First off, I only filled in the absolute minimum amount of info when creating the account. I also did NOT include my real location as that would make things too easy for Facebook.
Secondly, during the initial phase I am not allowed to add anyone. I can only add those who have sent me "friend" requests.
Lastly, if someone asks me if I'm on Facebook I have to tell them the truth. Arghh...this one was tougher than I thought it would be as I'm still not proud of it ;)
The idea behind the first two above was simple: I want to randomize the experiment as much as possible. Having your true location makes its too easy for people to find you. Adding people yourself takes away much of the randomness of how your friends group grows. I'll admit, though I haven't yet added anyone, I have let it slip a time or two that I had an account
and told a couple of people to send me friend requests - sort of cheating.
Well, that's pretty much it for the idea. As of this post, I have 25 friends - mostly family members. I probably have another 20 unanswered friend requests which I have had to purposely hold up because I kept procrastinating on this blog thing. In my next post I will
recount how it has gone thus far and then after that, I can approve some of the requests and really see it grows. Like I mentioned before, it would have been much better to have started the blog concurrently with the account but oh well, nothing I can do about that now.
"Procrastination is like masturbation. At first it feels good, but in the end you're only screwing yourself. " -Author Unknown
