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Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

gizmodo.com

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Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#131

Post by godelski »

dbingham wrote: post #8

The thing that holds me to Facebook is that it's become the town square for my local community. It's where people go to discuss the community's political challenges. So many important dialogs about local issues happen on Facebook, and it's the only real way to be a part of those conversations. Things like zoning, planning, city and county budgeting, ordinances, and so on. If I leave, not only do I lose the ability to…

I feel like this isn't so crazy of an idea, but any can't the city host it's own website with forums and everything? This could enable easier and more clear threading than Facebook, and you can look through history and pin topics/announcements. The library could be in charge of hosting it and archiving everything (isn't this already something libraries are supposed to do? The archiving of local news.) There's plenty of free software to do this too.

There are so many variants that could be done off of this too. A federation of these servers, as towns help one another balance and archive data. Or help communication between towns. I'm sure a discussion somewhere like HN could quickly improve on this idea in a way that would be robust and easy to implement (because a key thing is that we want to get small towns to be able to implement this)

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#132

Post by majewsky »

mxuribe wrote: post #53
carlob wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally agree with you. And I'm very scared of the day a job, the school my kids go to or whatever important life activity will require me to have a facebook, whatsapp, linkedin, twitter or whatever account. We need something to replace these, possibly a federated, open standard, but I guess even the self hosted forums of yore were much better than this.

There are numerous alternatives that could (and hopeful should) replace FB - through what is referred to as the FediVerse - specifically via Pleroma, Mastodon, GnuSocial, etc. While admittedly mastodon is the platform that gets the most mindshare (and most users access the fediverse through it), it is not the only one...And much like email, users employing mastodon as "their tool" can communicate with other users who…

> Well, the migration has already begun, so it should only be a matter of time...

As much as I would like this to be true, they said the same thing about XMPP.

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#133

Post by canada_dry »

godelski wrote: post #131
dbingham wrote: post #8

The thing that holds me to Facebook is that it's become the town square for my local community. It's where people go to discuss the community's political challenges. So many important dialogs about local issues happen on Facebook, and it's the only real way to be a part of those conversations. Things like zoning, planning, city and county budgeting, ordinances, and so on. If I leave, not only do I lose the ability to…

I feel like this isn't so crazy of an idea, but any can't the city host it's own website with forums and everything? This could enable easier and more clear threading than Facebook, and you can look through history and pin topics/announcements. The library could be in charge of hosting it and archiving everything (isn't this already something libraries are supposed to do? The archiving of local news.) There's plenty…

> can't the city host it's own website with forums and everything

Of course it could... but with tight public budgets it would likely be implemented so poorly as to be useless.

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#134

Post by subpixel »

jadbox wrote: post #120
spurmboy wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I say this with respect and for your benefit: this is the most cringe inducing product description I’ve ever read.

Ah, thanks for that feedback. Would you like to try your hand of writing a better summary here? It would be appreciated, as it's hard to improve from just a single word criticism (cringe).

"Product abc.xyz is like Facebook, without the suck."

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#135

Post by [deleted] »

subpixel wrote: post #134
jadbox wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, thanks for that feedback. Would you like to try your hand of writing a better summary here? It would be appreciated, as it's hard to improve from just a single word criticism (cringe).

"Product abc.xyz is like Facebook, without the suck."

[deleted]

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#136

Post by javagram »

baq wrote: post #125
javagram wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems extremely exaggerated. What’s illegal about private citizens choosing to use a service like Facebook to talk to each other? If you want to “participate in government” nothing stops you from showing up to town or county council meetings, planning commissions, and so on, or from sending letters to your elected officials, or a phone call, or running for office yourself.

At which point it stops being private and becomes public instead though? And what to do after it happens? Discussing town policy isn’t something that should be kept behind a gate, and especially not Facebook.

> At which point it stops being private and becomes public instead though?

When the actual decisions are being made there. Many places have “open meeting” laws that require decisions be made out in the open.

Facebook is not the ballot box, it is not the county council, it is not the town meeting. It’s just a place where people can choose to talk to each other.

> Discussing town policy isn’t something that should be kept behind a gate, and especially not Facebook.

This is what freedom of association and freedom of speech is though. If your neighbors choose to talk to each other through Facebook, Nextdoor, a google group, an email list, a BBS, or in their own living rooms, you shouldn’t be able to stop them from doing that, whatever it is they prefer to do.

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#137

Post by JetezLeLogin »

cols wrote: post #52

I just passed my two year anniversary with no FB, Twitter, Instagram, or Snapchat and I've never been happier. I convinced my wife to cut the cord about a year ago and she completely agrees. For me it was an addiction. I was compulsively checking FB many times an hour to stay caught up with people. This was after culling my friends list multiple times. Turns out, life goes on just fine without a constant water hose o…

Going on 8 years for me. Suddenly this feels like an AA meeting or something. "Got my 8 year medallion!"

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#138

Post by xtiansimon »

canada_dry wrote: post #133
godelski wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like this isn't so crazy of an idea, but any can't the city host it's own website with forums and everything? This could enable easier and more clear threading than Facebook, and you can look through history and pin topics/announcements. The library could be in charge of hosting it and archiving everything (isn't this already something libraries are supposed to do? The archiving of local news.) There's plenty…

> can't the city host it's own website with forums and everything Of course it could... but with tight public budgets it would likely be implemented so poorly as to be useless.

My city can barely make a webpage (poor content structure), and event calendar that isn’t woefully out of date.

What about the US Digital Services? A WPA program for 21st century?

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#139

Post by tracker1 »

Facebook is really the only place I'm able to connect with most of my extended family and friends. I'm active on a few FB groups by interest, but also with old friends from H.S. and a lot of other groups of people it would be difficult to break or migrate from.

If there were a social network that charged an active fee, that I could say pay $20-40/year for myself and be able to invite maybe 10-15 others whose fees are covered by my own, that might get people to move. No ads, no selling customer data, minimal intrusion.

Re: Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently

#140

Post by tracker1 »

ej12n wrote: post #27
dbingham wrote: post #8

The thing that holds me to Facebook is that it's become the town square for my local community. It's where people go to discuss the community's political challenges. So many important dialogs about local issues happen on Facebook, and it's the only real way to be a part of those conversations. Things like zoning, planning, city and county budgeting, ordinances, and so on. If I leave, not only do I lose the ability to…

Nextdoor comes to mind, but not necessarily a local online town square which I agree with your comment that a source like that is invaluable to keep up with local issues.

Not sure about other areas, but there seem to be some really power hungry moderator tyrants on there... similar to some HOAs for example.
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