You’re out at a bar or a frat and meet this totally nice, cool, down to earth guy (please let me come out with you, where do these people exist?). The only next logical step in pursuing a relationship with this gem that you’ve found is to Facebook stalk him…obviously. Calling him to go out to lunch is so pre-2007. You need to do a brief (extensive) background check to see whether this guy is really as smooth as you thought he was the other night at Cannon’s when you were 4 shots deep. There are many characteristics about a guy’s Facebook page that can tell you if he is worth pursuing.
You type in his name in the search bar (congrats, you remembered it after all that tequila!) and immediately see that you only have 2 friends in common. Although this might be a chance for you to meet some new people and expand your horizons, or whatever it is we’re supposed to be doing in college, it might also be difficult to casually run into this guy without intensely creeping on him beforehand…
· As you continue to browse his page you see that the first 20 pictures he is tagged in include at least one girl drunkenly draped across his body. If in most of the pictures he is looking elsewhere or is tilting his upper body away from his female parasite you can probably assume that he is just as repulsed by this behavior as you are. However, if he is actively engaging by putting his arms around her and smiling at her, chances are that these two are more than just friends. If he does this with multiple girls, you might also consider the fact that he is a player.
· All of his profile pictures include the same girl, and there is a bunch with them in different sets of formal wear. Girlfriend alert. Move on. Your drunken 30-minute conversation about how much you both love sea otters does not mean you are soul mates. You will find someone else whom you can connect with on that level.
· Most of his pictures include him raging with his bros. Though this clearly indicates that he is social (something that can be rare at Columbia) and likes to have fun, it might also mean that he is more committed to getting belligerent with his friends than focusing on a girlfriend.
· All of his pictures are of him standing alone in front of various famous international architectural sites carrying a backpack, wearing hiking boots and calf-high socks with his t-shirt tucked into his basketball shorts. Dork alert. People usually travel with friends. And with their t-shirts un-tucked. But hey, Seth Cohen proved that dorks are totally cool and fun to date, so don’t write him off right away. Maybe he’ll take you with him on these adventures to the Empire State Building?
· He has privacy settings that don’t let you see his pictures. He threw us a curveball, how sneaky! This does tell you that he is conscious of potential stalkers and might be having too much fun in some of his pictures that he doesn’t want the university or future employers to discover. However, it does not give you hints about his relationship status and cohorts. Maybe he’s trying to hide something. Maybe he’s a CIA spy! Maybe he’s in the Italian mob! But to find out you’ll sadly have to just approach him the old-fashioned way and send him a coy text asking him to hang out that doesn’t seem too desperate and that maybe even sounds like you don’t really want to hang out with him anyway you’re just SO BORED and was JUST WONDERING what he was up to. How high school.
If Facebook doesn’t tell you what you need to know about this guy, never fear, there are plenty of other ways to learn more about him. Stalking his Twitter, LinkedIn, and residence hall are all options. So is actually talking to him and his friends. But let’s hope that Mark Zuckerberg’s creation doesn’t let us down.