Sweet, one friend request! Who could it be? Is it an old time friend? Maybe it’s that kid I met at the bar last night? Oh no, it can’t be … mom?

That’s right. These days Mom, Dad, even Grandpa, can join the Facebook network. To some, getting a friend request is no longer thrilling, but instead, a little frightening.

When Facebook was introduced in 2004 it was limited to college students. Today, anyone over the age of 13 can join the network. As a result, Facebook has over 150 million current users. Is the original Facebook generation ready to let parents and older relatives in on their Internet lives, or are you going to join the “Petition to keep parents off Facebook” group?

Scott Riedman, a junior biology major, said he is not completely in favor of or opposed to the idea.

“It appeals to them just as much as it appeals to us,” Riedman said. “It keeps people connected. It’s convenient. That’s something that people who are older can appreciate more.”

However, despite these words, Riedman would not accept a friend request from his mother, who recently joined the Facebook network. “She doesn’t really care that I’m not friends with her,” he said. “I’m not against her having it, as long as she doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

He said there was a chance he would accept her friendship in the future, when he “stops being an immature party animal.”

Chris Strunk, a senior financial engineering and accounting major, just recently accepted his 35-year-old cousin’s friendship request on Facebook. “It was all fine and dandy until she started wall chatting with me,” he said. “It’s just awkward.”

He believes that older people are definitely entitled to join in on Facebook fun but that they should be prepared to see “undesirable things.”

Strunk keeps his profile fairly private, not only from his elderly cousin, but from all his Facebook friends. He utilized the Facebook privacy settings so that nobody can view any pictures of him. “Employers are looking into Facebook more and more,” he said. “So you shouldn’t have anything really bad on it anyway.”

Reidman, on the other hand, finds it makes more sense to just decline his mother’s friend request. “Privacy online is so conflicted,” he said. “The whole point of the site in the first place is to make yourself available.”

Parents and cousins aren’t the only people joining Facebook. You can expect a friend request from your professors too! Al Vos, Hinman faculty master and English professor, has been an active Facebook user for more than two years. He joined to keep in touch with Binghamton alumni and family.

“I wondered if I would be considered an interloper,” he said about friend requesting past students and family. “Usually people are delighted.”

He said it’s very important to stay connected with students. “Of course I see news about their world that I wouldn’t otherwise see,” Vos said. He sees pictures of alumni partying and drinking from time to time. “But they are of age.”

According to a Facebook spokesperson, the network’s key purpose is to keep people connected. “Facebook will always have its roots in colleges and universities,” she said. “As users on the site get older, we want them to be able to connect with the people around them whether that’s older generations in their family, co-workers or anyone else they may meet.”

Facebook isn’t about to start listening to the cries of outraged users (new Facebook anybody?), so next time you log on that new friend request could be your mom, your chemistry professor or your new lab partner. Will you accept?