Social media and, for the purposes of this blog specifically Facebook, has transformed the way we access information about other people. Even though most of the information we are exposed to about people isn’t particularly relevant to our lives, or even information that we necessarily need to know, we are nonetheless inundated with it every time we access the Facebook site.

Personally, I assume everything I say, do or write is going to eventually be heard, seen or read by someone, somewhere, and therefore I try to limit engaging in activities I wouldn’t want people to see pictures of the next day, or write things on my blog about myself that I wouldn’t want other people outside of my close circle of friends and family to know about me.

After college I got my first job and during the time leading up to my first day I did my best to track down the pictures other people had posted of me that weren’t, shall we say, flattering. It was during this exercise when I began to realize the true extent of how much my, and pretty much everyone else from my generation’s life, was on Facebook for (depending on your privacy settings) everyone, or at least all of our Facebook friends, to see.

It wasn’t until my junior year of college when Facebook made its’ way to Indiana University. Yet, this still left me with plenty of time to fill my Facebook page, and many of my friends’ pages, with “interesting” pictures, comments and other information. Through the Facebook newsfeed I am inundated every time I log on to the site with information about what my Facebook friends are doing, where they are, and what information and pictures have recently been posted about them or they added to their profiles.

As a result of this newsfeed, and the access that my Facebook friends have to the information and pictures attached to my profile, I have definitely been more careful with who I accept to be my Facebook friend, which includes not only people I meet but also women who I’m seeing. Initially the thought of being Facebook friends with the woman I was dating seemed like a no-brainer since, after all, it was only Facebook; it wasn’t until after going through a break up that I realized being Facebook friends with your ex was a potentially complicated situation.

Even though I have never had a problem being Facebook friends with a woman while we were dating that doesn’t mean there weren’t problem with us being Facebook friends after we broke up…