I was happy to change my status to let my few hundred Facebook contacts know that I agree with the statements "No one should die because they cannot afford health care, and no one should go broke because they get sick."

If you want to try to cynically boil it down to a PR ploy, that's your prerogative. For me, it's a quick way to express a heartfelt opinion about healthcare to my friends.

This is great for those who are actually on Facebook. The other 95% of the world haven't a clue.

Do you have any thought-provoking comments on the subject that you would like to share? Or just empty criticisms of the desire of thousands of people to do something positive?

I wholeheartedly disagree, Facebook and Twitter and evolving as methods not only for individual self-expression, but also of the group consciousness. At last count Google report over 3M search results containing the exact theme. Would it have worked better as a Trending Topi on Twitter to make news? Most certainly. But given the ubiquity of the meme, and the so-far lack or willingness of the popular majority to rear its collective mindset, this most certainly is a milestone of sorts. Perhaps you enjoy watching re-runs of mindless sitcoms on cable more fulfilling and world-changing. The FB community deserves kudos not cynicism and if and when I move to LA, which will happen when hell freezes over, I most certainly will not read any of your stay-on-couch drek.

Perhaps your "friends" are so self-centered that they would immediately "glaze over" if you posted a social plea as your status, but that generalization cannot be made of everybody who uses social media. My apologies if you were offended by having to do without a day's worth of "I'm taking out the trash while listening to U2", but sometimes things in the world percolate to a level deserving of a little statement. And no, nobody using their Facebook status to make a political statement thinks that they are single-handedly changing the world with their small shout into the void. Self-expression is meaningful in its own right, and at least we can see which of our friends still has a desire to make the world a bit more fair.

Karin,

I agree that I would not want to look at the same post over and over again.
But you have to admit it was an example of many people expressing the same sentiment and showing their numbers. I think it served as a good test case for viral social activism. FaceBook is approaching 300 million active subscribers. Just imagine if only 10% of them does something like this again. I think in the future it could be a powerful way to express widespread public discontent.

The question is who will notice. You did, and you wrote about it in a very visible forum. LA Times Opinion section on the net. And of course those with more than a few hundred friends will notice.

I truly wonder whats the FaceBook stats are on this. Unfortunately there are too many words in the posts to check on our own.

Roger. Dude. Be original at least. I bet you have it in you.

Funny. That's not the way I saw it at all.

To me, it felt a hell of a lot more like the cyber equivalent of seeing just about everybody in town lay down what they were doing for an afternoon to all gather in the square and stand in quiet solidarity and witness.

I'm sorry that wasn't your experience, Karin. Sounds like my perception may have been a lot more inspiring and edifying than yours was. Unless, of course, smug superiority is your idea of a good time.

I just checked. I divided the number of people who posted this by my total number of friends. Only 7% of my friends support health care reform. So much for the tidal wave of protest.

I never realized the free market was responsible for the scientific curiosity and academic policy underlying most of the research surrounding disease and treatment.....

Seeing this post multiple times was annoying, but even more important, ineffective. We are generally "friends" on facebook with people who share our political sentiments. Talk about preaching (in an especially preachy way) to the choir! "Protest" is fine, political activism is fine, but originality is what gets others' attention. Just like the thousands of same-colored postcards or identically-worded e-mails to elected officials that are simply tallied and then generally ignored, this facebook status update "protest," as so many who changed their status felt it was, was completely ineffective.

"...but I'm wondering exactly what the viral campaign is supposed to accomplish except for making the eyes of these folks' "friends" glaze over?"

How about thoughtful debate on the topic? That's precisely what happened on my page. Perhaps you'll remember these posts when you've been fired for being such an inadequate journalist and find yourself without heath insurance.

Good luck!

And I find the repetitive selfish and greedy attitudes toward healthcare for all annoying too, but there they are...

Here is my impression of the obama lama ding dongers,
WAAAHHH!! Im poor and opressed too mr. obama (With hand held out for spare change). I want MY entitilements...NOW!
We should ALL be equal. Reward the poor and penalize the rich! Barf. Paahleeze! Shut up you friggin liberal democrats. Dont you people have an illegal immigrant to go pander to?

Well, this is certainly an article of substance.

No one should die for any reason ever, and every human being should have a million dollars at all times. I want a pony. If you agree, please post this as your status for the rest of the day.