Throwback Thursday: 11 Things I Miss About Old Facebook

Back when Facebook was cool (because we all know it’s not anymore), we did much more on the website than share BuzzFeed articles and post pictures of ourselves in LoFi or Valencia. We communicated with other people (like, directly). We shared feelings. We shared inside jokes. We shared our lives basically. Many older people would argue that we still do that on Facebook, and we do — but to a smaller degree.

Here are some things I miss that I used to do on Facebook. Get ready to get all nostalgic because yes, Facebook is now associated with nostalgia (the site IS almost 9 years old).

1. Sharing Bumper Stickers. This was, like, such a weird phenomenon. I used to post bumper stickers like it was my job. Whether it was lyrics to a rap song, an inspirational quote, a funny picture, or an ecard (I believe that Facebook bumper stickers gave birth to ecards) I was posting it. Soon enough, the craze faded. Then, Facebook bumper stickers basically got their own website. It’s called Pinterest. Have you heard of it?

2. Checking “Wall-To-Walls.” Before you could check two peoples’ friendship, you checked their wall-to-wall. Basically, all we cared about back then was writing shit on people’s walls… and checking to see what other people wrote on other people’s walls. If we wanted to see if so-and-so had a history, we would check their wall-to-wall. If we wanted to get all nostalgic with an ex or old friend, we would check our wall-to-wall. If we wanted to watch a relationship or fight unfold between two people, hello wall-to-wall. It was so easy to stalk. Now, we have to check out friendships… ughhhh.

3. Playing Jetman. I am not one to get into stupid games and apps. I don’t know what Candy Crush is and I blocked everyone who suggested I join their fucking farm. BUT for some reason I was addicted to jetman. Boy could that guy move. It was a goal to beat your friends because your scores would show up on your wall and their walls.. and then on newsfeed. BRING BACK JETMAN.

4. Joining Networks. In a land before status making, we cared about our ‘networks.’ Originally, you could only be in a college network. Then you could be in a high school network. THEN, you could be in a city’s network… and then they realized that meant anyone could join so networks went away. I still miss “Ithaca ’10” being associated with my name.

5. Poking people. Not that I ever did this… Poking was always weird to me. It was usually done by a creep and meant absolutely nothing. Soon SuperPoke was added where you could high five a friend… or chest bump them… or something weird like that, instead of the boring old poke. Eventually pokes went away and that was that. But now there’s an app for poking, which is weird. Because no one was into poking in the first place.

6. Writing Notes. How many stupid quizzes did I answer 60-90 questions for and then post to the public platform of Facebook? It was all like “when was your last kiss” and “what did you have for dinner” and “do you prefer boxers or briefs?” I think this was me not being able to let go of MySpace, but that’s a conversation for a different time. In addition to quizzes, there was also the note where you listed 25 things people didn’t know about you… and then the one where you tagged people and had them write about their best memories with you in the comments. I have to admit, I did love a good note. And now I’m a blogger. So it makes sense.

7. Joining/Creating Facebook Groups. Here’s an example. But, like, picture a private group with your friends talking about who everyone has hooked up with (aka each other) and other inside jokes. People made groups such as “You know you went to ___ high school when…” and also made groups dedicated to sports teams and college. Now, we just have “fan pages” which is not nearly as exclusive and fun. Oh well.

8. Changing my profile to Pirate language and thinking it was funny. I’ll spy your portraits.

9. Updating my “about” page. No one updates their about info anymore because if you do, it will be ALL OVER NEWSFEED. Back in the day though, if you had a change in heart about a certain band or TV show, you could erase it easily or add a new one in without having to worry about your updates being shown to the general public. Many people had fun with their interests and made jokes. You could even see if anyone else in your network had similar interests to you by clicking on the hyperlink. Now, everyone is in the same network: Social Media Land.

10. Giving Gifts. This was weird because it cost money, but for some reason I think I actually PAID MONEY to send people stupid pictures. What was wrong with me? I do remember there being a free gift though… It was a poisonous apple… and people kept sending it to me anonymously… because you could send anonymous gifts. Now you can send real gifts on Facebook like gift cards to Target and Starbucks. LAME. Bring back the pictures!

There was also the dick-in-a-box and thong. Those were Facebook favorites.

11. Updating my status via “Facebook for Blackberry” without having to worry about being annoying. Although I was annoying. But it was okay, because so was everyone else. There were no check ins back then. No way to post a quick picture from your iPhone by way of Instagram showing what you were doing. You had to update your status. And you couldn’t just write ANYTHING because they put “is” in front of your name… making it be like “Samantha IS ____.” In addition to writing what you were doing or feeling (For ex: Samantha is NEVER DRINKING AGAIN.. UGHHH), everyone could see where you were writing it from. Were you on your BLACKBERRY?

Facebook newsfeed literally told everyone what mobile device you were using. The iPhone industry should have paid them for that advertisement (only cool people have iPhones). Ugh, I really miss when Facebook was like this. It makes me think of college. And I WANT TO GO BACK. FUCK.