Facebook Loses Face

A few weeks ago, after hearing about the wonders of Facebook from my girlfriend and my daughter, I decided to give it a try. It was an amusing (if not information-overloading) way to pass the time, and I did, in fact, connect with some people I hadn't seen or heard from in quite a while. I also found it gratifying that my daughter accepted me as one of her "friends" on Facebook, as did my niece and nephew -- both of whom had declined an invitation from their mother (my sister) to become her "friend." I also got my somewhat skeptical mother ("Isn't Facebook for young people?") to join, and simultaneously advised/threatened my niece and nephew to accept their grandmother's invitation to be her friend if she invited them to do so.

Anyway, all was well in the Facebook world -- until last week when my Facebook "friends" received a notice that I had changed my email address to lyndel_james6@verizonmail.com. Some friends thought it was me just goofing around. It wasn't. It was an unauthorized change to my account. As a result, I have been locked out of my Facebook account for about a week, while somebody named "Lyndel James6" presumably has control of it. I contacted Facebook to let them know of the apparent snafu. (BTW, Facebook doesn't do customer service over the phone. You have to write to them via email and wait for them to respond.) It's been three emails from me and a week now, and Facebook still hasn't responded. The whole matter was somewhat frustrating and annoying, but not terribly urgent. Friends (real friends in the real world) were monitoring my Facebook page and communications for me, and not much was happening. Until today.

Today started with a phone call from my niece in Pennsylvania. Her voicemail went something like this: "Hi, Uncle Mike. Wanted to let you know that I got an email about you today that said you had died in London. I figured out it was bogus because I knew you weren't in London, but then when I closed the email, my computer kind of went crazy, so I think there was a virus attached to the bogus email. Just wanted to let you know!" A short while later, I got an email from my daughter telling me that she and several other people on Facebook had received a message from me (aka Lyndel James6) saying that I was stranded in London and needed money (because I was "in deep shit after Christmas").

As you might guess, both messages were bogus (the one about needing money a little less so than the one about being dead, but bogus nonetheless), and I have spent most of the day today writing to family and friends to let them know that I'm not dead and that I don't need money -- but if they do feel inclined to send money, please send it to the real Mike O'Mary and not to my friend, Lyndel.

All of this serves to remind me that while virtual communities like Facebook are, for the most part, good clean fun, there's still something to be said for old-fashioned face-to-face communication. Lyndel isn't fooling anybody as it is. He'd have an even more difficult time showing up at the homes of my family and friends and trying to pass himself off as me.

On the other hand, maybe some of them would welcome the change...