What I Learned When Facebook Disabled My Account (2012) • Hacker News Board

Re: What I Learned When Facebook Disabled My Account (2012)

#131

Post by chrismcb » Sat, May 27, 2017, 10:26 PM UTC

Jaruzel wrote: post #9

I know the article is old, but the author showed a severe lack of common sense. Facebook is NOT a backup. If you only keep stuff in your Facebook account, then it is as 'at risk' as if you only kept on the hard-drive of your ageing laptop that you bought on discount in Walmart/ASDA ten years ago. This oft quoted adage also applies: 'If you are not paying for the product, then you are the product'. The author seemed t…

You are right in that Facebook is not a backup, even if it was a paid service. But the old age doesn't apply. While we may be the product we are also the client. Fb does have a certain responsibility. Especially when they are encouraging people to user the platform for just what she as using it for. Ignoring any legal ramifications, it is in fb's best interests to help her because they need people like her. If we assume that we are the product, fb needs to do a certain amount of work to keep the product happy, or it goes away. I'm not saying they have to bend over backwards to help everyone, but at some point the backlash could hurt them... Yeah it probably won't, but it is still good business sense to help your "product"

Re: What I Learned When Facebook Disabled My Account (2012)

#132

Post by marenkay » Sun, May 28, 2017, 6:33 PM UTC

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #50

marenkay wrote: post #26

Consider not using Facebook at all. It has zero value for the user, it only has value for Facebook.

Facebook has enormous value for the user. They didn't get this popular by accident. They provide a wonderful service, and they chain it to acceptance of their awful terms. Imagining that your use case is the only use case is the great bane of geeks and developers. If you want to help build a world without awful tech companies, you need to stop doing that.

Just honestly make a list of things you get out of FB that you did not have before and actually enrich your life.

Re: What I Learned When Facebook Disabled My Account (2012)

#133

Post by marenkay » Sun, May 28, 2017, 6:35 PM UTC

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #129

turc1656 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to agree with Marenkay. I left Facebook a long time ago and haven't missed it on bit. There was some minimal value, I suppose, in being able to have anyone contact me if they didn't have my email. And possibly organize invites for events. All of this is, of course, possible without Facebook, they just made it easier. However, the real issue is the secret cost of Facebook far outweighs any benefit the user deri…

Again, your use case is not the only use case. Facebook doesn't provide value for you , and that's perfectly reasonable. But at this point you're basically a guy who doesn't care for falafel standing outside a packed falafel restaurant trying to figure out what character flaw drives people to eat there, since obviously they can't just like falafel. I don't use Facebook much, in part because of how awful its policies…

> it remains a fantastic tool for keeping in touch with friends ... that is exactly what I question about FB. Their notion of friendship is merely on a level of "people you met at least once".