Journal of the mental environment
You’ll never find me on Facebook. You may scoff at my refusal – I used to do the same, rolling my eyes whenever my elders claimed resistance to the latest internet phenomenon – but Facebook is a scary, commercial dead-zone that’s killing our real-world relationships.
Like most Americans in their mid-twenties, I am a child of the computer age. That I did not immediately jump on the Facebook wagon is not due to an innate dislike of technology or an irrational fear of the web, but merely because I graduated from college before Facebook became a university fad. I was, like an ever-decreasing number of people, happily oblivious to this social networking website. But then something troubling happened: my wedding photos appeared on Facebook.
In a typical website, a user may upload a photograph, write a funny caption and that’s it. But in Facebook, users are asked to identify who else is in the photo. This is the crucial difference that allowed a friend of a friend of a friend to view pictures of my wedding a bridesmaid had uploaded. Although neither my wife nor I had ever joined Facebook, our names, pictures, social connections and wedding photographs were already in its database. With 60 million users busily adding information about their hobbies, political positions, employment, education, friends and plans for the weekend, you too might be in Facebook without your knowledge.
My first reactions to learning about my presence on Facebook were contradictory. On the one hand, I felt the thrill of social connectedness – an exhibitionist feeling of delight at having my existence confirmed by a third party. But I also felt violated and confused. Having never used Facebook, I couldn’t understand how my wedding pictures had gotten there or who was now able to view them. And I became concerned about what Facebook will do with the information it’s collecting about me.
In a recent Fast Company magazine article, Facebook’s vice-president of product marketing and operations explained that while companies like Google are concerned with “demand fulfillment” – helping a consumer find the product they want – Facebook is cornering the market in “demand generation” – subtly encouraging individuals to consume products and services they’d otherwise not care for.
The first step toward demand generation was encouraging users to share information about their interests, favorite movies and books, and political beliefs that would allow Facebook to send advertisements targeted to their demographic. The second controversial step that Facebook took is to partner with dozens of online retailers so that when a member buys a widget on a partner’s site, all their Facebook “friends” find out. This sinister system would be akin to my computer automatically emailing my address book when I purchase a book online.
By turning members into consumers who involuntarily advertise to their friends, Facebook hoped to extract profit from social interactions. However, by commercializing friendships, Facebook has irrevocably destroyed its image. Now a vanguard of the anti-Facebook movement is developing out of an increasing disenchantment. No longer a fun, harmless place to hang out, Facebook has become just another commercial enterprise.
Because Facebook has intentionally made it very difficult for users to leave the site, demanding that they manually delete every bit of information that they added into the system before their account will be removed, a growing number of users are fleeing by committing what has been called “Facebook Suicide.” By manually removing their Facebook friends before deleting their account, indignant users ensure that their friends are fully aware of the real reasons why they are leaving.
The movement could reach epidemic levels if more users kill off their electronic selves rather than submit to corporate control over their friendships. Facebook, and the other corporate lackeys, will then learn that they can’t exploit our social relationships for profit. From viral growth will come a viral death as more people demand that Facebook dies so our friendships may thrive.
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I believe the problem is that Micah *didn't* post those photos, and therefore has *no* control over them. They were posted by a bridesmaid.
In a typical website, a user may upload a photograph, write a funny caption and that’s it. But in Facebook, users are asked to identify who else is in the photo. This is the crucial difference that allowed a friend of a friend of a friend to view pictures of my wedding a bridesmaid had uploaded. Although neither my wife nor I had ever joined Facebook, our names, pictures, social connections and wedding photographs were already in its database.
It wasn't his decision - he's not even a user - and that's the problem. I personally take issue with the fact that Facebook would encourage users to post personal information of someone other than the account holder and keep it in their database in that manner. It's one reason I avoid Facebook like the plague. That Facebook isn't the only site to do so doesn't mitigate the offense.
You keep telling yourself "I am not my facebook" and follow that right up with "I am not in the matrix" and then, for your grande finale, tell yourself "This is not my beautiful house" (of cards)
I was visiting the website adbusters.org and was surprised by the title of this essay. In the group of website vandals I am a member of, "Facebook Suicide," "Myspaace Suicide," and similar terms refer to a person abandoning their social networking profile as a result of our efforts. It's interesting to see the term used outside of the context of harassment.
You can leave FB by the way, but not in the way you've written about. Deleting all your "friends" on there and then the account can still leave it alive. And of course will still leave all "your" content on there. I say it in quotes because of course as soon as you stick it up there, it becomes property of FB.
http://kraftymiles.wordpress.com/2008/03/04/i%e2%80%99ve-managed-to-leav...
So if you do want to leave Facebook entirely, here’s the group telling you how to do it
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=16929680703
and here’s the form you need to fill in.
http://www.facebook.com/cs_forms/fshelp.php?page=9
Someone at FB HQ will then assess your request and get back to you.
hi everyone! here cris & sol, we're spanish girls and we'd like to give our opinion:
we're not against facebook, it's just an other way of comunication and so you can meet new people. anyway you MUST be careful whit all those people who surf the net, have you ever seen HARD CANDY (not Madonna's new albun lol)?
neither cris nor me have a facebook, we don't have the time to spend on it and we find it a bit borring but, why not haveing one?
PEACE AND LOVE!!
I always forget that I have a facebook or myspace account...
I have a face book and all i have in it is a picture of jimmy hendrix that i drew and a cuple of my freinds who are out of state.......so just dont put all ur effing info on a stupid site and ull be fine :)
you are not ur face book
For me, it's about self-control and effort. I got rid of my Facebook for a month just to see what kind of effect it had on my life. It had none. It's possible to mix real life and the internet in a healthy, productive way. For example, what of the relationships I have with people who live on the opposite side of the world from me? It's nice to have another option besides snail mail. Yes, most social networking sites are full of sleazy advertisements, but it's up to the individual to recognize and process this information. Am I going to mindlessly click on every link that pops up? Or am I going to try to counteract them by posting links to educational articles, essays, and stories with substance?
There is absolutely no promotions made towards Facebook nor any other corporate runned social-interaction based websites such like MySpace or the like. Rather, this is an individual's legitimate and empathetical outcry about Facebook and its powerfully innocent... yet invasive machine that helped plaster his wedding pictures on the web. It's a wake-up call for Mr. White and soon to be, for many others too. Facebook is dangerous and should never be overlooked, we as human beings should be aware and responsible of our own activities before ignorantly share our or one another's personal information into the relatively permanent and naked system. Which can be abused by many... particularly those who have guns to our necks and/or hands into our pockets.
Also, not to be nosy, but congratulations on your wedding Mr. White.
I am a proclaimed face book hater. Quite frankly, I think it's stupid. But there CAN be benifits. You can use facebook to put out your thoughts and outrage much like this site. Can we say it's a complete waste of time and effort? No, because our people are using the good side of it. Just a thought from a kid who is proud to say " I am not on facebook."
It is a bit strange people will post photos of you online... I think for some people - perhaps really young people facebook might get in the way of more natural forms of communication. However I dont think the internet is out to get you or anyone is spying on you, this is paranoia and happens when people have a bad LSD trip or go crazy
The article did not mention facebook being "out to get you" It stated what it does with the information facebook users give them..?
I agree that we should use facebook to our advantage and not throw the baby out with the bath water.
Once we know such options exist we can avail of the privacy settings facebook has to offer. Unfortunately facebook wont inform "stupid" people on the privacy options which it offers and it is these "stupid" people who are the most susceptible to this method of "demand generation". But hey that doesn't mean we shut facebook down. As with all forms of advertising it is up to the individual/consumer to decide whether or not he wants the product.
Facebook is perhaps a more evasive type of advertising than we have seen before as it uses our peers to pressure us into purchasing; and it approaches us when we're in a comfortable state of mind whilst communicating with friends. But again once we are aware of this it should not be a problem.
I don't use facebook (I have no friends) but after reading this article and the comments which followed I figure that the problem,in terms of advertising (don't ask me about information gathering government agencies), is not with facebook but with its users level of awareness. Advertising preys on the ignorant.
Why not just set up your own web site, and host it where you like? Why go to some corporation who will screen and filter everything and monitor and OWN the content that you publish? They can bring it all down on a whim - so why participate? Set up your own web server instead!
(Obviously, Facebook and Myspace will get "priority" if the net is ever turned into a controlled cable environment)
I thought of posting this article on my facebook page, since every article of adbusters can be posted on facebook... its funny yet quite meaningless.
Its idea is abolishing all internet global relationships by viewing it as harmful when it really isn´t.
anywho..
by the way if you don´t want anybody to see your photos, besides your friends that can be done.. so its not as explosive as the author says it is.
.
I got in touch with a whole bunch of friends from childhood and saw them in REAL life... and i keep on seeing them because of facebook, so HAH
So you start promoting facebook. Goodluck, i hope they pay good bucks for an article like this.
Oh how ignorant you are, what do you want? what the hell are you reading the article for if you do not want to hear adbusters comments? would you prefer the comments were censored?
Oh, jeez. This article is definitely overreacting and ill-informed. For instance, the partnerships with other websites to have your actions posted are voluntary. For instance, I can make a post on Livejournal and voluntarily decide that I want to share the info that I posted there on Facebook. I can voluntarily post that I bought some book from Amazon. Initially, there were some screw ups with that, but were quickly corrected due to massive complaints with the Facebook population (you screw over a customer base that big, in a medium that is designed to allow easy grassroots gatherings, and it will virally bite your own ass *with* your own ass). Besides which, you have to voluntarily associate your accounts at these other places with your Facebook account for it to even give you the option of voluntarily sharing your actions, many of which are not consumer-related at all.
So your wedding pics are online? Welcome to the internet. Since the early days of it, people have been sharing information about people who aren't them. What can you do about it? Ask the person posting the pics to take them down, if it bothers you. If you were signed up to Facebook, you can remove any tags of yourself as well, regardless of who tagged it, and once a tag has been removed it can't be re-tagged. What info does Facebook gain from your wedding pictures being tagged about you, when you're not signed up? At most, a name and email. From their privacy policy: "We do not provide contact information to third party marketers without your permission." Also, regarding any one-time emails that Facebook sends re: invites etc., "Your friend may contact us at info@facebook.com to request that we remove this information from our database." So do that, instead of complaining about a site you don't really understand the operations of. AND, before complaining about the privacy policies of a site, actually read and understand the privacy policies of the site.
Personally, for me, Facebook has kept me in greater touch with my friends, has helped me find out more about things going on in my local scene, independent shows, free movie screenings at universities, helped with organising events, and generally all around makes it easier for me to find out about non-corporatised culture in my community and relevant to myself and my circle of peers, which I would've figured Adbusters would, y'know, like. Yes, I find getting irrelevant Coors ads (for instance) periodically in my news feed - but that just really shows that my information is essentially useless to them for marketing, if their 'targeted' marketing has no advertisers looking for my information. As for the regular ads that almost every site has these days - well, that's what learning about how to use a HOSTS file is for. Repeat with me: "ads.ak.facebook.com 127.0.0.1".
All in all, this article reads like someone wanting to show up their moral superiority by not being part of the big bad, by coercing others via poor information that their opinion is better, when really they are just taking a stand and saying, "I refuse to join Facebook, because I haven't joined Facebook, and I will come up with a justification later that suits my imagined principles."
A social networking site directly opposed to the CIA and the military-industrial complex would be cool too.
Any recommendations for social networking sites besides Facebook or MySpace that respect privacy and downplay corporate marketing?
Or any tips for pro-active socially concious, anti-corporate social networking sites?
I didn't realize this until after my original response, but isn't it ironic that this article can be shared, via Adbusters, using Facebook.
This is such a dumb conversation it is rediculous...facebook is making money...thats what they want to do at this point when the creator originally started it, it was a great way of harvard students or whatever to get in touch with each other because...well, harvard students have no lives and work all the time on there computers in the library. Now that it has become what it is, a profit targeted website that makes profits from ads, it wants people to be addicted lets face it hardly anything on facebook in terms of apps are actually useful, video....pics...messages are basically it. That means you can basically do this anywhere else like a webshots or send videos to your friends via email.
facebook is fun and addictive....thats what it wants to be...its like american idol but a website...in other words it needs to stop but you know it will be back next year bigger and better.
Concerning Facebook, the only grudge I have against it is the huge amount of widget notices I receive to install. I ignore them. However sometimes, a request to install an app comes in as if sent by a friend in facebook, so before I accept it, I ask the person if indeed he/she sent me a request. Half the time the asnwer they didn´t. It seems as if Facebook "lies" about someone sending requests. A recent example I received:
XXXX sent a request using Sexiness Battle:
I just nominated you as the best friend on Facebook! Join now and don't let me down :(
Well, I´ve asked XXXX and if she nominated me for that , and her answer was no.
Just the latest example of Facebook "lies".
Cheers!
The big problem is that people are sheep. They are used to not having to read anything carefully, so often people don't realise that they have to invite 20 friends to get the result for some stupid quiz. In this case, people just click the View Results button and don't notice all the checkmarks on their friends' faces.
Also, people don't realise that Facebook has quite an extensive set of privacy settings. You can actually set exactly who can (or who can't) see each of your photo albums, which parts of your profile certain people can see, and so on.
For now, as a knowledgeable Facebook user, I still see many more advantages than catches. But then again, I'm not a terrorist or anything.
"Facebook has intentionally made it very difficult for users to leave the site, demanding that they manually delete every bit of information that they added into the system before their account will be removed" -- this is blatantly false -- in fact, as soon as a person deletes his profile (which takes maybe 3-4 clicks tops), all the information, including that on other people's profile "walls," is eradicated. it does instantly appear if an when the person rejoins, however.
the error can be forgiven, of course, on account of your proud lack of personal knowledge about that which you decry.
How does a person's information eradicates if it reappears when that person joins again? Obviously then, the info is still sitting somewhere in the database that can be accessed, no?
Social networking sites are the controlled cubicle model for the Internet.
Imagine if you had to log in to any Internet activity via your Facebook or Myspace account (Guerrilla News Network, the shady Alberta tar sands-linked outfit, also uses the Myspace format). Maybe you had a special card, or maybe you had to log in via a retina scan, but that would be your (closely monitored) portal to the Internet.
Such a system could easily be adapted to control and monitor all content arriving in your cubicle. Indeed, that's what China is doing right now, with the help of Western Internet corporations. Facebook and Myspace can easily turn into a tight control system for the Internet here in the United States as well.
A ban on exports of such internet-monitoring technology to repressive states is a good idea - but not one that the U.S. politicians or corporations would ever think of supporting. Indeed, the U.S. is really starting to fit into the "repressive state" model - we have the greatest percentage of our population in prison, ranked #1 globally. Not really a "beacon of freedom" from that perspective, are we?
I have less hope for the future of our human relationships. I am just a couple years younger, still in college, and I am consistently bothered by my friends for not being on facebook. I don't know anyone else not on the network. It has changed how people date, how they hang out, and, most worryingly, has defined 'friendship' as the mere exchange of information over the internet. And if my generation is unhealthily invested with the site, what about those still in high school, who have never known social interacting without myspace/facebook? I hope that 'facebook suicides' increase in number, but it seems to me that we are moving away from ever being able to really communicate without mediation again.
Relax. Your friends who do use Facebook wanted to share the joy of YOUR wedding with their world, which likely includes more of your friends. This is troubling?
How is Facebook "killing our real-world relationships"? Is this not the real world? Am I not actually typing this response to your piece?
Facebook is merely a different way of interacting with your friends and family. Facebook enhances relationships. How often would you speak with a friend overseas on the phone? Can they show you pictures of their weekend trip while you chat? Can they show you pictures of THEIR wedding?
It is somewhat narcissistic of you to assume that people are interested in accumulating your personal information specifically. You decide what information goes on your page. You don't have to submit any financial information. Does it actually matter if someone finds out your favourite movie is Mannequin?
Facebook requires voluntary registration so users are not 'involuntarily' advertising to their friends. Both parties are aware of the requirements for using the service. If advertising is targeted to your specific interests and hobbies, isn't it more useful? Does it not specialize the process and help to remove the random transmission of useless advertising?
With the advancement of technology and expectations of real-time results from even the most novice computer-user, Facebook is a way for people to keep an electronic journal of their lives and share the journal with those who have been a part of their life. Advertising makes it possible for this service to be free for its users. It appears as though the users have decided that price is enough of a bargain to withstand the advertising.
But, don't forget, as you mentioned, it is a 'fad'.
Agreed. Furthermore, although I admit I don't know what online retailers are allied with Facebook, I've never seen anyone ever have it advertised when they buy things on the internets. Facebook has never broadcasted any of my purchases to my friends (a far cry from mailing my e-mail address book out or controlling my friendships), and even if it did, you have the option of hiding anything you do that shows up in your mini-feed so others don't know. You can make all of your actions covert if you want to. Also, what is this "Facebook suicide" movement you're claiming exists, anyway? How would manually removing all your friends before deleting your account do anything at all? It doesn't alert them to the fact that you unfriended them, and it certainly doesn't tell them your reasons for doing so. Maybe I'm just not as "counter-culture" as you, but I've not heard of anyone doing anything like this.Have you even tried using Facebook? You sound like you are too old to even understand it or bother doing research.