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We Poll the Populace: 'What is a Poke?'

by Switched Staff on December 16, 2009 at 12:08 PM

In the cold, dark days pre-Facebook (BFB, as we say in these parts), a "poke" was a polite way a nurse described the feeling of a shot to a patient, or an annoying thing siblings did to each other in the backseat of a car. When we signed up for the Web wonderland that is The Book, there were several options underneath a person's profile: "Message This Person", "Report This Person", "Add This Person as a Friend," and "Poke This Person." When our parents logged on, they frantically called us, demanding to know what sort of sick world we encouraged them into. "What was a 'poke?'" They begged, and is it bad that they did it to Uncle Artie?

What we told them: A poke is not much, actually. A friendly way of saying hi, an online method of flirting, or even a prelude to a threat. The problem with pokes is that, five years after Facebook launched, we don't know the proper response. A poke back, and then back again, threatening to evolve into a never-ending poke war? Ignore it and let it fester on our home page? Delete the poke and get on with our life? The best advice is, just confront it head on, and send a message, "Hey, (no) thanks for the poke." We have complicated thoughts on the complex matter, so we took to the streets to see if the New York public could more adequately tell us what exactly the elusive poke was. Check out the video after the break.

Tags: facebook, facebook poke, FacebookPoke, features, poke, switchedvideo, top, video

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