The Myspace Creeps

I'm as free-spirited as the next guy when it comes to Myspace. Despite how creepy I first felt when friending a young person that might like my books, I think Myspace has potential to be a sweet networking tool.

Yet, it still gives me the creeps now and then.

Admitededly, it has flaws. Among them, the fact that bulletins are primarily used to spread eons old urban myths or wacky hoaxes.

Today, Princess A got a bulletin announcing that Ben Savage - the actor from that show, Boy Meets World, had died of a fatal accident.

When she told me, I thought it strange. I'm an entertainment junkie. I figured I would have seen it on Yahoo headlines or something. I read the bulletin over her shoulder - two things struck me as odd:

1) It said he died Sept. 16th. Well today is the 24th. By now, if it were true some media source would have confirmed it.

2) It said "fatal accident" but not specifically a car, bungee jumping or eaten by his pet spider type of accident. Just seemed too vague.

I told her to google it. And of course, it was a hoax.

So, yes, my number one Myspace pet peeve are the friggin' hoaxes. It's as if the thought to use the bulletins to spread real info like - Dude, party at my house in an hour - never crossed people's mind.

But the hoaxes are annoying, not creepy.

What can be, for me, is not knowing who to trust when approving a friend.

Myspace is pretty anonymous. Most of my friends are fellow writers and potential readers. I love networking with other writers. But the downside to this is that sharing the craft of writing in common is not necessarily enough, sometimes.

I'm an author of YA fiction and many of my Myspace friends are young girls. I can't just friend anyone and open my friend list to potential pervs and wackos.

If even half the people on Myspace are like me, they'll likely approve someone if they see that person on a trusted friend's page.

Ahhh...see what I'm getting at?

I once had this dude who had written a book in German friend me. On the surface, not a big deal. But ahh...if his book is in German how do I know what it's saying? It could be saying - Kill all the black writers whose name begin with P.

Boy would I look stupid being pal-sy with him.

I'm also frequently approached by writers of erotica. Some of them have tame sites. But some of them are damn near porn!

Again, for the sake of my young Myspace friends, I'm not comfortable at all with this.

And I know that most times, my friends are buried deep enough within my pages of fellow Myspacers that it may not make a difference. But, tweens and teens have way more time on their hands than I do.

If they have nothing else to do but peruse a few pages of friends, they could happen across some weird shit.

I'm especially creeped out by men who friend me. Not ALL men. But really random guys. It's obvious from my page that I'm 1) a writer and 2) a writer of girly YA.

So when some random guy friends me who isn't a fellow writer or the occasional band (since I'm listed under the bands) it freaks me out.

The ones I'm especially leery of are the men who are writers (or claim to be) and yet, from their page I can't really tell they're writers.

Let's keep it real, writers on Myspace are all about talking about their latest work, latest trial or trib in the biz or inquiring about how to go about getting published. So we're not hard to identify.

I'm totally not a prude.

I'm a fairly liberal parent. Neither Myspace, television or the radio are raising my kids. Me and the hubster are. So I don't freak about what Princess A may encounter. I'm there to help explain the scary, inappropriate and sometimes, just plain bizarre things she may come across in her web travels.

But, something about how casually people friend one another gets me.

Yes, yes, it's about networking.

Still, if you're an erotica author and your page has photos of a guy with his abs all oiled up and his hands down his pants...ummm...do you really think I want any of my cliquesters to come across your page through mine?

The answer would be, NO!