10 ways we depended on social networking before Facebook was born

Facebook turns 10 today. It’s hard to imagine my current life without this social platform, but I was lucky to grow up in such a rapidly expanding technological age, and experience internet communication as it first developed.

Here are ten methods of social networking that even Mark Zuckerberg probably used before he invented Facebook:

1. Instant Messaging

My my, the things we thought we could get away with in an IM. And of course, the Away Message was the precursor for the Status Update…

2. TV show parties

12 of us would cram into someone’s living room on a Tuesday night to watch the latest episode of 90210. Microwave popcorn, and Skittles, were usually involved.

3. Sat in parking lots and talked

This also occurred in empty school yards, pizza parlors, and the occasional soccer field.

4. Wrote letters

How were you going to communicate with the cute boy you met at camp, who had a different area code than you, and thus would rack up long-distance telephone rates?!

5. Passed notes in school

“Circle ‘yes’ or ‘no’ if you like me.”

6. Burn books

Yes, these were real things. Consider them to be the original “trolls.”

7. 3 hour phone conversations

You had to stay on the phone that long, because you didn’t know when your parents would let you use it again.

8. Internet chat rooms

Don’t forget the obligatory A/S/L.

9. Mailing party invitations and thank-you notes

I’ve yet to receive a physical thank-you note from the seven weddings I attended last year. People seem to think “Thx 4 the gift!” posted on my Facebook wall is sufficient.

10. Myspace

We all became amateur HTML coders so we could customize “our space.”