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Call them, shoot them an email, or pay them a visit. Not only can you stay in touch, it will also likely be a more satisfying interaction than browsing a feed.

icebraining 11y ago
Lots of us live far away from our extended families, and phone calls don't really replace seeing pictures of your nephews. Email might, but in my experience since FB came around, people aren't all that interested in regularly sending emails just for you - I'm told that I should just join FB like everyone else.
- unclebucknasty 11y ago
  That is partly my point: I don't tend to think of replacing one-on-one interaction with a "broadcast" pub/sub model as being more conducive to building and maintaining intimate, fulfilling relationships.
  - icebraining 11y ago
    I think you're painting a false dichotomy, though. Using Facebook as a way to keep track of your family's pictures stream doesn't prevent you from interacting with them one-on-one - in fact, it might enhance it!
    - unclebucknasty 11y ago
      It's definitely possible, and I'd guess it does enhance for some. But, I don't believe it's generally the case, as it's not a format that encourages it. Instead, I believe it discourages more focused one-on-one relationship-building in favor of a bi-directional consumption model. People don't interact as much as publish and consume. Knowing what people are doing is not a real substitute for intimacy, but I think the dependence on FB as the medium tends to relegate people to the former (i.e. just keeping up). In any case, I was responding specifically to an ancestor who stated that he/she was having trouble keeping in touch outside of FB. That makes my point: people tend to be so reliant on FB to manage their relationships, that those relationships evaporate sans FB to the point that people don't even communicate! But, of course, while on FB, people don't generally have meaningful, in-depth conversations. That pretty much says it all, as it doesn't leave much space for real relationships. Not saying this is absolute, but that it is a net negative.

icebraining 11y ago

Lots of us live far away from our extended families, and phone calls don't really replace seeing pictures of your nephews. Email might, but in my experience since FB came around, people aren't all that interested in regularly sending emails just for you - I'm told that I should just join FB like everyone else.

unclebucknasty 11y ago
That is partly my point: I don't tend to think of replacing one-on-one interaction with a "broadcast" pub/sub model as being more conducive to building and maintaining intimate, fulfilling relationships.
- icebraining 11y ago
  I think you're painting a false dichotomy, though. Using Facebook as a way to keep track of your family's pictures stream doesn't prevent you from interacting with them one-on-one - in fact, it might enhance it!
  - unclebucknasty 11y ago
    It's definitely possible, and I'd guess it does enhance for some. But, I don't believe it's generally the case, as it's not a format that encourages it. Instead, I believe it discourages more focused one-on-one relationship-building in favor of a bi-directional consumption model. People don't interact as much as publish and consume. Knowing what people are doing is not a real substitute for intimacy, but I think the dependence on FB as the medium tends to relegate people to the former (i.e. just keeping up). In any case, I was responding specifically to an ancestor who stated that he/she was having trouble keeping in touch outside of FB. That makes my point: people tend to be so reliant on FB to manage their relationships, that those relationships evaporate sans FB to the point that people don't even communicate! But, of course, while on FB, people don't generally have meaningful, in-depth conversations. That pretty much says it all, as it doesn't leave much space for real relationships. Not saying this is absolute, but that it is a net negative.