I just had to say it. I already said it on Twitter, but this whole big deal with Facebook coming out with usernames was really dumb. There was so much hype into it that I felt like people would be seriously worried about their username being taken. It kind of sounds like when you hear those Black Friday stories from Walmart goers that stand all over the store and when it hits 7AM, everyone goes bonkers. Or, the one analogy where you (that is, if you are a woman) end up fighting over a bra at the Victoria’s Secret Semi-Annual sale.
Well, there were those who acted like it, and I laughed when people were counting down the minutes and seconds until Facebook allowed users in as if they pushed a button to let people through their virtual turnstyles. Once they got their usernames, they were said “I got my username that I wanted.” I could just hear the thrill…well read it. Yeah, I know… I am not enthusiastic.
My response – Well, good for you. I did get my username over 20 minutes after because I was not in a rush, and did not care. It was easy to pick my username, but I kept thinking on why in the world Facebook did not think of it sooner. I feel special that I am no longer a number, but I that have a username. It was the worst hype ever since the recent KFC grilled chicken (which my local store cannot cook the chicken to what I need it to be. It was a whole debacle that was tramatizing for me…physcially. Enough said on that before it goes over that WTMFI line.)
Frankly, Facebook is becoming too much like MySpace. All the applications that you can use for it are similar and with MySpace trying to keep up, your real-time activity stream now appears. All the ads are annoying too. I have ads that have nothing to do with me as a person.
Did you get your username? What did you think of the whole ordeal?
To me a number just made more scene to me your not bob with numbers behind the name. My only question now is what happens if someone gets married .. are you able to change the username at that point? It just seems silly to me.
I changed from a number to a username, I would have loved to use my username of choice but facebook for me is mostly friends and family that don’t need to know about my online life.
Having a double life is sometimes hard. :/
.-= Kimm´s last blog ..1950 housewife, am not =-.
@Kimm, As far as I know when I signed up for the username, it said you could not change it. So if you do get married, you are kind of stuck.
With the numbers as the username before, you could do shortened URL direct, like mine was formally profile.to/nileflores.
I did get my username, but frankly, I was not too worried about it. I have two or three usernames I could have used, so it was not a big deal to me. I do not thing I even attempted to get my username for a few hours after they became available.
However, I do not believe the username addition to Facebook was worth all the hype. Yes, I like having a username to make it easier to direct people to my profile instead of a number. But really, unless they are going to allow people to see my profile without logging in and adding me as a friend, it will not make any difference.
I agree that Facebook and MySpace are becoming a lot alike. The only difference is that Facebook’s apps will load properly where I can rarely get MySpace apps to load. LOL
.-= Charity´s last blog ..No More Calls =-.
Yes, I was not worried either. I would either get my name or I would get my preferred username. If someone tried blondishnet, I would have just reported it to facebook.
I wanted my name, so I was there at 11:59.
It was a minimal hype issue, I’m sure they could have figured out a way for users who were there longer to get their name first. There were a dozen people with my name, although 1/2 didn’t look active, but I wanted mine….
BTW, I got my name. “GaryLaPointe”
.-= Gary LaPointe´s last blog ..Get your FaceBook Vanity Address =-.
You were lucky it was minimal for you. I was seeing it from the crazed side of the reaction spectrum…lol
Got mine, but didn’t expect a challenge. I forgot about it until 15 or 20 minutes after the opening.
The hype was overdone.
Regarding ads – you don’t use AdBlock?
Yeah, I just took my time. I was at a ustream live show watching and listening. It was just ridiculous.
Okay, honesty forces me to admit that I hadn’t really paid any attention to it until I saw a “countdown” tweet. Since I was on anyway, I went and got my username….and still don’t understand the whys or wherefores about the whole thing. Practically speaking, what exactly does it change? Now, if they had donated a dollar for everyone who registered to a charity, then I could see how exciting that would be. I can think of a few to suggest if they ever try this again. 😉
It was funny. At first I was like countdown… this is not NASA! I just about had a flashback from my highschool days when I worked at McDonalds and they did the mini Beanie babies. Now, that was really insane and people actually got hurt from it.
I did not see any fighting, but it was funny how people got worked up about it.
I actually thought about what I wanted even though I knew (http://facebook.com/bloqhead). But the whole thing was overblown and I think Facebook was WAY late on the whole clean URL bus. I feel like Facebook is slowly going the way of MySpace but isn’t that how the whole thing works? One network becomes passe while another new, shiny one comes along to replace it. Then later down the road you rinse and repeat.
We have to be honest here though. Anything is better than MySpace.