Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

blog.mozilla.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 210 posts

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#111

Post by Mikeb85 »

31098347 wrote: post #110
Mikeb85 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your statement is victim blaming. Really? You're going to equate this to crimes someone perpetuates against another? For weeks I've seen posts blaming Ukraine for being invaded and having genocide committed against them. That's victim blaming. Social media users aren't victims of anything except their own inability to limit and moderate usage. Back in the day people would sit in front of the TV, now it's just a dif…

The naïveté of this take is astounding for someone who frequents a technology message board. You’re just going to ignore the part where these services employ A/B tests to make their services more addictive? You’re going to ignore the countless stories about how Facebook knew that the content they boost is bad for mental health and is addictive but they did it anyway? You’re going to ignore .. the entire surveillance…

And commercial food producers make their products more addictive too... How about the tobacco industry? How about illicit drugs? Porn?

At some point you need to talk about personal responsibility...

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#112

Post by 31098347 »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #111
31098347 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The naïveté of this take is astounding for someone who frequents a technology message board. You’re just going to ignore the part where these services employ A/B tests to make their services more addictive? You’re going to ignore the countless stories about how Facebook knew that the content they boost is bad for mental health and is addictive but they did it anyway? You’re going to ignore .. the entire surveillance…

And commercial food producers make their products more addictive too... How about the tobacco industry? How about illicit drugs? Porn? At some point you need to talk about personal responsibility...

> And commercial food producers make their products more addictive too... How about the tobacco industry? How about illicit drugs? Porn?

How about them? They also designed their products to be addictive.

“Personal Responsibility” is just the shield that powerful companies use to avoid being regulated.

Shift the blame to the exploited and make it clear that their problems stem from their moral deficiency. Pretty convenient all told —- the personal responsibility of the architects of these systems and products somehow evaporates.

Personal responsibility cannot overcome AI designed to addict you. These services are not your friends. You are not the customer or the product. Your future behavior is the product. The only way to win is not to play.

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#114

Post by belval »

toastercat wrote: post #82
thenerdhead wrote: post #75

I've found myself between deleting, deactivating, and moderating my use of these apps for many years of my life. I never found deleting or deactivating to be very helpful. At some time or another you're going to need said account for something. While deleting is a bit extreme, some of these services will respect the actual deletion and others will not. I suppose the question at the end of the day is...why bother? I'v…

> At some time or another you're going to need said account for something. Nope for almost all of these. Different strokes different folks. > Facebook Nope. Haven't had one for more than 10 years now. So easy to live life without a FB account. I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. > Instagram Used it for maybe 10 minutes in 2013, haven't touched since. > Snapchat Same as Instagram, but in…

> I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble.

You are a counter-example for sure, but this means that you don't have a group chat platform to plan coordinated events with your friends? Maybe it's an age thing, but getting my friends in a call at a given time to organise a social event is probably as hard as organising the event itself. Compare with Facebook/Messenger/Whatsapp where everyone is in a group chat I can just write "Anyone wants to have dinner at my place this Friday?".

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#115

Post by harrylove »

Mikeb85 wrote: post #111
31098347 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The naïveté of this take is astounding for someone who frequents a technology message board. You’re just going to ignore the part where these services employ A/B tests to make their services more addictive? You’re going to ignore the countless stories about how Facebook knew that the content they boost is bad for mental health and is addictive but they did it anyway? You’re going to ignore .. the entire surveillance…

And commercial food producers make their products more addictive too... How about the tobacco industry? How about illicit drugs? Porn? At some point you need to talk about personal responsibility...

You can be an impartial observer of predator/prey behavior without considering yourself part of either group. But it doesn’t change the fact that there is a predator/prey relationship. In the case of social media, just like many addictions, there are too many variables at play to propose a simple solution like “just stop doing it.” So when you say people (who are indeed targeted) should “just” do the simple solution or else suffer the consequences, that is victim blaming.

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#116

Post by tomtheelder »

belval wrote: post #114
toastercat wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At some time or another you're going to need said account for something. Nope for almost all of these. Different strokes different folks. > Facebook Nope. Haven't had one for more than 10 years now. So easy to live life without a FB account. I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. > Instagram Used it for maybe 10 minutes in 2013, haven't touched since. > Snapchat Same as Instagram, but in…

> I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. You are a counter-example for sure, but this means that you don't have a group chat platform to plan coordinated events with your friends? Maybe it's an age thing, but getting my friends in a call at a given time to organise a social event is probably as hard as organising the event itself. Compare with Facebook/Messenger/Whatsapp where everyone is i…

I just use text message group chats, and so do most people I know.

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#117

Post by VLM »

agency wrote: post #95
VLM wrote: post #84

Most people don't need to delete their accounts. I have a tasty bottle of rather expensive whiskey on the bar in my basement right now. Luxury consumables are a good gift, I guess. I don't want to drink it right now because I have things to do requiring sobriety, its a bit early in the day for that sort of thing, etc. I got my reasons, none of them terribly interesting. If I don't want to drink it for various reasons…

What a bizarre take. You should continue to volunteer your personal information to an ad-tech behemoth… in order to prove you’re not an addict?

Binary thinking. You can ONLY actively consume or actively delete, unthinkable that you can passively not use it.

Its like claiming its impossible for that bottle of whiskey to sit, undrinking, on my basement bar top, whiskey can only either be chugged immediately or angrily poured down the drain. Its impossible that bottle is sitting there without my drinking it.

I assure you, despite your claim that its impossible, I have a mostly full bottle of whiskey on my bar and an unused Facebook account. Why do you believe I'm lying? It seems realistic, reasonable, and a wise course of action.

The other reason deletion is pushed is to provide the illusion of privacy. You have no privacy anymore. Everyone important or actionable has total access to your entire digital life and always has and always will; the government, the banks, the big corporations. Its a false illusion that deleting your cat-meme-sharing account somehow protects you from the credit reporting agencies or the NSA. Its important to provide that false illusion of choice so that people are distracted from the actions of the credit reporting agencies and the NSA and the IRS and the banks and ...

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#118

Post by bombcar »

belval wrote: post #114
toastercat wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At some time or another you're going to need said account for something. Nope for almost all of these. Different strokes different folks. > Facebook Nope. Haven't had one for more than 10 years now. So easy to live life without a FB account. I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. > Instagram Used it for maybe 10 minutes in 2013, haven't touched since. > Snapchat Same as Instagram, but in…

> I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. You are a counter-example for sure, but this means that you don't have a group chat platform to plan coordinated events with your friends? Maybe it's an age thing, but getting my friends in a call at a given time to organise a social event is probably as hard as organising the event itself. Compare with Facebook/Messenger/Whatsapp where everyone is i…

Telegram or slack or discord or even iMessage or SMS can provide group chat.

It can make it even easier, especially if you have various groups you interact with on different platforms.

Re: Internet spring cleaning: How to delete Instagram, Facebook and other accounts

#119

Post by scruple »

belval wrote: post #114
toastercat wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At some time or another you're going to need said account for something. Nope for almost all of these. Different strokes different folks. > Facebook Nope. Haven't had one for more than 10 years now. So easy to live life without a FB account. I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. > Instagram Used it for maybe 10 minutes in 2013, haven't touched since. > Snapchat Same as Instagram, but in…

> I stay in touch with family and friends by phonecalls and Mumble. You are a counter-example for sure, but this means that you don't have a group chat platform to plan coordinated events with your friends? Maybe it's an age thing, but getting my friends in a call at a given time to organise a social event is probably as hard as organising the event itself. Compare with Facebook/Messenger/Whatsapp where everyone is i…

Friends? What friends?

More seriously... My wife has friends that she sees pretty regularly, because we still live in her home state near where she grew up, but I really don't. I'm not sure what they use to organize but I do know that it isn't Facebook or WhatsApp.

I have a couple of friends that I keep in touch with over text but we aren't a group of friends. One of my friends does have a large friend group and I happen to be in a group MMS because of him. But it's not a place where events are organized because his friends are also scattered all over the country.

I use Discord for the group that I play DnD and video games with but, again, we're scattered all over the country. Only one of them is nearby.

Post reply on HN