Happy Birthday

(Sing the below verse to the tune of "Happy Birthday")
Happy birthday to youuuu
Happy birthday to youuu
Happy BIRTHday, dear Faaaaacebooooook
Happy birthday tooooo youuuuu!

That's right. Twelve years ago today a young Harvard student decided to come up with a way for people to be in touch with each other on a virtually constant basis with just a few clicks of a keyboard.

Now you too can find out the last time someone took out the garbage or blew their nose or got a divorce-which is pretty much what it's come down to if you peruse some of the posts.

Yet, here I am, a Facebook member.  I must admit there are things I like about it.  I do get to keep in touch with colleagues, friends or distant family who I otherwise would not know a thing about.  Very often, that's not so bad but being the busybody I am, I like to snoop-to a point.  I finally realized I can block some of the more obnoxious posts without 'unfriending' people so that's what I do.

There is an aspect of Facebook though that's very troubling-cyberbullying.  It happens way too often among young people and sometimes leads to tragic results. 

For this reason-among many others-I feel sorry for parents these days.  Add social networking to the very, very long list of things they must now monitor and worry about.  Of course it isn't just Facebook.  There are lots of other social networking sites to keep track of as well.  All in the good name of technological progress. 

Ah, for the good old days when all we had to worry about was polio and smallpox and the bomb.