Expert Perspective

Work/Life: Warning to Workaholics: Facebook Is Waiting To Bust You

BY Tom Stern | 05-08-2008 | 11:53 PM

This article is written by a member of our expert contributor community.

The call went out to Facebook users in Leeds, England, and 350 of them responded. Summoned by an impromptu posting on the social networking Web site, the 350 showed up at an award-winning outdoor garden park with water pistols, buckets and, presumably, plenty of uncaring spirit, and proceeded to trash the place. Videos of the destruction have been posted on both Facebook and YouTube.
Well, I’m always looking for the silver lining in the storm cloud, and what I see here is the enormous potential of Facebook to select something to mess with, and instantly organize people around a common goal. Just think what this could do for work/life violations!
The daughter of an overworked businessman is late for soccer practice because her oblivious businessman of a father has forgotten it’s his turn to drive her there. A quick visit to Facebook, an e-mail blast goes out to thousands, and within ten minutes a couple of hundred teenagers have stormed Dad’s office building, working up a smash mix on some turntables and skateboarding in the atrium until the old man gets his butt out of the corner office and goes to where he is needed.
A beleaguered husband, fed up with his workaholic wife’s third speaking engagement in one week, hops onto Facebook and invites the entire population of Naples, Florida (the location of his wife’s leadership conference) to show up at the keynote event wearing nothing but pasties and lederhosen. Bonus Internet credibility if they also bend at the knees while singing “I Feel Pretty.”
Or, a long-suffering wife gets someone in her Facebook entourage to pose as a potential business client for her spouse, except when he shows up to the function room at the local Holiday Inn, it’s for a women’s book group that begins with a ritual four-hour marathon of Oprah on Tivo.
Nothing can turn unsatisfactory behavior around like public humiliation, and the Internet is already full of videos of idiots sliding down ramps into wading pools, or overweight people falling on their butts while attempting some overly-ambitious stunt with a Vespa. It’s time to start posting the everyday transgressions, like clueless behavior towards those you love, that are not only more annoying, but can, potentially, do more lasting damage. So be careful, work-obsessed drones: Facebook is well-positioned in the marketplace…to finally bring you down.