MI6 is hiring through Facebook. That strikes me as odd. If I was hiring somebody to work in an animal testing lab, I wouldn’t pop down to the gates on my break and grab the first Johnny with a plackard and bucket of red paint I could find, and yet MI6 seems to have done just this.

 Basic requirements of a spy? Well, I’ve never infilitrated a secret lair that’s been fiendishly built beneath an active volcano, but presumably, discretion is one. And discretion is not something typically ascribed to Facebook users. I can see it now “James Bond is crouched on the thirtieth floor of a burnt out apartment block waiting to assasinate the President of Paraguay”

2 mins pass.

“James Bond has just assasinated the President of Paraguay.”

2 mins pass.

“James Bond has just uploaded a new album.” 

It could lead to some interesting Facebook groups I suppose. “People who’ve murdered world leaders – started just for fun by Carlos the Jackal.”

Yes sir, there’s a world of possibility in this one. Though I’m pretty sure my friends would get pretty suspicious when that ”Stuart is now friends with Gordon Brown” notification popped up. And surely this sort of thing is a goldmine for enemy agents?

Generic terrorist No1: “Hang on, isn’t that man swigging Tequila in Buenos Aires and identified as James Bond in this picture, actually John Smith that new accountant we hired just last week to do the books on our next nefarious plot?”

Generic terrorist No2: “It appears to be. He really shouldn’t have added us a friend. Schoolboy error, really.”

Generic terrorist No1: “That crafty blighter. Give the order, him, his family, his village.”

 I’m sure there’s a good reason for all of this, but personally I prefer the romance of the tap on the shoulder, the shady indoctrination and the joy of spending the next fifty years lying to your nearest and dearest out of habit. 

And one final point… just how much less cool would James Bond have been if we’d discovered he got the job through Facebook. I’m sorry Spy-type people, you really need to rethink this one, if only for the movie industry’s sake.