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Making it official: social-media style

Guidelines for your relationship's relationship with social media.

By Erica Zucco and Joe Bradley

Published Feb. 26, 2010

She says: When you begin a relationship, a question will inevitably form in the back of your social media-obsessed millenial mind: when to go F-B-O (as in, Facebook official).

Maybe you'll decide not to do it at all, but whether you go there, you're also faced with the decision of how to relate with and about your significant other across social media platforms. How will you present your relationship to the outside world, if at all?

Obviously, your "relationship brand" is up to you. But here are some basic guidelines for avoiding behaviors that will drive the rest of us crazy.

Your social media profiles are supposed to represent you, not your relationship. So be careful what you share about your partner on your profile. Personally, I'm wary of allowing a significant other into my profile picture. Should I make the one picture that I choose to represent myself, represent me as just a half of a whole? I get that people often have friends in their picture, but for some reason, this feels a little different. But maybe it's just me.

Now, let's talk Twitter: you do not need a hashtag that combines your names that you use every time the two of you hang out. #Puke. And when making date plans, do NOT @ each other — we don't care. Really, we don't. Twitter is a mix of lifecasting, mindcasting and news-sharing, but it isn't the place to flaunt your romantic life.

And when you're loving long-distance or one's away on vacation, it can be tempting to express just how much you miss each other 24/7. A little bit of this is fine, but be careful not to overdo it.

He Says: Unlike Erica, I have few reservations when it comes to putting our relationship out in cyber space. Erica is in my profile picture as well as computer and phone background. (Although now that I know how she feels about it, this might change just to see her reaction.) Erica and I have had lengthy conversations about whether we should list our relationship on Facebook to which all I could say at first was "Why wouldn't we?" but it also begs the question, "Why would we?"

I'm all for writing on walls (Facebook walls, not real walls, that's a crime) and tweeting at your significant other. Erica is pretty into having a strict ratio when it comes to wall-to-walls which I often laugh and poke fun at, but no one wants to be that person who writes something like this — 7:02 p.m. OMG 7:03 p.m. I miss you 7:04 p.m. so much!!!!! — and so on.

However, if I see one more Facebook status or Twitter update that sounds anything remotely close to "I wish he was here, I miss him so much" or so and so "HAS THE BEST GIRLFRIEND IN THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD!!!" you're getting unfollowed/unfriended. You've been warned.

Finally, be sure to talk to your significant other about your online identities at the start of your relationship. Set some guidelines for yourselves in terms of how far is too far. If your significant other doesn't want pictures of them being all kissy-face posted all over the internet, they have that right, no matter how great of a profile picture you think it would make.