Oh Facebook, You’re No Shakespeare!

Social media is a key tool in being sociable. What gave that away huh?! But how sociable can you really be with just 140 characters like on Twitter? Or 500 like on Facebook? Yes private messages and wall posts allow for longer ways of communication but that’s simply no good if you want to send out a message to everyone in your network, ie, the entire point of a Facebook update. So Facebook have come up with a solution. The 63,000 character Facebook update! Or 63,206 characters to be exact…

What This Means

This is excellent news for people who are sociable and have close friends and family on their profiles. For example, if you are travelling for 6 months and want to “Update” your nearest and dearest, Facebook will now let you send a report via statuses. This is great for the traveller as they have published their news where everyone they care about can see it without having to send it to loads of people via emails etc. It’s a time saver and a incredibly convenient. After all, when you’re on your holidays, you don’t want to be sat at the computer telling everyone the only thing you had time to do all week is email all 200 of your friends…

Who knows, with that many characters going spare, you may publish something wonderful, be scouted and become the next big thing. It’s a long shot but never say never!

For businesses it would be useful, can bash out a lengthy detailed update about any new offers or why people should be buying from you without having to compromise on detail and grammar.

It’s also great if you like a good rant or have a lot to say. Just think of the arguments or views you could put across fluently and eloquently in 63,000 characters! The Internet is a place for free speech, you sure could use it to your advantage if you have something to say! Whether or not anyone read it is a different matter though…

However, it’s not all good news. Personally, I see someone’s status and think “why oh why do you think anyone cares?” So if you think that about a normal 500 character one, imagine how brain dead and comatose you would be when you see someone has essentially written a book as their Facebook status. And that’s before you even read it. No one wants to be on a site as foot loose and fancy free as Facebook to be met with a barrage of lengthy self opinionated statuses. It would be fine once or twice but as soon as it looks like it would be a normal occurrence from that friend, you would reach for the “Block” or “Unfriend” button pretty damn quickly.

Fun Trivia

You may have an idea that 63,206 characters is a lot and you would be right. So exactly what could you fit in this vast amount of space? Here is a list of a few fun things that would fit in a new Facebook update  (give or take) according to Mashable:

1- A move script such as “Bambi”

2 – The U.S Constitution (Twice)

3 – Shakespeare’s “Comedy Of Errors”

Let us know what you would fit into 63,206 characters!

~ Reference’s made in this post: http://mashable.com/2012/01/04/facebook-character-limit/#411293-4515-Full-Tweets

~Image source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonynetone/2688212829