FaceBook

NB now called Meta : FacebookGoesMeta.

New Facebook Policy

I closed my account. Around March 2013 ... It's now October 2024 and I haven't re-activated it or joined other Meta services like Instagram or WhatsApp.

http://blahsploitation.blogspot.com.br/2013/04/exit-planet-facebook.html

I have not used FB since then.

So, this is the last straw. I'm leaving Facebook.

I've been too caught up, not so much talking to real-life friends (which FB is useful for keeping track of) but having discussions with various interesting online people and groups.

This is ludicrous. Most of these conversations could be had anywhere. We used to have them on blogs and wikis. Or on Tribe. Or Slashdot.

We don't need to give this power to Zuckerberg and Facebook. We shouldn't have let our social AND intellectual lives get enclosed like this.

I've been saying this for a long time, of course. But this time ... I mean it. I've logged out of FB. I haven't deleted the account yet because I want to make sure the message I sent to all my FB friends doesn't disappear too. But I'm gone.

There's also a deeper problem, which I may have mentioned before. I think Facebook has essentially reinvented TV. It's an absolutely lousy medium for thoughtful discussion. Long comments are truncated to a couple of lines. Your actual content is squashed into a narrow column between acres of adverts / chat and infrastructure and is unceremoniously flowed off the page as quickly as possible. Facebook's design is ruthlessly optimised not to let you talk and listen but to keep you titillated with NEW items. Little hits of stimulation (an easily shared new image / meme; status from a DIFFERENT friend you hadn't thought about in the last 10 minutes.) etc. All your emotional / personal connection to people is harnessed to keep you fixated on an overwhelming flux and your response to little more than automatic "likes" and "forwards".

The patterns of Facebook interaction are as disinforming and dis-empowering as the mindless channel hopping that TV promoted.

Marshall Mcluhan was right: the shape of a medium swamps its actual content. It's time to say no this perverse refinement of TheFlowInternet and look for something that enables productive networking, thought and discussion.

(See also LeavingQuora)

Old Facebook Policy

With a very few exceptions I will NOT be your facebook friend unless I know you in real life.

It's nothing personal. You may be a very likeable and cool person. I may very well hang out with you on a number of of other YASNS etc. But I try to keep Facebook for IRL people.

(WhoIsMyFriend)

A couple of thoughts on the FutureOfFacebook

It's all criticism

• TheProblemWithFacebook
• EbenMoglen on Why you should not be on Facebook (Good comment)
• AToxicPlatformToReasonedDiscourse
• FaceBookVsPrivacy
• FacebookCensorship
• FaceBookVsDemocracy

Platform Wars

• FacebookTakeOverTheWorld
• BeatingFacebook

Facebook Doesn’t Know What It Does With Your Data, Or Where It Goes: Leaked Document: https://www.vice.com/en/article/akvmke/facebook-doesnt-know-what-it-does-with-your-data-or-where-it-goes

Biased towards or running scared of the right : deliberately censored left-wing media

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-mark-zuckerberg-learned-politics-11602853200?redirect=amp#click=https://t.co/BeIYghE1xt

Contrast :

• FaceBurbs
• WeirdFacebook

Good Riddance

Facebook threatens to leave Europe if it doesn't get its way :

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/889pk3/facebook-threatens-to-pull-out-of-europe-if-it-doesnt-get-its-way

See also :

• SocialNetworkingSoftware