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Don't mislead me with your status message!

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CIOL Bureau
New Update

MUMBAI, INDIA: Being a member of social networking sites is becoming a fad in today's digital world. For many users, the social networking sites have been the prime witness to happy re-union stories of old time friends, relatives, peers and others.

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However, for some, the social networking experience hasn't been so good and happy like the others. For them it has been a bit sad, confusing and bitter and that changed their lives to an extent. The reason for such experiences is the online status messages — like 'single', 'committed', 'married' or 'complicated' - displayed on the users' profile of social networking sites.

For Mumbai-based techie Viraj Sharma, it was a great moment to meet old school mates on Orkut and Facebook after a span of 14 years. “I saw a picture of my classmate with her daughter and was happy that she is married and settled in the US,” Sharma says.

It was after a few scraps (messages) between Sharma and his friend that they both started talking on Google Gtalk. One day, while chatting, he was shocked to know that his friend has been divorced since two years and leading a difficult life.

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“What shocked me is her 'married' status message on her profile, although she was divorced,” Sharma explains, while recalling the moment that shocked and confused him.

It was a joyous moment for Gujarat-based accountant Mehul Desai, to find his school friend Amit Patel, who too was a bachelor like him.

“Among our batch, only about 2-3 persons are unmarried today and rest all are settled in life. So when I found my friend (Amit) on Orkut, I felt that I am not the only one bachelor here, since Amit had a single status on his profile,” Desai says.

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However, the joy didn't last long; one day Desai came to know about Patel's life from a common friend.

“One of our common friends told me that Amit was married and had moved to UK some two years before; however, his marriage didn't work and so had to go for a divorce. So he (Amit) had the single status,” Desai explains how he was misled by the 'single' status message.

While, the 'single' status misled Desai, Anne D'Souza, a PR executive from Mumbai was shocked to see the 'single' status of her brother-in-law on Facebook. D'Souza says, “My elder brother-in-law is actually married, has wife and two kids but still showed the 'single' status, which to me is absolute cheating — he is cheating friends and others on the social networks as well as in real life.”

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In another cheating instance, Priyanka Mehta, a PR trainee from the city, says that her friends have formed a group on Facebook, where all the friends discuss everything about their life and day-to-day activities.

“While we interact on Facebook, we also do meet regularly; however, recently I found that my best friend is actually dating someone and is in a relationship,” she says, adding, “Though my friend was in a relationship, she didn't change her 'single' status and so it is surely cheating.”

According to her it's an unfair practice to use false status messages.

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It's quiet interesting to know how the small information given by status messages created different impact on other people and showed how these messages are able to give wrong information or impression to others.

But for Remya Shetty, a young journalist from Chennai, displaying 'committed' status message on her Orkut profile is a clever and smart way to evade unknown or strange visitors' friendship requests.

“I am a single girl so there would be males interested to have online relationship with me. I don't want to have such online relationships but do want to maintain friendships with my real-life pals, whom I know very well,” Shetty explains the logic behind her 'committed' status sign.

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However, all girls are not as smart and clever as her. Mamta Panchal, a graduate from Gujarat, mentioned the 'committed' status message on her profile, because she actually had a relationship and wanted to marry her boyfriend. However, her love affair broke up and the marriage dream shattered. The story didn't end there. One day she got a a friend request from a stranger which she casually accepted, not knowing that it was her uncle.

That was it! Her family came to know all about her 'shady' activities on the social networking site. It was Panchal's 'committed' status message that caused tsunami in her life as her uncle collected all her personal information and 'social networking history' by reading the scraps sent by Panchal to her boyfriend.

With the rise in such complex incidents, specially pertaining younger generations, many social media experts advise users to be careful about their personal details and messages posted on social networking sites and suggests to give up the casual approach of making more friends on the Internet.

(Disclaimer- People’s names in the story have been changed for privacy and security reasons.)

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