friend" on Facebook. That means I have more "friends' than you. Sounds like that "Grandfather Paradox" time travel stories like to mention.

By the way, I dumped my Facebook account a couple of years ago and have not regretted it.

Shall we call it "global" friendship? The worst of friendships? Friendship is not for numbers Dr Milgram, the famous social psycologist, a great friend of the family did not intend his research to be considered as a way of making friends. He had to few to know that friends are few but the most exclusive, important kind of relationship in humans. My feeling is that his research had to do with global communication, and statistics proved correct. Facebook is only proving that friendship is not for the crowds. In a way it is for me a way of ignoring the important and and not having to get involved totally with people. It makes me think of Einstein; He did not have to go to prove his theory. He knew better. Only geniuses are creative. By the way, do you realize that friends GET TOGETHER mostly because they don't like to talk "invisibly"? And they write emails if they don't "have the time" to write letters, long letter by hand...Hurrah for friendship!
Forgive my mistakes! if any.
Phasebo

Since people create meaning through usage, people should just call these FaceBook Friends 'contacts' or ' aquaintances' and not let our language be muddled by faddish internet platforms. Of course, it will all work out anyway as people consider context.

I have no Facebook "contacts" or "aquaintances" because I only friend people I actually know, like, and wish to keep in touch with. "Friends" certainly describes my Facebook friends.

to start off, i don't care how popular they feel; the idea of social networks is tantamount fo the old clothes line (good for gossiping). albeit, there is use in these social networks. one i can think of is as some sort of early warning system when there's a problem and much of the rest of it is no more than jibber-jabber. how would these people be my friends with the exception of the few who were my friends pre-facebook? the others are about as much my friends as those who travel on the subway with me. we're going in the same direction with varying deboarding and independent of one another.

is there a social networking armageddon brewing?
i posted yesterday expecting a rebuttal concerning my being negative but after trolling the comments it seems facebook et al are on the precipice. or is it only an illusion from where i'm standing?

Facebook is hyped up to seem important than it really is. It has a few legitimate uses for clients but is mainly a money making scheme and information collection tool, as well as a mill from which propspective employers and other nosy people could try to assemble an in absentia psychological profile. I agree with some here that most of the "friends" on facebook are merely acquaintances and "fair weather friends" and would not do a "friends' duty" if it cost them anything substantial.