Last week I was doing my usual sift through recent Facebook status updates on a mobile app, in an effort to avoid X-Factor. After ignoring not only every group or fan page update (Please support this charity, dates for my next tour, etc) but also the mounting afore mentioned X-Factor posts of disgust at one Wagner, I realised that the only things most of my 273 ‘friends’ would post about were about their child’s latest toilet escapades, how great life was being to them, or self-demoting posts aimed at gaining sympathy from equally bored posters.

Something in me changed at that moment. Snapped is too harsh a word, but it will do in this case. I realised that for the past 3 years of having a Facebook account I have been hunting around trying to add just one more person who vaguely remembers me from school, had a fleeting conversation with at college, chatted to on an internet forum, or even know of though a friend and ends up accepting my request for the same reason I added them… to give me another number to my friend list. Only 2 people I went to senior school with I still speak to (and are very good friends with to this day), a handful of people from college, half a dozen from the internet, and definitely none from anywhere else!

So, my question to myself was: What is the point?

Recently I have made huge efforts to improve my professional connections via various methods, including Twitter, LinkedIn, and this blog. These connections are important to me in my efforts to improve my career and professional publicity, as well as keeping in touch with some brilliant, knowledgeable and generally worth knowing individuals and companies. On face value I would appear to have done exactly the same here, but actually in this case every one of my professional connections I have an interest in, communicate with or do business with currently. These are my active connections.

So returning to my social connections, 273 ‘friends’; now basing on the premise that I want active connections (friends). Moreover, removing the extremely complex method I am forced to use to only expose particular information to particular groups of ‘friends’, because lets face it, that guy who used to pick on you at school who you added thinking he can’t still be a complete pratt, do you really want to let him know that you are going on holiday? Will your car still be there when you return?

The point for me finally sunk in when I couldn’t (through laziness) filter out just to keep up to date with my ‘real’ current friends, you know, the ones you actually see or have seen in the last 5 years. No only do I not want to tell them about myself, or know about their latest night of passion with a complete stranger, but I don’t want to be associated with them at all.

Because the bottom line is, if I wanted to be a ‘friend’, then I would have seen you in the last 10 years!

PS I would have also told you not to have had so many children before your 21st!

Anywho, Facebook friends now totals 74, and I feel fresh as a daisy! If you like to chat to me more about this, add me on Facebook at.... never mind!