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Why I deleted my Facebook account

blakewatson.com

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Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#71

Post by MegaButts »

Swizec wrote: post #65
avaer wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Impossible is hard to square with the people in this thread (myself included) that did it. You don't have to tell your boss you're not reading notifications. You just have to eliminate the notifications that serve no purpose except a high. Facebook still spams my email; it's filtered to the trash. Business carries on.

"You can totally quit heroin! Just stop taking it" "Oh and if all your friends are doing it and are wondering why you're not having fun with them, just ignore them" Sure you've quit Facebook. But did you quit dopamine-seeking technology use? What I've found in myself is that when I pry myself away from Facebook, I spend more time on Twitter. When I pry myself off that as well, suddenly my HN engagement goes up. When…

You're being hyperbolic, and it diminishes your argument. Not everybody in your generation suffers from the same addiction as you. I could be persuaded it's a large problem and is generational, but I don't believe we have the same kind of biological responses to social media as we do to something like sunlight.

I also believe there is another side of the argument, and people just consume media differently today. The internet came and it was the death of media, the TV came and it was the death of books, the books came and they were the death of the bard, etc. Maybe some people actually enjoy Facebook?

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#72

Post by Swizec »

MegaButts wrote: post #71
Swizec wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You can totally quit heroin! Just stop taking it" "Oh and if all your friends are doing it and are wondering why you're not having fun with them, just ignore them" Sure you've quit Facebook. But did you quit dopamine-seeking technology use? What I've found in myself is that when I pry myself away from Facebook, I spend more time on Twitter. When I pry myself off that as well, suddenly my HN engagement goes up. When…

You're being hyperbolic, and it diminishes your argument. Not everybody in your generation suffers from the same addiction as you. I could be persuaded it's a large problem and is generational, but I don't believe we have the same kind of biological responses to social media as we do to something like sunlight. I also believe there is another side of the argument, and people just consume media differently today. The…

Watch the video I linked. Sinek does a good job of explaining how most (many?) of us have a similar problem with social media as alcoholics do with alcohol. For much the same reasons.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#73

Post by zer0tonin »

z92 wrote: post #16

When someone leaves FB, he makes a public declaration. But his return years or months later is generally silent. Not claiming everyone that leaves FB, returns. But Facebook is continuing to expand. I remember reading here years back that new generation isn't really using FB cause their parents are using it. And they weren't comfortable with that setup. Rather they are switching to other social media.

>I remember reading here years back that new generation isn't really using FB cause their parents are using it. And they weren't comfortable with that setup. Rather they are switching to other social media.

They are mostly using FB for "public" stuff, and the stuff they would only share with their friends is on snapchat and similar applications.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#74

Post by hnarn »

babyrainbow wrote: post #54
hnarn wrote: post #26

This might be an unpopular opinion in the tech-savvy crowd of HN, but while I agree with pretty much 100% of the points brought up in this article, I still disagree that leaving facebook is a net positive. I simply believe that as privacy violating as facebook is, as scary and orwellian their statistical analysis of my life and habits are, they have solved a very real problem for real people: social networking online…

> social networking online... Isn't this a manufactured problem/requirement? EDIT: I mean, did people have this problem before social networks?

I don't understand what you're trying to say. Surely you can't be suggesting that social interaction between human beings is a "manufactured" requirement?

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#75

Post by aphextron »

>As a person who writes a lot of JavaScript and (mostly) enjoys it, this makes me sad because while I enjoy the interactivity it provides, I must concede that big data companies and advertisers have weaponized it against us.

I could not agree more. I have started browsing the web with JS turned off by default in all of my browsers (desktop, laptop and mobile) over the last few months. I've never been happier. Especially on mobile. The web has become a bloated, unusable mess.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#76

Post by markatkinson »

adrianN wrote: post #25
grx wrote: post #10

It's too late to join the Leaving Facebook party. If you were a regular user since 2005 and leave now, it does not make any difference anymore. The collected data about you is enough to interpolate your profile for the next decades. Of course, decentralization is a valid point and it's really important to get people who are kinda "new" to social media on distributed platforms. Twitter is centralized as well and also…

> The collected data about you is enough to interpolate your profile for the next decades. Did Facebook recently hire Hari Seldon?

Hahaha haven't heard that name for a long time!

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#77

Post by em3rgent0rdr »

grx wrote: post #67
em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ideally could have an "ad financed network" that is open-source and distributed p2p, allowing anyone to install the server in their home on a raspberry pi and still be somewhat in control.

Problem could be that implementations for ad networks are notorious for tracking. You would need privacy sensitive, distributed ad networks as well.

Ads don't necessarily have to be tracking. I do realize that is the current standard reality on the internet, but historically ads don't track.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#78

Post by yellow_postit »

grx wrote: post #67
em3rgent0rdr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ideally could have an "ad financed network" that is open-source and distributed p2p, allowing anyone to install the server in their home on a raspberry pi and still be somewhat in control.

Problem could be that implementations for ad networks are notorious for tracking. You would need privacy sensitive, distributed ad networks as well.

The money in such a network is severely lacking when more targeted products are available.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#79

Post by zer0tonin »

notliketherest wrote: post #15
dontlie wrote: post #8

I stopped using facebook when i graduated from college, i couldnt accept to have my whole life archived somewhere in the internet.

No one uses Facebook enough to actually have their whole life archived on the internet. You're running from a fantasy.

A lot of people do multiple post a day on facebook and use it as their only private messaging solution, it's as close as you can get to having your whole life archived on the internet.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#80

Post by markatkinson »

grx wrote: post #53
adrianN wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The collected data about you is enough to interpolate your profile for the next decades. Did Facebook recently hire Hari Seldon?

Heh, nice reference. Of course I am exaggerating. But IMO people vastly under estimate how similar their own behaviour is to other people. Meaning, if Facebook "knows" me since 12 years (!) it can very precisely categorize me into a group of people. And those other people do not leave Facebook but feed it more information.

Agreed to a degree, they can probably quite accurately fill in the missing puzzle pieces of your life according to the category you are in.

It almost makes me jealous of all the data they have.

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