Do You Ever Do A 'Sweep' Of Facebook Friends?

[Saphire]

I just removed several of my 'friends' from Facebook. If I haven't spoken to you in six months or more, then what is the point?

It reminds me of those people that clean out your house. If you haven't used it in a year, then it needs to go. It is actually very liberating.

 

[handinpocket]

Um, no. If you aren't my true life friend in the first place, I don't friend you.

 

[LoraJ]

The only ones I removed were the ones I had friended just for a game.

 

[ilovepcot]

I did a huge sweep a few weeks ago and am so glad. I only "friend" people I know IRL...not friends of friends I "sorta, kinda almost know" like many people do. But, when you haven't had any dealings with many friends in quite a while, what's the point? I only kept the ones I am in contact with on a regular basis. Many of the ones I did a sweep on will probably never even realize it.

 

[Shutterbug]

I do this with everything yahoo messenger, email, etc....

Like an above poster said if I barely hear from you, you get removed.

I know some people that friend or accept everyone...just to say ohhh look how many "friends" I have.

 

[Disneyland1084]

I just removed over 40 people from my FB friends list in the last week. I admit when I first joined FB over two years ago, I added a lot of people I never really knew, only because I was curious as to how they were doing. The ones I deleted were people that never said hello on my wall or anything, or they had over 1,000 friends. If I send a friend request now, it's only to people I know.

 

[disykat]

I have only have about 20 friends on facebook I really keep up with. Everyone else is there because I didn't want to ignore a request. I just hide them on my feed. I don't really feel the need to clean house.

 

[Eagle-]

Exactly, after 15 or 20 years it was nice to see who was doing what,
who got married, where people were, but I haven't talked to them in 15 years.
They aren't 'friends' anymore, they are acquaintances.
I think I cleared about 120 people out of my list.
Of them only 2 people asked to be re-friended.

 

[pearlieq]

Yes. I just did my first sweep and I'm really glad.

My problem was that when I first joined Facebook I got a bit giddy. I looked up old high school and college friends, and accepted friend requests from people I barely remembered. It was just the novelty of the experience.

Once I realized that I barely knew these people and that I really didn't care how their aquarium was doing, I went though and just unfriended anyone that I didn't speak to regularly. It's much less cluttered now and I feel a little less exposed.

 

[jelloarms]

My policy on FB friends is that if I see you in public but will pretend to NOT see you or just ignore you, then I will not friend you on FB.

There are some people from high school that want to friend me and in high school they didn't even like me! So why would they want to be my friend now? They just want to see my pictures and I refuse to give them the satisfaction.

What I really hate is when co-workers friend me. Co-workers that I am not even close to and I rarely talk to. But I friend them anyway to prevent bad blood.

 

[Tinijocaro]

I know some people that friend or accept everyone...just to say ohhh look how many "friends" I have.

Do you really thing people do that?

 

[MushyMushy]

I only did it once to unfriend people I'd had for Mafia Wars. I have somewhere around 350 friends. No, I don't know all those people, but I still wouldn't do a "sweep" of them. I'm also not trying to be "popular" or collect friends.

A very few I've communicated online with somehow (DIS, a parenting forum I used to frequent), but most of them are people from my town that I'd gone to school with. I'm involved with planning our class reunion, so I have most people from my graduating class to send out updates. I go to "all-class" reunions, so I have a lot of those people on my list. I see a lot of these people out and about in town and even though we'd never really talked in person, we have a good time joking around online and now that extends to real life.

There's one woman I'd never been more than passing acquaintance to since we were kids, and she has since become one of my dearest friends thanks to our interactions on FB.

Anyway, I guess that long-winded post was just to say, it is what you make it. If you want a smaller circle of close friends, then there's nothing wrong with that at all. But please don't diminish those of us who might have more that extends to just acquaintances and/or strangers. We all have our reasons. FB was a blessing to me after losing both my mother and one of my best friends a year and a half ago, and continues to provide me entertainment and friendship today.

 

[LuvOrlando]

Good for you! I only say yes to or invite people I actually like or did like. Some are old friends and some are new, but I must seriously have considered them a friend at some point in order to say yes otherwise it's like inviting a Peeping Tom into my life. Too weird.

I also do think some people say yes just to up their numbers. Seriously, how could it be possible to ACTUALLY know well and genuinely like 600+ people? No way.