Monday Rant: To Friend or Not to Friend

The following has been a controversy on social media since American society began wasting hours of valuable time using it. The question is whether or not to add people as friends on a social media network even though you've never met or known them in real life.

Untappd has become it's own version of social media. You can network with other fans of beer and see what your friends are drinking (that's if you have friends that actually take the time to check-in the beers they're consuming. Untappd has also become a simpler way for beer bloggers such as myself to let your Twitter followers know what you're drinking as well as what your thoughts are on said brews.

The only complaint I have about using Untappd is the same thing I've had with any social media application I've associated myself with over the years. That's the people you've never met before trying to add you and others in an attempt to compile tons of friends.

I have a stack of people on Untappd that have requested to be my friend. I've let those requests sit in there for at least two weeks. I'm not totally sure why I refuse to respond. Maybe part of it is the feeling that the entire world doesn't need to know what I'm doing. This is the same reason that I don't post every single check-in to my Twitter feed. It's just a personal preference.

I've pretty much held the same policies when it comes to other social networks such as Facebook. If I don't know you, you're not likely going to get a friend request accepted when it comes to me.

In my early days of Twitter, I'll admit I was obsessed with gaining more and more followers. Now, I barely look at who is following my account.It really doesn't matter to me. Life is far less stressful. It's all about the exchanging of information.