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Facebook has become almost completely useless to me yet I waste so much time on it every day. No one posts anything on it except like 3 guys who post 10 times a

Facebook has become almost completely useless to me yet I waste so much time on it every day. No one posts anything on it except like 3 guys who post 10 times a day that I barely know yet find their extremist political posts mind numbingly amusing. The news on there is trash, I much prefer the WSJ and if I want sensationalist things I'll go to Reddit and my tastes are more niche now so I have some forums I visit occasionally for better discussion. I have never in 10 years clicked on a single ad and I've removed the apps so I don't get autoplaying videos so I'm not bothered by the future ads on there. Messenger is important to me and the Birthday list is too. Without those I wouldn't deCtivate since you need it as social proof for Tinder, but I'd never go back on. Honestly, I was busy for just 3 days and didn't log on and the "addiction" completely vanished. We need to have a no shave novemebr for Facebook, maybe a no Facebook February and I guarantee millions would get off the addiction and vastly limit daily social media use.

TheNewKanye 9y ago
You actually only need a phone number for Tinder, making facebook even more useless.
jressey 9y ago
I think you just coined the phrase. Let's take a page from the alt-right playbook and meme "No Facebook February" in to existence.
- RpFLCL 9y ago
  Taking a break could be a new years resolution :)
- hbhakhra 9y ago
  Facebook Free February
  - RileyJames 9y ago
    Looks like it already exists: http://facebookfreefebruary.org/ http://facebookfreefebruary.org/
- justhw 9y ago
  I'm in. Let's make it happen.
  - randomsearch 9y ago
    Ironically, the best way to promote this would be with a viral Facebook status that says “this will be my last post until March, let’s see if I can make it! I challenge Mark, Sarah, Sam to do the same” etc. I’m amazed at how easily people obey the challenge memes. I’m guessing a lot of them are instigated by Facebook to increase engagement.
toddmorey 9y ago
Leaving Facebook has honestly made me a happier guy. (I left my account active, but I've removed the apps from my phone and I only visit the site about once every three months to message someone my phone number.) Browsing the site always made me a bit angry (at the politics) and a bit sad (because someone else always seems to be on some impressive vacation). Then I'd close the browser be angry at myself for wasting time I could have invested in learning something or creating something. My #1 fear was that I'd feel out of the loop, but I honestly don't. I've yet to have anyone mention something with a "didn't you see that on Facebook?" A friend of mine tried the same experiment and says he's also happier. If you catch yourself left with a bit of pensive sadness after using the site, try taking a hiatus and see how it feels.
- throwaway613834 9y ago
  > I've yet to have anyone mention something with a "didn't you see that on Facebook?" Any chance this is because you don't know what you've missed, and hence you don't talk to people about them?
  - adjkant 9y ago
    Anecdotal, but the only time I've ever hear that phrase in the past 3 years is for my college meme group (one of the few reasons I am still on Facebook). As far as I know, nothing happens on Facebook for anyone under 25. As you get older, life event announcements are about the only thing I can imagine would be useful.
    - eropple 9y ago
      Maybe it's just my friend group, but absolutely everything is scheduled and planned through Facebook events. I basically don't visit, I use Social Fixer to trim down the news feed when I do, but Events is invaluable.
      - adjkant 9y ago
        Yeah, I think it's just a matter of social circles. For me, events exist on Facebook, but plenty of people get invited off of Facebook, and the events are private so there's no discovery aspect you'd get in your news feed. I get told in person about most parties or events before seeing an invite on Facebook. I do like and use events on Facebook, but I wish it was any other service at this point. It's all about the network effect though, it doesn't matter how many better options there are if no one has an account there.
empath75 9y ago
I deleted the facebook app 2 months ago and since then I've looked at the site like twice. Don't miss it in the slightest.
notjustanymike 9y ago
Nuked it when I got my new phone, shocking how little I miss it.
heedlessly2 9y ago
Facebook has lost ground for genuine social interaction. Facebook is more serious stuff such as life announcements for new job, grad/college acceptance, engagement to their significant other, uploading a vacation photo as their profile pic in Grand Canyon as a DSLR, etc.. Everything feels so "official" and "serious" Snapchat is low-stakes and more playful for throw-away stuff in people's day-to-day life.
- richardknop 9y ago
  None of my extended friends around the world (late twenties so we are not that old) nor my family use Snapchat. So in my opinion Snapchat is so niche and has such narrow group of users it will never replace what Facebook used to be.
  - dannyw 9y ago
    People grow in age. The audience that is using Snapchat now (I talk to a dozen friends on Snapchat) are going to keep using Snapchat (I haven’t seen any age based dropoff), and younger people start using Snapchat. I don’t even have some fairly close friends on FB!
    - richardknop 9y ago
      Sure but I doubt it. For example after initial students on college campuses who started using Facebook, it has spread to older generations and people in 30s, 40s even 50s now use Facebook. With Snapchat I don't see such trend. It has no website, only a confusing mobile app with horrid UX that most people can't figure out and is mostly used for adding pig noses and cat ears to pictures by teenagers.
      - heedlessly2 9y ago
        if Snapchat had a website, then users could screenshot photos/conversations without notifying the other person. That's exactly why they don't have one.
  - 9y ago
ranie93 9y ago
I'm not sure if I understood correctly but; you can keep using messenger (and maybe Tinder, I haven't tested) even after you deactivate your fb account. Just leave the last checkbox unchecked on the account deactivation page.
southphillyman 9y ago
Private groups. My user experience was similar to yours and I was close to deactivating my account before I got invited into a private group. Topics and discussions get much more interesting when people know coworkers and family members can't see it.
- photonios 9y ago
  I second this. I live in in a foreign country and there's a Facebook group with people from my home country who also live here. It's a small group with (50 people or so) and I really enjoy the friendly discussions and the fact that people try to help each other out. I keep my account for groups like those.
- mantas 9y ago
  So like old good forums? Preferably with anonymous handler. So your coworker or family may be on the same forum, but wouldn't ever know that.
RodericDay 9y ago
> extremist political posts > I much prefer the WSJ lol
electic 9y ago
The greatest thing I did was delete Facebook off my phone. Here are the benefits I discovered: - I didn't miss anything. Turns out there wasn't any real quality content on there anyway. - My battery lasts 2x longer. - I seem to be happier. No joke. With all the rage articles and click bait headlines gone, I am far more happier. - I am way more informed now. I visit allsides.com and get the news there. I quickly get up to speed and find well written articles that inform me about what is really going on. - I am more productive. Without all the garbage Facebook puts out, I have more time to get actual work done. - I feel accomplished. I go home feeling more accomplished. I am happier, more productive, and more informed. It is a win-win-win all around.
- ct0 9y ago
  - Spend much more time on HackerNews. Jokes aside, I did the same. Its a healthy move, I also forgot my FB password on my main computer and have not gone through the trouble of using chrome to look it up.
  - cm2187 9y ago
    Did the same, same effect on time on HN!
- mcescalante 9y ago
  I have been leaving the FB app off my phone (Android) for 2-3 years now, and I don't miss it one bit. I was running Messenger, but that's also a resource hog. I am now using Messenger Lite, as I am in some personal friend groups (muted) that I sometimes catch up on, and I will say that it hardly uses any resources at all. Would highly recommend it for anyone who still wants Messenger but without the bloat and battery loss.
- bischofs 9y ago
  Ive found on my 16GB phone I can either have the facebook app or every other app that I want but not both at the same time . It takes up an insane amount of space for a mobile app and they for some reason need to update it once a week. Needless to say I use the browser now to check fb.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
techiferous 9y ago
Just delete your account and don't look back. I did years ago and have no regrets. It's junk food.
- username223 9y ago
  I've been happy with a middle ground lately: * Do not install it on my phone. My long, complex password isn't even stored there, so I couldn't log in if I wanted. * Open https://mbasic.facebook.com/ https://mbasic.facebook.com/ in a private tab on my computer when I want to post something or check in, then close it when I'm done. This greatly reduces tracking surface (no JS), and provides just enough friction to eliminate compulsive checking or interaction. It's like not buying a giant bag of potato chips every time you go to the store.
- yoz-y 9y ago
  Messenger is fine and useful, I have deleted the app and all my likes and stuff from my account though.
justboxing 9y ago
> The news on there is trash Since when did Facebook become a news outlet? Oh wait...
vm 9y ago
How often do you use Instagram, Snap, iMessage/SMS, WhatsApp, Messenger, or other social apps? Curious whether you get that "fix" elsewhere or if it yes/no for just FB. Thinking about it more, all media should be in the running, from HN to Netflix, because it's really about time spent.
- astronautjones 9y ago
  whatsapp, messenger, and sms/imessage are kind of a different ballgame, though, as there's no algorithm dictating what you see and when
andrei_says_ 9y ago
Facebook messaging works in the browser at https://mbasic.facebook.com https://mbasic.facebook.com Useful for emergencies to non-daily users like me.
- tanderson92 9y ago
  There is also messenger.com
  - ndr 9y ago
    Unfortunately that doesn't seem to work on mobile.
surrey-fringe 9y ago
Ever since deleting facebook I've felt so much ___. It's only once I quit the site I was able to take a long hard look at my perception of ____ and realized that everyone else does ____ while I should do _____. I realized that I'm actually ____, not ____. I started handling my _____ relationships in a healthier, more ____ manner.
JoshMnem 9y ago
> yet I waste so much time on it every day I recommend deleting your account. Facebook wants people to think that everything happens on Facebook, but really almost nothing happens on Facebook. It's basically a useless recreational drug that is wasting the lives of many people (and severely damaging human civilization with its reality distortion -- time will tell us the full effects).
- a3n 9y ago
  It's TV.
  - JoshMnem 9y ago
    Much worse than TV though.
xirdstl 9y ago
I was off Facebook for awhile but rejoined this past year. I primarily use it to follow some organizations that post updates I'm interested in. If a "friend" posts something political or something that annoys me, I just Unfollow them. That means I've unfollowed most of my friends, but I have no interest in partaking in the outrage.
Spooky23 9y ago
My computers have the Facebook domains blocked in their hostfiles. Best decision I’ve made. Just make sure not to logout or Facebook will hammer your email to entice you back in.
tomduncalf 9y ago
I’ve said this before on here, but bears repeating as I don’t know that everyone realises you can do it - a great way to wean yourself off the Facebook checking addiction is to unfollow all your contacts and pages. Once you do this, your homepage is basically blank (no news feed), but you still retain the ability to use the messenger, which unfortunately is still socially quite useful from time to time despite having a horrible UX. You also maintain the ability to access pages as usual (FB aggressively tries to push you to register if you view them logged out) and get notifications if people tag you. I’d really recommend trying it if you have the same feeling of wasting time as the OP - it’s a bit less drastic than removing your account, but it does the job. I thought I might refollow certain people after a while but six months later I haven’t bothered and I now only check the site once a day for messages usually. You can either do the process of unfollowing manually, or using JavaScript - there is a settings page where you can list all your contacts (by pressing load more a lot) then automate clicking “unfollow”. I can try to find the script I used if you are interested. Sounds like another option is to use a browser extension. Another piece of advice that others have mentioned is to delete the app - if you want access messages, you can use mbasic.facebook.com. It really sucks that they removed messaging from the mobile site to push users to their sucky apps. I’ve got respect for people just deleting their account but for me messenger still has enough social use that this is a perfect compromise for now!
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
otteliotto 9y ago
ITT: the good old facebook-is-useless-wake-up-sheeple circlejerk.
mrweasel 9y ago
> No one posts anything on it I've been seeing the same thing, almost everything is links, clickbait or "tests" that everyone just re-shares. Very few people are posting any original content any more. Currently I think Messenger is what's keeping people from abandoning Facebook.
TheRealPomax 9y ago
What do you _do_ on facebook, thought? All I see on it are people saying what they just did or how they feel, that's something that has zero importance in living your daily life and trivially deferred to "check it maybe once a day".
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
setecgastronomy 9y ago
I agree that facebook is terrible and I think I'm one of the rare individuals who never created a facebook account. But I find it so odd that someone would find facebook as terrible but praise the wsj. WSJ is easily far more toxic than facebook. I've noticed that every thread about social media, the top comments always attack social media and praise traditional media. It's strange how much the sentiment on HN shifted all of a sudden.

TheNewKanye 9y ago

You actually only need a phone number for Tinder, making facebook even more useless.

jressey 9y ago

I think you just coined the phrase. Let's take a page from the alt-right playbook and meme "No Facebook February" in to existence.

RpFLCL 9y ago
Taking a break could be a new years resolution :)
hbhakhra 9y ago
Facebook Free February
- RileyJames 9y ago
  Looks like it already exists: http://facebookfreefebruary.org/ http://facebookfreefebruary.org/
justhw 9y ago
I'm in. Let's make it happen.
- randomsearch 9y ago
  Ironically, the best way to promote this would be with a viral Facebook status that says “this will be my last post until March, let’s see if I can make it! I challenge Mark, Sarah, Sam to do the same” etc. I’m amazed at how easily people obey the challenge memes. I’m guessing a lot of them are instigated by Facebook to increase engagement.

toddmorey 9y ago

Leaving Facebook has honestly made me a happier guy. (I left my account active, but I've removed the apps from my phone and I only visit the site about once every three months to message someone my phone number.) Browsing the site always made me a bit angry (at the politics) and a bit sad (because someone else always seems to be on some impressive vacation). Then I'd close the browser be angry at myself for wasting time I could have invested in learning something or creating something. My #1 fear was that I'd feel out of the loop, but I honestly don't. I've yet to have anyone mention something with a "didn't you see that on Facebook?" A friend of mine tried the same experiment and says he's also happier. If you catch yourself left with a bit of pensive sadness after using the site, try taking a hiatus and see how it feels.

throwaway613834 9y ago
> I've yet to have anyone mention something with a "didn't you see that on Facebook?" Any chance this is because you don't know what you've missed, and hence you don't talk to people about them?
- adjkant 9y ago
  Anecdotal, but the only time I've ever hear that phrase in the past 3 years is for my college meme group (one of the few reasons I am still on Facebook). As far as I know, nothing happens on Facebook for anyone under 25. As you get older, life event announcements are about the only thing I can imagine would be useful.
  - eropple 9y ago
    Maybe it's just my friend group, but absolutely everything is scheduled and planned through Facebook events. I basically don't visit, I use Social Fixer to trim down the news feed when I do, but Events is invaluable.
    - adjkant 9y ago
      Yeah, I think it's just a matter of social circles. For me, events exist on Facebook, but plenty of people get invited off of Facebook, and the events are private so there's no discovery aspect you'd get in your news feed. I get told in person about most parties or events before seeing an invite on Facebook. I do like and use events on Facebook, but I wish it was any other service at this point. It's all about the network effect though, it doesn't matter how many better options there are if no one has an account there.

empath75 9y ago

I deleted the facebook app 2 months ago and since then I've looked at the site like twice. Don't miss it in the slightest.

notjustanymike 9y ago

Nuked it when I got my new phone, shocking how little I miss it.

heedlessly2 9y ago

Facebook has lost ground for genuine social interaction. Facebook is more serious stuff such as life announcements for new job, grad/college acceptance, engagement to their significant other, uploading a vacation photo as their profile pic in Grand Canyon as a DSLR, etc.. Everything feels so "official" and "serious" Snapchat is low-stakes and more playful for throw-away stuff in people's day-to-day life.

richardknop 9y ago
None of my extended friends around the world (late twenties so we are not that old) nor my family use Snapchat. So in my opinion Snapchat is so niche and has such narrow group of users it will never replace what Facebook used to be.
- dannyw 9y ago
  People grow in age. The audience that is using Snapchat now (I talk to a dozen friends on Snapchat) are going to keep using Snapchat (I haven’t seen any age based dropoff), and younger people start using Snapchat. I don’t even have some fairly close friends on FB!
  - richardknop 9y ago
    Sure but I doubt it. For example after initial students on college campuses who started using Facebook, it has spread to older generations and people in 30s, 40s even 50s now use Facebook. With Snapchat I don't see such trend. It has no website, only a confusing mobile app with horrid UX that most people can't figure out and is mostly used for adding pig noses and cat ears to pictures by teenagers.
    - heedlessly2 9y ago
      if Snapchat had a website, then users could screenshot photos/conversations without notifying the other person. That's exactly why they don't have one.
- 9y ago

ranie93 9y ago

I'm not sure if I understood correctly but; you can keep using messenger (and maybe Tinder, I haven't tested) even after you deactivate your fb account. Just leave the last checkbox unchecked on the account deactivation page.

southphillyman 9y ago

Private groups. My user experience was similar to yours and I was close to deactivating my account before I got invited into a private group. Topics and discussions get much more interesting when people know coworkers and family members can't see it.

photonios 9y ago
I second this. I live in in a foreign country and there's a Facebook group with people from my home country who also live here. It's a small group with (50 people or so) and I really enjoy the friendly discussions and the fact that people try to help each other out. I keep my account for groups like those.
mantas 9y ago
So like old good forums? Preferably with anonymous handler. So your coworker or family may be on the same forum, but wouldn't ever know that.

RodericDay 9y ago

> extremist political posts > I much prefer the WSJ lol

electic 9y ago

The greatest thing I did was delete Facebook off my phone. Here are the benefits I discovered: - I didn't miss anything. Turns out there wasn't any real quality content on there anyway. - My battery lasts 2x longer. - I seem to be happier. No joke. With all the rage articles and click bait headlines gone, I am far more happier. - I am way more informed now. I visit allsides.com and get the news there. I quickly get up to speed and find well written articles that inform me about what is really going on. - I am more productive. Without all the garbage Facebook puts out, I have more time to get actual work done. - I feel accomplished. I go home feeling more accomplished. I am happier, more productive, and more informed. It is a win-win-win all around.

ct0 9y ago
- Spend much more time on HackerNews. Jokes aside, I did the same. Its a healthy move, I also forgot my FB password on my main computer and have not gone through the trouble of using chrome to look it up.
- cm2187 9y ago
  Did the same, same effect on time on HN!
mcescalante 9y ago
I have been leaving the FB app off my phone (Android) for 2-3 years now, and I don't miss it one bit. I was running Messenger, but that's also a resource hog. I am now using Messenger Lite, as I am in some personal friend groups (muted) that I sometimes catch up on, and I will say that it hardly uses any resources at all. Would highly recommend it for anyone who still wants Messenger but without the bloat and battery loss.
bischofs 9y ago
Ive found on my 16GB phone I can either have the facebook app or every other app that I want but not both at the same time . It takes up an insane amount of space for a mobile app and they for some reason need to update it once a week. Needless to say I use the browser now to check fb.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

techiferous 9y ago

Just delete your account and don't look back. I did years ago and have no regrets. It's junk food.

username223 9y ago
I've been happy with a middle ground lately: * Do not install it on my phone. My long, complex password isn't even stored there, so I couldn't log in if I wanted. * Open https://mbasic.facebook.com/ https://mbasic.facebook.com/ in a private tab on my computer when I want to post something or check in, then close it when I'm done. This greatly reduces tracking surface (no JS), and provides just enough friction to eliminate compulsive checking or interaction. It's like not buying a giant bag of potato chips every time you go to the store.
yoz-y 9y ago
Messenger is fine and useful, I have deleted the app and all my likes and stuff from my account though.

justboxing 9y ago

> The news on there is trash Since when did Facebook become a news outlet? Oh wait...

vm 9y ago

How often do you use Instagram, Snap, iMessage/SMS, WhatsApp, Messenger, or other social apps? Curious whether you get that "fix" elsewhere or if it yes/no for just FB. Thinking about it more, all media should be in the running, from HN to Netflix, because it's really about time spent.

astronautjones 9y ago
whatsapp, messenger, and sms/imessage are kind of a different ballgame, though, as there's no algorithm dictating what you see and when

andrei_says_ 9y ago

Facebook messaging works in the browser at https://mbasic.facebook.com https://mbasic.facebook.com Useful for emergencies to non-daily users like me.

tanderson92 9y ago
There is also messenger.com
- ndr 9y ago
  Unfortunately that doesn't seem to work on mobile.

surrey-fringe 9y ago

Ever since deleting facebook I've felt so much ___. It's only once I quit the site I was able to take a long hard look at my perception of ____ and realized that everyone else does ____ while I should do _____. I realized that I'm actually ____, not ____. I started handling my _____ relationships in a healthier, more ____ manner.

JoshMnem 9y ago

> yet I waste so much time on it every day I recommend deleting your account. Facebook wants people to think that everything happens on Facebook, but really almost nothing happens on Facebook. It's basically a useless recreational drug that is wasting the lives of many people (and severely damaging human civilization with its reality distortion -- time will tell us the full effects).

a3n 9y ago
It's TV.
- JoshMnem 9y ago
  Much worse than TV though.

xirdstl 9y ago

I was off Facebook for awhile but rejoined this past year. I primarily use it to follow some organizations that post updates I'm interested in. If a "friend" posts something political or something that annoys me, I just Unfollow them. That means I've unfollowed most of my friends, but I have no interest in partaking in the outrage.

Spooky23 9y ago

My computers have the Facebook domains blocked in their hostfiles. Best decision I’ve made. Just make sure not to logout or Facebook will hammer your email to entice you back in.

tomduncalf 9y ago

I’ve said this before on here, but bears repeating as I don’t know that everyone realises you can do it - a great way to wean yourself off the Facebook checking addiction is to unfollow all your contacts and pages. Once you do this, your homepage is basically blank (no news feed), but you still retain the ability to use the messenger, which unfortunately is still socially quite useful from time to time despite having a horrible UX. You also maintain the ability to access pages as usual (FB aggressively tries to push you to register if you view them logged out) and get notifications if people tag you. I’d really recommend trying it if you have the same feeling of wasting time as the OP - it’s a bit less drastic than removing your account, but it does the job. I thought I might refollow certain people after a while but six months later I haven’t bothered and I now only check the site once a day for messages usually. You can either do the process of unfollowing manually, or using JavaScript - there is a settings page where you can list all your contacts (by pressing load more a lot) then automate clicking “unfollow”. I can try to find the script I used if you are interested. Sounds like another option is to use a browser extension. Another piece of advice that others have mentioned is to delete the app - if you want access messages, you can use mbasic.facebook.com. It really sucks that they removed messaging from the mobile site to push users to their sucky apps. I’ve got respect for people just deleting their account but for me messenger still has enough social use that this is a perfect compromise for now!

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

otteliotto 9y ago

ITT: the good old facebook-is-useless-wake-up-sheeple circlejerk.

mrweasel 9y ago

> No one posts anything on it I've been seeing the same thing, almost everything is links, clickbait or "tests" that everyone just re-shares. Very few people are posting any original content any more. Currently I think Messenger is what's keeping people from abandoning Facebook.

TheRealPomax 9y ago

What do you _do_ on facebook, thought? All I see on it are people saying what they just did or how they feel, that's something that has zero importance in living your daily life and trivially deferred to "check it maybe once a day".

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

setecgastronomy 9y ago

I agree that facebook is terrible and I think I'm one of the rare individuals who never created a facebook account. But I find it so odd that someone would find facebook as terrible but praise the wsj. WSJ is easily far more toxic than facebook. I've noticed that every thread about social media, the top comments always attack social media and praise traditional media. It's strange how much the sentiment on HN shifted all of a sudden.