Narcissus tagged you in the note "25 Random Things About Me"

You may have noticed the recent wave of Facebook notes titled "25 Random Things About Me". When I say may have noticed, I mean probably didn't notice because you have no friends, Facebook or otherwise. Those of us who do have at least fake-life friends have noticed, so I will speak for this crowd and fill you in.

Popular people can hardly log into Facebook anymore without noticing that they've (we've) been tagged in several people's notes. Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits or goals about you, according to the official rules. These are rules that we are all bound to by some mysterious online rulemaking body. Break them at your own risk, man! Presumably after you've divulged over two dozen "random" things about yourself (note to world: please grab a dictionary sometime), you are to pay it forward by tagging 25 of your own friends. The aforementioned rulemaking body says that you do this because you're interested in learning 25 random things about those people, too. It's okay, you can trust them. They're the internet.

Make no mistake, this is an epidemic, says today's Boston Globe. The article decries the phenomenon for giving rise to narcissism, impropriety, and--egads!--online clutter. Tales of the horror of crowded email inboxes and the woe of decent, hard-working folks being required to stomach the existance of their friend's 11th toe abound in the Globe's call to action. The article presumably had to go to the presses before they could tackle the issue of a newspaper paying staff during a recession to cover a Facebook non-event, but I'm sure that that writeup is coming soon.

In the meantime, where does that leave us, the community of Facebookers that people actually care about (i.e., myself, my friend Todd, the ShamWow guy, etc.)? Part of the reason behind the popularity of "25 Things" is the open format. Whereas other chain-letter-type surveys come with existing questions, this note allows you to dictate 100% of the content and the pace at which it is delivered. Most internuts lack the creativity to write their own survey and find the one they received last week to not accurately reflect how quirky, humorous, and deep they are. However, when asked to discuss themselves over twenty five lines (or paragraphs, for you junior Hemingways), they are more than willing. After all, they are quirky, humorous, and deep. And repeat buzzwords in lieu of topic-specific substance.

Side note! Hipsters teach us that it's never cool to be really into a fad or trend while everyone else is (unless you like it ironically--then it's funny). I enjoy the reactive note titles like "I gave in..." or "I said I wouldn't do this, but...". They want us to know that they tried to hold out, but in the end, it was just too hard to simply not write a score and a quarter points about themselves and broadcast it.

I politely suggest that it might be worth considering the argument that if I don't know something about one of my close friends, it's probably not that important. If I don't know something about a casual friend but want to, I should get to know that person better. I think by stating my case this way, I can offend less people than if I told the general public that most people aren't that interesting or unique.

Nevertheless, in conclusion, within the month this one will go the way of most email surveys, the "Beautiful Truck", and Bob Saget's third wave of coolness. I calmly entreaty the Globe to let the Facebook community have their harmless fun, and devote front-page space to more important news, such as the boston.com snowplow game.