A colleague who is considering signing up on Facebook wonders whether there might be a journalistic conflict of interest. Once in, as I am, one will be writing about fellow bloggers and other writers who are also Facebook friends. Would this involve any compromise of integrity?
I suspect not, but I hadn’t considered the issue.
Keep in mind the elasticity of that word friend in the context of Facebook. It very nearly encompasses as many categories and individuals as John McCain’s ritual vocative “my friends” during last year’s presidential campaign.
Some of the 400-plus people I'm linked to on Facebook are, in fact, what one would call personal friends. Some are professional colleagues from The Sun, the American Copy Editors Society, and other newspapers; some are fellow teachers; some are my former students; some are fellow bloggers; and some are readers of my blog — the word fan sounds odd, I know — with whom I have scarcely any acquaintance but who asked to be "friended." So it would be a mistake to identify Facebook association with any particular degree of intimacy.
From my perspective, Facebook membership can indicate an association akin to the kind of praise and recommendation other bloggers and I already engage in by pointing out one another's work. Or to put it this way: If I were reviewing a book by an acquaintance, I would disclose that in the review and let the reader make appropriate judgments. I'm not sure that a Facebook association would be any more compromising. If you disagree, please comment.
Whether anyone would want to put up with the inane quizzes and other crap that Facebook throws at its members is a separate issue, as is toleration of friend as a verb.