Abstract
The book presents Facebook "addiction" as a dependence on social contact, which can only function in an effectively managed middle region. In light of Joshua Meyrowitz (2006), the middle region is understood as a new feature of electronic media, which also implies new forms of behaviour.
It is a region where the information barrier between back stage (the region where we perform roles in relation to the audience) and front stage (the region where we prepare performance without revealing to the audience) in a Goffmanian conception becomes blurred. The Facebook middle region is created by connecting audiences from various areas.
The Facebook feed works most commonly in this way. However, the feed does not always work as the middle region; conversely, the middle region can be found in other Facebook areas as well.
The middle region does not become attractive by itself. Users can only make use of its benefits as long as it is effectively managed and rich enough to provide the necessary information.
This only occurs after the user has gone through several stages of their "Facebook career" and learns about usership. The Facebook career leads primarily to the user learning which interactions, behaviour and communications are suitable for the given interaction region - the middle region, the back stage, the front stage (Goffman, 1999).