People have been saying in the papers for years now to be careful with who you befriend on social media websites. Last week I found out why.
Like all of you I'm sure I have an eclectic mix of 'friends' and contacts from all parts of my life. Friends, family, old school buddies, people I knew from various societies I was a part of, people from forums like this one, and of course total strangers who I befriended because they support the same footy team I do.
You'd think with about a hundred or so friends I could rely on a few to give me a hand when times got tough. Right?
So I got an email from the club a couple of weeks ago inviting me to a '2011 Legends Dinner'. Those of us who pay $850 in membership fees a year are called Legends, you see. Anyway the whole club was going to be there, as well as the 'most influnetial' supporters, and it was going to be a nice cozy evening in a nice fancy restaurant and you could have a chat with the players, the coach, etc. A fanboy's dream, you could say. And fanboy I am!
So going to this event quickly became a lifelong dream of mine. Unfortunately, tickets to the dinner cost a thousand dollars. Not easy money to come by when you have a mortgage and a hydrolocked car.
Having decided that I wanted to go to this event without paying for it, and ruling out scamming the club out of a thousand bucks, I figured that with 100 facebook friends I could buy the ticket if they each donated to me $10 to help me achieve this lifelong dream of mine.
"I want to go to the Collingwood legends dinner but tickets cost a thousand bucks and I don't have that sort of money handy. I want you all to chip in so I can go. $10 from each of you should cover it."
$10 is nothing compared to the sacred bonds that unite facebook friends. Or so you would think. Not one of my facebook friends came up with the goods. Only two took the time to post and pretend that they didn't have any money.
I am bitterly disillusioned by this experience and I am wondering what on earth facebook is for, since it obviously can't be used to elicit money from strangers.
Like all of you I'm sure I have an eclectic mix of 'friends' and contacts from all parts of my life. Friends, family, old school buddies, people I knew from various societies I was a part of, people from forums like this one, and of course total strangers who I befriended because they support the same footy team I do.
You'd think with about a hundred or so friends I could rely on a few to give me a hand when times got tough. Right?
So I got an email from the club a couple of weeks ago inviting me to a '2011 Legends Dinner'. Those of us who pay $850 in membership fees a year are called Legends, you see. Anyway the whole club was going to be there, as well as the 'most influnetial' supporters, and it was going to be a nice cozy evening in a nice fancy restaurant and you could have a chat with the players, the coach, etc. A fanboy's dream, you could say. And fanboy I am!
So going to this event quickly became a lifelong dream of mine. Unfortunately, tickets to the dinner cost a thousand dollars. Not easy money to come by when you have a mortgage and a hydrolocked car.
Having decided that I wanted to go to this event without paying for it, and ruling out scamming the club out of a thousand bucks, I figured that with 100 facebook friends I could buy the ticket if they each donated to me $10 to help me achieve this lifelong dream of mine.
"I want to go to the Collingwood legends dinner but tickets cost a thousand bucks and I don't have that sort of money handy. I want you all to chip in so I can go. $10 from each of you should cover it."
$10 is nothing compared to the sacred bonds that unite facebook friends. Or so you would think. Not one of my facebook friends came up with the goods. Only two took the time to post and pretend that they didn't have any money.
I am bitterly disillusioned by this experience and I am wondering what on earth facebook is for, since it obviously can't be used to elicit money from strangers.
