Dear William, Pick Me!

As part of his regular publication, The Pessimist's Guide to Modern Living, William D. Green is preparing to undergo a week-long challenge to stay away from Facebook entirely in order to dispel (or otherwise) the myth that people living in the digital age cannot avoid logging into their favoured social networking site for any long period of time. He believes he could do this challenge for longer if he didn't need it after a week to advertise the publication of the seventh Pessimist's Guide.

In the course of this challenge, in order to make sure he has absolutely no chance at all of even glancing at his Facebook account, each member of The Pessimist Chronicles will be posting their arguments as to why they should be the one to recieve William's password, and then to change it so that he is well and truly locked out. These arguments are being posted, one by one, as articles herein. Here is the first of these arguments, posted by the esteemed Japan-based travel writer, Simon Birkmyre.

Dear William,

Firstly, may I congratulate you on your groundbreaking endeavour and wish you the best of luck. You are a braver man than myself. Facebook and I are happily inseperable and are planning on marriage to cement our dependency.

Onto the matter at hand: I am writing this letter to explain to you why I should be the keeper of your password during this courageous experiment.

My sole reason for being the best candidate is my residency in Japan, however this is beneficial on various levels. Firstly, due to the considerable time difference we are busy at seperate times, asleep at seperate times and so on and so forth; this means that it will be difficult to contact me to explain the 'emergency' that means you have to have your password. Secondly, when I (rightly so) disregard your 'emergency' as the deceitful ploy it will undoubtedly be and refuse to relinquish my burden, I am over six thousand miles away from you, and thus am unable to be intimidated by you when you inevitably begin to threaten me with futile violence.

In addition to the above reasons, I am a man of my word and pride myself on my honour and so once the prerequisite contract is signed I will abide by it and all its restrictions.

Yours Faithfully,

Simon Birkmyre

William D. Green has read your argument, and would like to congratulate you on raising so many good points. He is now considering your plea, and you will be made aware of the result as soon as all arguments have been posted...