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Why I deleted my Facebook account

blakewatson.com

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Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#271

Post by marcuslager »

ssivark wrote: post #249
whiddershins wrote: post #216

The one greatest internet life hack I discovered in the last couple of years is to delete browser autocompletes (cmd + shift + delete or similar). Once I became aware of the "slot machine" effect of websites I deleted the default autocompletes for Facebook and Hacker News, for example. Prior to doing this, if I typed "F" into chrome I went to my Facebook news feed, and "N" in chrome took me to HN. I deleted those def…

I use a slightly different trick in the same spirit. I prevent my browser from saving login credentials for Facebook. So, any time I want to check Facebook, I need to type my email address and long password. One can also set the password to be some message one wants to reinforce, eg: 'nomorethanfiveminutes'.

Can I have your email address? I just need to send you something. Nothing fishy.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#272

Post by ivm »

logicallee wrote: post #265
ivm wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's with the sarcasm? I asked why somebody keeps a purely entertaining app while trying not to get distracted by it. The Messenger argument is completely unrelated because it's a useful app to stay in touch.

Not the other poster, but something that might explain their reaction is that you mentioned keeping an entire separate computer. It is easy to see why this would cause an extreme reaction. (Not saying it's not a good idea.)

I wasn't able to predict that discussing a better setup can cause "an extreme reaction".

The second machine is not that important, I would prefer to schedule distraction blocking on my computer for most of the day and removing apps like FB from my phone.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#273

Post by WorldMaker »

yequalsx wrote: post #189
tvanantwerp wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny how Facebook can have all of this information about me, my preferences, my social groups, etc., and has not once served me a remotely relevant advertisement.

I think it most likely has but you currently aren't consciously aware of it. Partly this is due to your desire to make a point. Partly due to our inability to off the top of our heads to recall any but a few specific adverts. We see thousands of them. It is very unlikely that none of them have been relevant to you. There are also the adverts that subconsciously manipulate you. The stuff that you aren't aware of.

There's a bias at work too. The ads in the news feed are slip-streamed, if you aren't constantly on the look out for that gray, barely there "Sponsored" they look like "normal" news feed items and scroll past/through them only really noticing the bad ones.

Even worse are the socially slip-streamed ones that started as a Sponsored post in a friend's news feed that they found funny/interesting/whatever and re-shared. Once reshared it loses even that gray, barely there "Sponsored" tag and has "grown up into a real boy" in the news feed.

A lot of the mind games in the last election cycle happened because of that (target ads to people susceptible to reshare them and watch them go viral for relatively cheap). Facebook has said they may try to crack down on that sort of thing, but slip-streaming ads is where they make their most money and they don't have enough financial incentive to really fix that.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#274

Post by ssivark »

marcuslager wrote: post #271
ssivark wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use a slightly different trick in the same spirit. I prevent my browser from saving login credentials for Facebook. So, any time I want to check Facebook, I need to type my email address and long password. One can also set the password to be some message one wants to reinforce, eg: 'nomorethanfiveminutes'.

Can I have your email address? I just need to send you something. Nothing fishy.

LOL; what I typed up there is not my password :-)

You can ping me at notmorethanfiveminutes@mailinator.com :P

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#275

Post by wepple »

free_everybody wrote: post #212

I deleted my Facebook account recently ONLY because of how spammy the notification system is! I didn't want many sources for my news feed so I unsubscribed to all of my hundreds of friends save a few. This redeemed my faith in the news feed, although I would have preferred to have just turned the whole feature off honestly. The problem came when I stopped using Facebook often so I wouldn't have any notifications, at…

Agreed. The tactics they've sunk to in order to try grab attention are borderline signs over general descent toward turning into a pile of mess that something will soon replace.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#276

Post by wepple »

jhasse wrote: post #190

The one thing keeping me on Facebook are events / RSVP. I don't know any good alternative. For example it's still missing in Diaspora: https://github.com/diaspora/diaspora/issues/1359

Totally agree.

I log in to Facebook on Thursday to see what might be happening on the weekend, and leave it at that. Once a week is more than enough.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#278

Post by Theodores »

rikkus wrote: post #103
gambiting wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't left because I was concerned about the data they were collecting, I left because I realised that I couldn't stop going on facebook, any time my hands were free I would open up my phone and check the feed, scroll through the endless stream of garbage and crap I didn't care about in the slightest. That, and the fact that I was getting really depressed by all the news surrounding brexit, then I would go and re…

I shifted to Twitter for a while and eventually kicked that too. I get the HN daily digest email and generally only visit the links from that, though there are exceptions when I'm looking for something interesting over morning coffee (hence replying to this post at this time). I stopped paying attention to the news media years ago. I think I'm pretty much free of the 'need' to look at what's 'new' now. You might thin…

I am at your stage of disconnect and I am thinking of going further. The next step is to wget the things I read on a cron job, piping to dev null.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#279

Post by ThatGeoGuy »

vgb2k11 wrote: post #259
HenryBemis wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like you I also dropped it and never looked back for the following simple reasons: 1. It offers nothing while it takes a lot. 2. When something is free, then YOU are the product. 3. Massive violation of privacy (that "like" button on most websites and any other facebook element which now I block with ABP and NoScript)(and all known FB URLs on my hosts file). 4. I can still be in touch with my friend without informing…

> 2. When something is free, then YOU are the product. Debian Linux, Firefox, gcc, visual studio... The list goes on. I think the "you are the product" quip has become an overplayed meme of late. Mutually beneficial / co dependence and such themes are more applicable in more cases than not when it comes to free products and services, in my own view anyways.

I think it gets twisted partially because the quote is wrong. It should be "if a _service_ is free", not "when something is free." I don't think any of the examples you've listed would be considered a service, but rather either a platform (OS) or product.

The quip is certainly overplayed, but I think the notion still stands. It is important to be aware of what intentions service providers and product sellers have. It's not so much a dig on libre / free software.

Re: Why I deleted my Facebook account

#280

Post by dabockster »

CalRobert wrote: post #101
keganunderwood wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LinkedIn is perhaps the worst of the bunch though. I see people in "people you may know" that I've already tried to add but LinkedIn will show them to me because I assume they're not the ones spamming if it happens due to me clicking a button. All for a blip in user engagement.

Except Linkedin is boring, inane drivel from "thought leaders" so I'm not even tempted to have a look. At least FB has the occasional picture of someone I care about, or a political link (that inevitably agrees with my already-established view of things)

> inane drivel from "thought leaders"

I think you mean "innovators". Even though 9/10 times they claim ownership on things they've contracted out on their parent's cash.

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