Many moons ago, I wrote here on printculture about the prospect of joining Facebook and seeing what my students were up to in their virtual social milieu (at the time, I referred to it as “the Facebook,” that’s how in the know I was). Well, I got as far as signing up—getting a username and establishing a password—but I never did get around to signing on. So, in fact, I still don’t know what Facebook looks or feels like as a social space.

Now, a year and a half later, I’m at a new school in a new city, and I spend even less time online than I used to. But every once in a while, I get an e-mail message saying that someone has tried to “friend” me on Facebook and that I’ll need to confirm that this someone is in fact my friend. I’ve been ignoring these e-mails. (J Lee, I’m sorry!)

I was curious, yes, but by that point, I’d long forgotten my password, and if I’d written it down somewhere, I had no idea where. When I mentioned to a friend that I’d been ignoring these friend requests, he said, oh these people must think you don’t like them, because you’re supposed to indicate whether you want them as a friend or not. Oh great. A twinge of guilt did push me to request my password by clicking on a few links a few months ago; I got a new link or something through which I could establish a new password, and though I put it on my mental to-do list, I waited too long and the opportunity expired. My inertia keeps me unconnected and unfriended (and presumably unfriendly) on Facebook. And at this point, it seems too late to respond to all of these lapsed requests.

It’s strange to think that I have some kind of presence on Facebook that I wasn’t even aware of until I started getting e-mails from (or about) people far and wide, including someone I haven’t seen or talked to in over 20 years and another who could be described as a distant acquaintance at best. It’s these requests from people I barely know that highlight for me the strangeness of this medium of social interaction. Being contacted by those I’m already friends with or already in regular e-mail contact with makes intuitive sense to me (though I ignore these requests just the same). But maybe because I didn’t grow up already acculturated to the world of virtual communities, I feel reluctant to venture into this one. Or maybe I’m resisting because I sense that once I sign on, I’ll be compulsively drawn in, “friending” every name I recognize and spending hours reading people’s profiles to see who they know, etc.

It hasn’t happened yet, though. I did sign up for Friendster, at the invitation of my college friend, and logged on once or twice, but I haven’t gone back or established my own presence there. Somehow, aside from e-mail, and of course printculture, cultivating a virtual social life doesn’t hold that much appeal. And that’s not a value judgment: I do feel on some level that I’m missing out on something, that my late-adopter tendencies – which get worse with age – are leaving me in the techno-social dark ages, which, as a fairly social person, does cause me some worry. But not enough worry, apparently, to do anything about it.

Part of the reluctance, I think, has to do with the sheer mechanical drudgery of logging on. I’m reaching a threshold for the number of times I can plug in a new username and password. Already, I’ve had to write down dozens of passwords for dozens of sites and vendors and services. Of course, I recycle passwords and there are a few variations I work with, but who can keep track of which variation I used for which site?

At my new doctor’s office, I can log on to retrieve test results so I need an ID and password for that site. I could re-order prescriptions online, but I endure the annoying phone tree, because I don’t want to have to go through that process of creating a new account. To make flight reservations for my mom, I use my husband’s Expedia and Travelocity accounts, because the computer’s set to remember them, and I can’t bother to retrieve my own digits. I might buy more things online if they didn’t require me to register. Online bill paying and banking? I get a serious headache just thinking about it. So, maybe if I had less of my life to manage online, I would be more willing to engage socially online.

It’s unclear to me whether all this mediated, regulated access is in fact keeping us secure. And I know that unfettered access is impossible, but there must be a better way. I have no grand conclusion to offer here, but I’m curious to know whether other people experience a similar log-on fatigue or how you manage the password volume. Do you feel your online behavior is affected by access requirements of one sort or another? Or do you just have your computer remember every password you’ve ever come up with? (You can comment without even becoming a printculture member!)