Facebook - Stay or Go?

[omasou]

Originally Posted by M_Six

I reluctantly, at Wifey's urging, joined Facebook about 9 or 10 years ago just to have a place to post vacation pics so we could share them with family. It's worked well for that over the years. I've also joined a few groups that have kept me in touch with former military friends and cycling groups and so on. There is definitely an upside to Facebook.

That said, Facebook the App is insidious. It worms its way into everything. And Facebook itself is sadly a net negative drag on society. Way too many people use it as their sole source of information and believe everything they read on it. And Facebook the Corporation seems to have no qualms about letting pure BS run amok on their system, or about selling the personal data of every member.

So now I'm torn between leaving or staying. I personally don't post much on FB aside from pics and the occasional post in a cycling group. And I do use it occasionally to have a quick chat with folks I normally wouldn't if it weren't for Facebook. But I'm finding it harder to justify to myself continuing to feed it. Sort of like feeding one particularly friendly rodent or raccoon or stray cat. You know all it wants from you is to keep feeding it, but you keep doing it anyway.

My nephew cleared himself of FB years ago and claims it was the best thing he's ever done. Anyone else ever delete a Facebook account or just not start one in the first place? Or, is it a case of using the beast for what you want out of it and accepting the inevitable cost of doing so?

What are your thoughts on Facebook?

The only reason, I have social media accounts is to stop someone else using my name and creating one. My accounts are private and if I "follow" someone it is to read what they post about, e.g. in your example cycling.

If I listen to my son Facebook is for boomers and Instagram is where it's at. I do tend to gravitate more to Instagram but that too is owned by Facebook so your not really escaping.

I use them for my needs but I don't feed them w/useful information. They can see what I follow and "develop" a profile but beyond that that's all they know about me.

I don't post pictures of the children and I don't allow people to tag me.

[David70]

Originally Posted by 2000cs

Seems like you all could meet at a bar!

Seriously, I have the same situation with the BMW CCA chapter and some other groups that really communicate exclusively via FB. But I’ve been removing friends and am down to just a handful now (if you post anything political, you get unfriended immediately whether or not I agree with your post). So it is becoming a groups bulletin board for me.

Bourbon club has 2k members, secondary market is bigger, running club 3k. Likely difficult to go to the bar.

I also like the ability to "ignore for 30 days", then there a lot of "friends" that really aren't friends so political or other irritating posts I just get rid of them. Always surprised when I hear how many people think this large group of Facebook friends are really friends because they post jokes occasionally.

[3.0L]

I view Facebook, Twitter, etc., as net negatives so I've never had an account. I think the negative side of these type social media have reached a new low during the past 4 years of political propaganda; both from enemies of our country and extremists within. It's simply not worth the brain damage to sort through the bullshit. And it's going to get worse. Much worse.

BTW, I do approve of the new version for dogs called Facebutt.

[fiveohwblow]

Originally Posted by 3.0L

I view Facebook, Twitter, etc., as net negatives so I've never had an account. I think the negative side of these type social media have reached a new low during the past 4 years of political propaganda; both from enemies of our country and extremists within. It's simply not worth the brain damage to sort through the bullshit. And it's going to get worse. Much worse.

BTW, I do approve of the new version for dogs called Facebutt.

Ive always said it was designed to be a highlight reel of ones life, humanity has utilized it as a lowlight reel instead.

Hardest of passes, never had accounts.

[pennsiveguy]

I say go, at once.

I had an account very early on in about 2008. I only lasted 6 months. The tripe that ended up on my wall was not worth reading, and the generally low quality of the discussions made it clear that this was not a platform I wanted to be a part of, given how much data they were gathering on me and how many compromises I was making concerning my privacy.

[King Rudi]

I just re-opened my fb account yesterday after 4 years. Completely against it, but I'm going through some shit at the moment and needed a distraction. I'll most likely shut it back down in a few weeks. I scrolled the feed once and already started to remember how this shit plays out. Either way, the end result after 45 minutes of fb, I have dates Friday and Saturday night.

[2000cs]

I continue to reduce the number of “friends” on FB (less than a dozen now), and never post or reply. But I am in 3-4 groups, including my BMW CCA local chapter, that only communicate via FB. Another is a community page for the town I live in, which contains lots of local info and also is supposed to remain non-political. Those groups sometimes have fun and interesting stuff, so I will probably keep an account to continue to listen to them.

Privacy settings as high as can be, no personal info on my “profile”.

On another note, it is fun to mess with their algorithms. For example, scrolling through videos and clicking or lingering on weird ones, non-congruent, etc. Then a whole different set on another day. They really don’t know what to serve up to me any more.

[TboneS54]

I enjoy using instagram as I know that they'll curate the content for me, protecting me from any information that might cause cognitive dissonance.

[OkieSnuffBox]

As soon as I can find a way to easily keep up with bands, comedians, venues and tours, without having to visit multiple sites and such, I'll delete them all.

I agree it's net negative for society.

[smyles]

I use FB marketplace as it's /somewhat/ better than CL, and few dedicated groups, mostly to steal funny memes and repost them here for reps. Also, do stick it to the man by reporting every news and ad FB shoves in my face as spam.

[nyalpine90]

my account is deactivated since 2012.
everyone uses social media to gossip, spread rumors and spying.

[Tambohamilton]

Originally Posted by M_Six

pi-hole is interesting. I may look into that. Have you done any research on it? Turning over DNS duties to an app is no small step. I run a Raspberry Pi VPN box and route through it all day long. Adding this piece might be an interesting bonus.

Pihole is awesome! I bought a pi specifically for that, and for lite desktop duty (4GB Pi 4B). In the past 24h, 20% of DNS queries have been discarded on my home network, and nothing that I wanted to see has been blocked. Sometimes it's as high as 40%!

Bonus of pihole is cloudflared which facilitates DOH functionality. There's a diy in the pihole documentation.

If you do get pihole, be sure to add the https://dbl.oisd.nl/ adlist - it has over 1mil domains.

Back on topic... I used to have Facebook and insta for my old business as well as personal ise, but when I left that I treated myself to deleting all social accounts. I miss connecting with some old friends on fb a bit, but overall I have no need for it in my life. I know a handful of people whose lives/marriages are actually being affected negatively by getting caught up in the wrong feedback loop on fb...it's not good; it preys on the weak, as an unfortunate (but very effective!) side effect of content curation.

[Habs11]

I've sold a few things on Facebook Marketplace - IMO better than craigslist for free local selling.
FB had enlightened me on how stupid/crazy some people are.
I do not have twitter or instagram so FB give me my sports news I want from various sources.
Sometimes the memes are great

[tcphoto]

I slowly distance myself from Facebook and hate that they bought Instagram. As a freelancer, I think that it helps me by having a presence. All you need to do is watch the Netflix show on social media to see how “free” literally turns you into the product.

[OkieSnuffBox]

Originally Posted by tcphoto

I slowly distance myself from Facebook and hate that they bought Instagram. As a freelancer, I think that it helps me by having a presence. All you need to do is watch the Netflix show on social media to see how “free” literally turns you into the product.

The really sad thing is how many people didn't realize this until they watched that way over the top documentary.

"If the product is free, you are the product."

[tcphoto]

So true, I hate how Instagram has gone to a “here are a lot of things we think you’ll like” mode. I follow the people I chose and now get bombarded with unwanted ads and people I have no interest in.

[CTinline-six]

Originally Posted by tcphoto

So true, I hate how Instagram has gone to a “here are a lot of things we think you’ll like” mode. I follow the people I chose and now get bombarded with unwanted ads and people I have no interest in.

Yep, pretty much any platform that Facebook or Google purchases just turns into a piece of shit ad fest.

I watched a 15 minute youtube video last night, and it had 12 ads on it, most of them over 30 seconds long. They can go fuck themselves.

[Tambohamilton]

If using a PC/Mac, use ublock origin browser add-on to get rid of YouTube adds. There are plenty others too which also do it.

On android (not sure about iPhone) you can use Firefox with the ublock add-on, then use that instead of the YouTube app. Again, blocks all yt adds. Not sure if that functionality is only available in the firefox nightly (beta) app. Bonus there is background playing, so you can switch apps or even lock your device with a video (audio) still playing.

[M_Six]

I finally cleared out my account and dumped it. Sort of cool how they organize your pics for download. Now they're all browseable from a webpage interface. But no more FB, IG, or WhatsApp.

[Tambohamilton]

What are you using instead of WhatsApp?

[unluky]

After being on and being pretty active for many years, I rolled mine up and ditched it last week along with Whatsapp. I 100% agree they are a company and can do as they wish, but I also am allowed to do what I wish and if it does not bring me joy - why do it? Will I miss the memes and jokes? You bet. Will I miss any minor comment being turned into a political statement and how someone might misinterpret something you say in jest? Nope.

A good childhood friends of mine's father passed this weekend and I didn't know it until I hear others talking about it - which is what I worried about the most. One more degree of separation and a death like that I will never hear about again without FB, but that is the way it was before FB - so I'm sure I will adjust.

So far except for that - I have not missed it at all.

I went to Signal - so far not so bad. The outage last Friday sucked a little, but instead of being a baby about it - I donated $20 to them. Be a part of the solution - right? At least they are trying. I've played with Telegram, which is pretty decent - but I like what Signal is trying to do - so I'll stick with them as long as that is the case.

[MightyMouseTech]

Fuck facebook, right in the ass....