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Facebook – You are the Product
- noncoml 9y agoIt's been years since I deleted my Facebook account, I do use WhatsApp though, and I don't feel like I am missing up on anything.
- bauerd 9y agoDeleted my Facebook account two months ago, but kept the Messenger for keeping up with a handful of friends. Haven't missed the newsfeed spam a day since! Rest assured you're not missing out
- edison85 9y agoIs it actually possible to keep messenger without Facebook? Because Facebook is a complete time wasting, spam filled, mind dulling echo chamber platform that I keep going back to due to habit. If I log out or deactivate I completely don't care after a few days, but messenger is essential to me.
- bauerd 9y agoYes, and I didn't know that either until I tried it out. My regular FB account is "deactivated", but Messenger works just fine. They seem to have decoupled both products some time ago.
- chickenfries 9y agoWait, that's awesome. I've been using news feed eradicator but now you're telling me that I can delete my Facebook account and still have a messenger account? Does that messenger account work for "sign in with facebook" buttons? For example, the only way to authenticate with Tinder is a Facebook account.
- bauerd 9y agoNo, you can't use the Messenger account for authentication. At least for Tinder I can confirm it doesn't work, maybe there's an OAuth provider for Messenger that no one uses, idk
- silassales 9y agoNo you cant sign into any other accounts with facebook, well you cant without reactivating it. If you sign into a deactivated facebook account even into a game, or something similar, it will count that as a account sign in and reactivate your account. If you fully delete your account, you wont be able to sign in at all.
- mandie 9y agoThey removed that possibility some time ago. Now if you disable your Facebook account, it's reactivated as soon as you log into Messenger. Tried it just a few days ago.
- tomfitz 9y agoI just tried deactivating, and upon logging in to Messenger (which works) it logged me into Messenger, but not FB. Sweet!
- sidcool 9y agoMost people I know dislike FB. But there are hundreds of millions out there for whom FB had become an addiction. B
- hk__2 9y agoResearch shows that most people use FB to keep in touch with their close friends and family. I don’t think it’s bad to be addicted to that. Edit: Some references for the people who downvoted: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0193397308000701 (also talks about how FB is a good help for people with low self-esteem) http://www.cairn.info/revue-sociologie-2017-1-p-57.htm (French) http://www.cairn.info/revue-sociologie-2017-1-p-83.htm (French, talks about how people in their 40s use FB - spoiler: to keep in touch with close friends and family) http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socnet.2014.01.002 http://www.pewinternet.org/2013/05/21/teens-social-media-and-privacy/
- noncoml 9y agoThat's what it was supposed to be for me, at least in the beginning. Then I realized that I keep in touch with the people who I want to keep in touch using direct messages, phone calls, email, etc.
- hk__2 9y agoYes; I wonder how the separation of Messenger and FB itself has changed the general user’s FB usage.
- steaknsteak 9y agoThat's my experience. I use it to keep in touch with friends and family, and to keep on top of events being held in my community and by my friends. I'm not sure what I would do without the Event and Group parts of facebook, as many of my friends and communities I'm a part of use those to plan/organize social activities and it works pretty well. One of my close friends who never checks his facebook is constantly out of the loop on that stuff. In my experience most people idly browse through the news feed for a couple minutes a few times a day. I doubt that a large portion are actually addicted to it.
- notadoc 9y agoI stopped using Facebook years ago and I could not recommend it more. I found it to be mental pollution at best and and a total waste of time. If you want to 'keep in touch' with people, call or text them. Make an effort to actually interact with the people who matter to you.
- ProAm 9y ago> call or text them There is no difference between a call or text and a message on FB, the medium doesn't change the context.
- d-sc 9y agoA call or text is a different interaction than scrolling through an infinite newsfeed designed to keep you addicted.
- ProAm 9y agoA facebook message doesn't force you to scroll forever. It's a message, just like a text message.
- turc1656 9y agoyeah but only the NSA will be tracking it if you use text, not some multinational conglomerate that is using it to continually build its profile about you while simultaneously selling that information to other parties. And if you do it right (meaning using the right app), your messages can be fully end-to-end encrypted so that no one can read them but the intended recipients. EDIT: it is widely known that the NSA has direct lines into places like Google and Facebook so using Facebook Messenger still routes your messages through the NSA indirectly. The only logical course of action, if someone cares about that sort of thing, is to not use Facebook Messenger and limit the amount of eyes that can see your communications.
- iaml 9y agoI find it a bit ridiculous that on HN you are damned both ways: if you rarely use fb to contact folks, you are still contributing to fb stats and still addicted (actual claims from other threads regarding fb), and if you aren't you're ignoring a (valuable) message channel.
- akeck 9y agoI wonder if, in the future, being able not to be on any social media will be an higher class privilege.
- ForRealsies 9y agoAgreed. Physical privacy (gated communities, SFH's) have long been a higher class privilege. If you're elite enough you can buy part of a Hawaiian island.
- Steer 9y agoWould the future then not hold social media that were invite-only in some way?
- gasof 9y agoIt's already there, it's called "an email server".
- lostlogin 9y agoIt's the 'reply all' button that ruined email. The other problems are solved by adequate filtering.
- seanp2k2 9y agohttps://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2017/4/26/15407144/exclusive-social-media-the-league-best-of-all-worlds-rich-kids https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2...
- yojo 9y agoA large part - 97% per https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanai https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanai
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- nawgszy 9y agoThere is a certain irony in an article criticizing of Facebook as a data-retailer disguised as a free service being "free with exchange of an email address".
- sametmax 9y agoI read more and more articles and comments about things we've been saying for years. How come you wake up now and say that like it's a surprise ?
- hk__2 9y agoEvery time I think something like this, I remember that xkcd [1] about people learning things you already know, especially the mouseover text. [1]: https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/
- MattSayar 9y agoOn the comics front, I've seen this comic since at least 2013 http://computerfloss.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/facebook-and-you.jpg http://computerfloss.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/facebook...
- sametmax 9y agoFair enough :) And probably wiser. I just felt frustrated that so much people discarded the arguments years ago only to read it everywhere now.
- rditooait 9y agoI agree that this particular article probably doesn't introduce any new ideas into conversation. However, I think it's important to continue dialogue on methods of action to combat this phenomenon. Realistically, while there are more and more articles and comments like this, the fact of the matter is that Facebook's growth and monetization is not slowing at an appreciable rate at all, and their methods have not substantially changed (if anything, they have changed for the worse as they concentrate more and more on monetization).
- occultist_throw 9y agoIndeed. Any service online, where you do not explicitly pay money for goods/services rendered, you can rest assured that you are paying with data or influence (advertisement). HN is no different. They control the news, and how the news is displayed. They run the YCombinator venture capital fund. You do not pay them, but they control influence (advertising). I would expect different if I paid YC for news access... But I dont.
- drewmol 9y agoThat line is increasingly blurred. Premium(payed) services also data mine, and I find it increasingly difficult to tell to what extent. As long as you collect a trove of data, and that data has market value, I generally expect it to be sold/used for profit. Edit: grammar
- brodock 9y agoMiddleground alternative is to have a non profit behind the "free service". This works relatively well for some opensource critical resources like rubygems.org which has a foundation paying the bills, sponsored by companies. I think there are other good examples. Problem is that social networks are hard to build, and tech people behind efforts like Diaspora, while they may understand the tech part, can't make something appealing enough for grandma or everage joe.
- amrrs 9y agoCal Newport has been saying things like Facebook and other SM are engineered to be addictive and we've constantly seeing Youths falling for it. Adam Alter made a similar comment that when we've got a proper regulation for substances, why not for something like social media? Fb is not just making us another node in a vast network graph but also ensuring a worst boring grown-ups who can't do anything worthy but post an Fb post condemning something and feeling great about their social responsibility.
- adrianlmm 9y agoI've been using Facebook for years, awesome tool, I'm in contact with friends, relatives and parters, it is awesome.
- adrianlmm 9y agoWhy the mod downs? It makes you angry that I find Facebook useful?
- wepple 9y agoPerhaps your comment didn't add anything useful to the discussion other than a lightweight opinion? However, HN downvotes do seem to be trending toward "I disagree" recently too, in my experience.
- Karunamon 9y agoAs if these constant digs at Facebook amount to deep nuance? By all means, if you can't use a website without becoming addicted to it, disconnect. But there's no need to damn everyone else with the "that's exactly what an addict would say" kafkatrap rhetoric that seems to be so popular every time the topic comes up.
- rconti 9y agoIt's of the same amount of value as the canned "delete facebook" comments we see in every thread on it (including the current top-ranked comment, which has zero value and is factually wrong).
- stephengillie 9y agoThe echo chamber disenjoys dissonance. I use FB to keep in touch with family and friends, and as a way for them to invite me to events. I avoid the "news" feed like the plague, and strongly prefer Imgur's User Submitted for a feed of "what's going on in the world today".
- steaknsteak 9y agoFacebook isn't new anymore so it's not cool to like it. I also find it vastly more useful than other social media sites.
- jellicle 9y agoI hope people are ready for Facebook to be fully integrated into Zuckerberg's political campaign.
- olympus 9y agoI'm here to fix some ignorance, since the source of the "you are the product" idea is not these books. Metafilter user blue_beetle first put this idea online when he said "If you are not paying for it, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold" in response to the Digg revolt of 2010. The idea apparently existed for a few decades prior regarding TV advertising. I prefer to think blue_beetle was the one who brought it into the zeitgeist. http://www.metafilter.com/95152/Userdriven-discontent http://www.metafilter.com/95152/Userdriven-discontent http://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/07/16/product/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/07/16/product/ Edit: Alex3917 posted a similar idea on HN on 6 May 2010, beating blue_beetle by a couple months. Gotta give credit where it's due: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15030959 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15030959
- guyzero 9y agoAs much as I give blue-beetle credit for having one of the earliest print references for that exact turn of phrase, I had definitely heard it before then. I don't think he really brought it into the zeitgeist, but then again I haven't talked to the entire zeitgeist about it yet.
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- rditooait 9y agoSorry - I want to make clear that the point of sharing this article on HN is not to give credit to who came up with this concept. I simply want to start (or continue) discourse on this particular subject. To be honest, this isn't even just about Facebook, I'm sure you could have the same argument about the majority of today's tech companies who are commoditizing information about users and using that to monetize. Generally, though, this is a trend that is not slowing down, instead it's rapidly speeding up. In addition to that, the methods have become increasingly worse. I'd like to continue discourse on methods of combating this particular phenomenon.
- olympus 9y ago
- taytus 9y agoI haven't used FB in the last 6 months or so. I'm mentally healthier.
- kristianc 9y ago> Whatever comes next will take us back to those two pillars of the company, growth and monetisation. Growth can only come from connecting new areas of the planet. This is a questionable assertion. Giant tech companies like Oracle and IBM don't tend to expand in this way, they make acquisitions of smaller companies, and use them to enhance the platform capabilities of the larger product. I'm sure Zuck will be delighted if the "bottom billion" do all sign up and use Facebook, but they're never going to be massively profitable accounts. Imo the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp show the way that Facebook will go - Instagram adds a new and lucrative ad format, a profitable user segment and a base for adding in ideas from other platforms, such as Snapchat. WhatsApp builds out Facebook's graph and can be mined for intel.
- phatbyte 9y agoI dropped all my social networks in the beginning of the year. I did for two main reasons. First, for privacy concerns. FB, specially was getting to creepy for me. I felt, every action I did was being analyzed and filtered, I felt like I was a lab rat. The fact that these companies know so much about us is pretty scary, I felt like I needed to regain my privacy, fight the system somehow. Second reason was because, I wasn't getting anything substantial that could improve my life overall. All I saw was dumb-ass posts, ignorant comments, the passive aggressiveness, the "look at me doing this really mundane thing, but please like my picture so I can feel validated", etc... feels like a mouse-cat race to see which of us has a better life or something. I honestly feel bad for how much time I spent there when I could apply that time to learn new things. After more than 6 months without FB, here's what I've learned: - I still keep in touch with my closest friends, we chat on slack/iMessage every day. It's actually a good way to know who really misses you, during this time, only about 5% of my FB friends reached out to me through message or phone to ask how were things in life. The other 95%, I really don't even remember most of their names anymore. Just ask yourselves, why do we have to share so much of our lives with so many "friends"? I know we can filter, and create groups, etc.. but damn...do you really want to spend your life "managing" relationships, to see who sees what? I find that tiresome. - I don't feel left out of anything, because I keep track of local events using other sources, I read news from faithful websites, and if I need to share anything I just use the old email or show face-to-face any pictures I need of my latest vacation from my phone without having to share anything with anyone. - I gain more time, less stress, I don't feel overwhelmed to keep track of every social media update. I just don't care. If something important happens I will know it sooner or later. - I no longer have this need to constantly keep posting photos of what I'm doing outdoors or whatever. I don't have the need to feel validated by anyone but myself. - But most importantly, I regained my privacy, or at least my social footprint is bare none at this point. I'm using uBlock, Firefox, DuckDuckGo and other tools to keep trackers at bay. I may never completely win this war, but at least my habits aren't being recorded and feed to any ML algorithm.
- nsnick 9y agoThe real problem with Facebook is that it causes depression. No one posts anything bad about their lives so your life looks terrible in comparison to the image everyone is posting.
- booleandilemma 9y agoI think every adult who uses FB is aware of this and they don't care. FB users self-select for people who don't care that a company productizes them.
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- 0xfaded 9y agoI log in whenever I need to use messenger, about once every three months. Was greeted with a notification telling me it had been 258 weeks since I last updated my profile. :)
- yoz-y 9y agoFacebook has been slowly making messenger worse though. They have added the stupid status updates which nobody in my circle uses. Before I knew that when I got to messenger I would only have conversations, now I dread that they will slowly transform it into yet another "platform". It would be a right move for them probably, going mobile first like WeChat did in China, still it is probably the only "messaging only" platform which people around me use.
- wentoodeep 9y agoMessenger bot platform is the only reason I turned back to facebook.
- tehlike 9y agoi am not using facebook actively, but still have my account. have been so much happier since i started doing this.
- grwthckrmstr 9y agoI'm using Facebook to earn my "fuck you money". The advertising tools are so powerful it is downright scary, the level of targeting one can do using it is just insane. That's partly the reason why I stopped posting updates. After seeing the depth of the advertising tools. I don't use Facebook for posting personal updates anymore but only to fuel my business. I realise that the only way I can "choose" to stay out of all these services that track and sell our identity to advertisers is if I have "fuck you money" (money is the currency you exchange for your limited time in order to survive in this world).
- ionised 9y agoSo you don't like Facebook tracking and advertising to you but you happily make your money using those tools you describe as downright scary on others? Does this not scream hypocrisy to you?
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- lanevorockz 9y agoIsn't it also true for Google ?
- justaguy2017 9y agoI don't understand the problem, you can use Facebook for adding friends and messaging them and it's free. You can use Facebook Messenger, not use the app and use website for adding people and getting their information. The newsfeed there can be turned off or customised, if you do install the app, all notifications can be turned off. This is a good and free service, but if people don't know hot to use it, maybe there is a point in writing about it. Messages about deleting Facebook account seem counterproductive, because why throw away a good tool if you use it rarely and it's useful?
- hohenheim 9y agoIt seems you didn't read the text. The point the article is making is not about how to use the Facebook and its set of features. I will not try to create a TL;DR in a comment as that would not do justice to the article, but please read it. It might help you understand why it is "free". You be the judge of if that is good or bad.