11 ms·

Confession: I am Facebook Login Scum

59 points by DanielBMarkham 16y ago

lhnn 16y ago
To those saying this guy is "polluting Google searches" and "infringing copyrights of Facebook", etc. 1) Domain names are not in the domain of copyright/trademark; anyone who buys it can have it. 2) Welcome to the freedom of the Internet. I'd have him polluting Google for a thousand years before I'd consider forcing him to justify content on his website.
Encosia 16y ago
I'm curious how the young ladies at the bottom of the page figure into helping illiterate people access Facebook. It's tough to send a much stronger spamminess signal.
- pmorici 16y ago
  I was confused by that too esp since they don't appear to link to anything, so whats the point? Maybe good taste correlates with literacy and the subtle genius of that page is something that's lost on the book worms of the world. Is it even possible to make something so ridiculously ugly by accident?
maxklein 16y ago
First of all, facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark. They are quite vigilant about this. Secondly, it would have been a bit more interesting to actually post the results, and not just the site. Thirdly, why would people living in urban areas be less literate than people from rural areas? Usually, people from urban areas are better educated than people from rural areas. Fourthly, if you are targeting people who cannot read well, why is there so much (pretty high-level comprehension level) text on your pages?
- DanielBMarkham 16y ago
  Thanks for the comment, Max. These are really good questions that I didn't address in the article, so I'm going to answer them. After that I'm out of here. I've learned that if you post an article with a title like "What kind of idiot do you think I am, anyway?" people will be very happy to tell you :) 1) Facebook is always welcome to contact me. Happy to help them try to provide login help to the audience I've selected. 2) I don't have results yet, but I promise to post everything you could possibly want to know about the site in a few months. At the slow rate of traffic the site is getting, it's going to take a while to come to any useful conclusions. 3) I don't know. I was going to make an extended metaphor and never really finished it. I was trying to say that the average Facebooker isn't a college kid or programmer any more. They're, well, average. I'll make the change in the edits. This was something I thought about in the shower and just pushed it out there. Wrote the whole thing in 15 minutes without any rewrites, which is unusual for me. Very sorry for the poor quality. 4) Now this question is an awesome one. Riddle me this, batman, how do you use a text-based search engine to provide assistance to people who can't read? If you have no text, the search engine doesn't know what it's looking at. If you have lots of text, people can't use it. If you hide the text, well, search engines don't like that, either. This was an initial stab. I'd like to try this again with another topic area, but I'm stumped with the problem you bring up. Perhaps a totally video-based site with extensive transcripts? It's worth exploring. You could even do the navigation in video format. I screwed this site up royally by personally writing the text. I should have asked a elementary school kid to do it. Live and learn.
  - vilya 16y ago
    Re #4, there's a spectrum of reading and comprehension ability - it's not just that some people can read and others can't. That may simplify your problem: you can still provide instructions in text form which are useful for your target audience. Government departments here in the UK have guidelines, I believe, about what reading level the language used in official forms should target. If you're interested, here are a few links: http://www.nao.org.uk/whats_new/0203/02031145.aspx?alreadysearchfor=yes http://www.nao.org.uk/whats_new/0203/02031145.aspx?alreadyse... http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/core/page.do?pageId=1536729 http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/core/page.do?pageId=1536729 http://www.cipd.co.uk/housestyle/plainenglish.htm http://www.cipd.co.uk/housestyle/plainenglish.htm
- CWuestefeld 16y ago
  facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark I don't see how that can be. Trademark isn't like copyright and patent law. The latter are intended to protect the owner of the IP. But trademark was is different: it's intended to protect the consumer. Thus, one may be found to violate tm law if they're creating confusion in the mind of the consumer, leading or allowing them to believe that they're using Facebook (or buying a real iPod, etc). If Mr. Markham's site simply provides help for users trying to figure out Facebook's site, while making it clear that it is not, itself, Facebook (and he does say, at the top of the page in a red font, "this is a fan site and is in no way associated with facebook"), then he's got no problem. It's not against the law to employ someone else's trademark. It's obviously legal to say that your product is "compatible with Microsoft Windows", and it's perfectly fine to publish a book "Adobe Photoshop for Dummies". This site is analogous to that.
- ggchappell 16y ago
  > Thirdly, why would people living in urban areas be less literate than people from rural areas? Usually, people from urban areas are better educated than people from rural areas. Hmmmm .... Certainly the high end (in education) of the population will be better educated in urban areas. And I imagine that will make the average better for urban areas. On the other hand, virtually everyone living in a rural area is going to be an independent businessperson, in some sense, thus establishing a minimum baseline requirement for literacy. In a city, one can be a cog in a huge machine, leaving the reading for someone else. So while I would expect the literacy highs to be higher in a city, I would also expect the lows to be lower. But what about some data? I did a few quick searches, but urban vs. rural literacy data for the U.S. seems to be a bit hard to come by. I did find this map showing illiteracy rates for Texas. http://www-tcall.tamu.edu/docs/09illitmap.html http://www-tcall.tamu.edu/docs/09illitmap.html The main trend the map shows, is for illiteracy to increase to the south & west. However, there is a big blob of illiteracy around Houston. On the other hand, there is not really any significant blob for the Dallas area. Go figure. More data would be appreciated, if anyone can find it.
  - _pius 16y ago
    On the other hand, virtually everyone living in a rural area is going to be an independent businessperson, in some sense, thus establishing a minimum baseline requirement for literacy. As someone who grew up in a rural area, I can assure you that this is false. As in urban areas, most people in rural areas work for someone else.
    - ggchappell 16y ago
      Alas, another beautiful theory ruined by ugly fact.
- drdaeman 16y ago
  > First of all, facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark. Lawsuits those days... The insanity of them goes so beyond imagination, people are starting to think it's even forbidden to mention Facebook®™ without Their Majestic Permission. OH WAIT--
Sandman 16y ago
What happens when people get past the login screen? If they need help with logging in, how will they ever be able to actually use the site?
eitland 16y ago
Using firefox or chrome, if you just type facebook into the url field as far as I know it will do a "I'm feeling lucky" search and send you to the first website in the search results. My guess is a lot of the "searches" for facebook or other well known brands are not from computer illeterate people (they use bookmarks) but from lazy people like me just typing the first part of it and hitting enter. (If you use safari however and just type some domain name without the .tld part you may be in for a surprise. From what I could see it just adds .com, which may or may not be what you're looking for. IE used to be the same, but I haven't seriously used it for a few years so I don't know.)
- w1ntermute 16y ago
  > Using firefox or chrome, if you just type facebook into the url field as far as I know it will do a "I'm feeling lucky" search and send you to the first website in the search results. Not really relevant. Most of these people are using IE, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't have that feature.
aw3c2 16y ago
Since you say you are doing it for a purely samaritan cause, could you "open" it? For example share traffic statistics. edit: Saw your answer to maxklein, thanks!
sliverstorm 16y ago
I tried to include several versions of the misspellings How about Logon (Log on) instead of Login (Log in)? I never really knew which was what was why.
- magicofpi 16y ago
  I think it makes more sense for "log in" - there's even a site explaining why: http://loginisnotaverb.com/ http://loginisnotaverb.com/ Basically, only "log in" makes sense as a verb (because could you say you "logined"?). Although as a noun, it's okay.
pmorici 16y ago
Do illiterate people have a preference for ugly websites? Why not make it at least not look like a scam. On another note, how many illiterate people do you suppose use ad blocking software?
blehn 16y ago
Now from where I sit, I can already hear the outrage. How could I "domain squat" on Facebook?!? How could I be so dastardly? Don't I know that I'm just polluting the internet? What kind of trash am I? To those people, all I have to offer is my good intentions. Wait, what? Good intentions? The top search result for "facebook login" (and relevant misspellings) is facebook.com/login.php. That's what it should be. Whatever your intentions are, you are polluting the internet as far as I'm concerned. I don't see any real benefit to anyone in doing this.
- jrockway 16y ago
  He's not really polluting the Internet, right? Some people may want to read about logging in to Facebook rather than actually doing it. (Learn by reading instead of learn by doing.) His site is about that. To me, there is no ethical issue here. It's a website with information about stuff. Do I need information about said stuff? Nope. But apparently someone does.
  - blehn 16y ago
    I don't see how having "information about stuff" qualifies a website as non-polluting. efreedom, mahalo — they have tons of information and are almost pure pollution.
    - jrockway 16y ago
      We're not talking about efreedom and mahalo. They republish other people's content (perhaps legally); this is original content. Is this really more "pollution" than people's blogs about how they went drinking with their friends last night?
      - blehn 16y ago
        Yes, because those blogs aren't located at drinking-with-my-friends-last-night.com, and the posts don't reference "drinking" and "friends" a combined 61 times.
jcfrei 16y ago
I like what he's doing. Running a few quality keyword targeted content sites might be more lucrative and helpful than trying to invent the next facebook or twitter. It's by no means as glorious or innovative, but it's pragmatic, provides you with revenue and in his case might actually help some people.
- btipling 16y ago
  Basically Mahalo's business plan.
elvirs 16y ago
can anybody sum up the article for those who are too lazy to read the longest version of a simple story.
cookiecaper 16y ago
Interesting perspective. I agree with maxklein that the login help page is not really helpful to your target audience of illiterate people because of the preponderance of text. It's also reasonable that your target audience probably is not using Facebook all that much anyway. Perhaps a more useful website would explain how to use the browser's address bar or bookmarks? Then you won't be targeting literally illiterate people, but just people who don't really know how computers works, which is a much larger group than the group that can't actually read. You could also create "advanced courses" that teach people not to use IE. Not that something shouldn't be created for illiterate people, but I think they'll need a solution that involves more of the stack than a simple login help page, like an alternate interface for Facebook that emphasizes images (something like what we see on consoles; Wii and Xbox Live both have very visual interfaces) and has icons on the main tabs (video camera by videos, worksheet by info, etc.).
purephase 16y ago
I know it sounds snarky to ask, but how did that site take two weeks to put together? There is not much to it.
sdghjtykty 16y ago
------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec --------
u48998 16y ago
I have a side question if anyone knows. How does Facebook know contacts from my email address book even though I have not given them permission to search friends in my email? I created a fresh FB account, and right away saw suggested people showing up in FB and these people are all in my Gmail address book. How is it possible that FB know this?
- slig 16y ago
  Your contacts have your email on their list, and they gave permission to facebook look at it.
  - u48998 16y ago
    You mean, people in my email address book gave permission to FB to show themselves up when I get on FB? If this is correct, how do I prevent this for myself? How do I not give permission to FB, prevent myself from showing up in someone else' FB profile when they get on FB?
    - lwhalen 16y ago
      The only winning move, is not to play. Facebook-free even in 2011, and I still have friends, a social life, and all the perks of 'being human', with none of the Facebook privacy problems. :-)
      - u48998 16y ago
        The only reason I'm messing with it is because Nintendo DS XL has partnered with FB to let me upload my photos to FB. I don't have a stinking SDHC card reader and I need to take my photos out of this device.
bambax 16y ago
> There are no tricks involved, although the site involves AdSense. (Which you never have to see if you use AdBlock or something like that) Is the target audience of that site likely to use AdBlock...?!? Edit: my point is, it doesn't seem consistent with the stated goal of "helping" those people to send them off on wild goose chases with ads (a number of which may advertise the same kind of service).

lhnn 16y ago

To those saying this guy is "polluting Google searches" and "infringing copyrights of Facebook", etc. 1) Domain names are not in the domain of copyright/trademark; anyone who buys it can have it. 2) Welcome to the freedom of the Internet. I'd have him polluting Google for a thousand years before I'd consider forcing him to justify content on his website.

Encosia 16y ago

I'm curious how the young ladies at the bottom of the page figure into helping illiterate people access Facebook. It's tough to send a much stronger spamminess signal.

pmorici 16y ago
I was confused by that too esp since they don't appear to link to anything, so whats the point? Maybe good taste correlates with literacy and the subtle genius of that page is something that's lost on the book worms of the world. Is it even possible to make something so ridiculously ugly by accident?

maxklein 16y ago

First of all, facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark. They are quite vigilant about this. Secondly, it would have been a bit more interesting to actually post the results, and not just the site. Thirdly, why would people living in urban areas be less literate than people from rural areas? Usually, people from urban areas are better educated than people from rural areas. Fourthly, if you are targeting people who cannot read well, why is there so much (pretty high-level comprehension level) text on your pages?

DanielBMarkham 16y ago
Thanks for the comment, Max. These are really good questions that I didn't address in the article, so I'm going to answer them. After that I'm out of here. I've learned that if you post an article with a title like "What kind of idiot do you think I am, anyway?" people will be very happy to tell you :) 1) Facebook is always welcome to contact me. Happy to help them try to provide login help to the audience I've selected. 2) I don't have results yet, but I promise to post everything you could possibly want to know about the site in a few months. At the slow rate of traffic the site is getting, it's going to take a while to come to any useful conclusions. 3) I don't know. I was going to make an extended metaphor and never really finished it. I was trying to say that the average Facebooker isn't a college kid or programmer any more. They're, well, average. I'll make the change in the edits. This was something I thought about in the shower and just pushed it out there. Wrote the whole thing in 15 minutes without any rewrites, which is unusual for me. Very sorry for the poor quality. 4) Now this question is an awesome one. Riddle me this, batman, how do you use a text-based search engine to provide assistance to people who can't read? If you have no text, the search engine doesn't know what it's looking at. If you have lots of text, people can't use it. If you hide the text, well, search engines don't like that, either. This was an initial stab. I'd like to try this again with another topic area, but I'm stumped with the problem you bring up. Perhaps a totally video-based site with extensive transcripts? It's worth exploring. You could even do the navigation in video format. I screwed this site up royally by personally writing the text. I should have asked a elementary school kid to do it. Live and learn.
- vilya 16y ago
  Re #4, there's a spectrum of reading and comprehension ability - it's not just that some people can read and others can't. That may simplify your problem: you can still provide instructions in text form which are useful for your target audience. Government departments here in the UK have guidelines, I believe, about what reading level the language used in official forms should target. If you're interested, here are a few links: http://www.nao.org.uk/whats_new/0203/02031145.aspx?alreadysearchfor=yes http://www.nao.org.uk/whats_new/0203/02031145.aspx?alreadyse... http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/core/page.do?pageId=1536729 http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/core/page.do?pageId=1536729 http://www.cipd.co.uk/housestyle/plainenglish.htm http://www.cipd.co.uk/housestyle/plainenglish.htm
CWuestefeld 16y ago
facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark I don't see how that can be. Trademark isn't like copyright and patent law. The latter are intended to protect the owner of the IP. But trademark was is different: it's intended to protect the consumer. Thus, one may be found to violate tm law if they're creating confusion in the mind of the consumer, leading or allowing them to believe that they're using Facebook (or buying a real iPod, etc). If Mr. Markham's site simply provides help for users trying to figure out Facebook's site, while making it clear that it is not, itself, Facebook (and he does say, at the top of the page in a red font, "this is a fan site and is in no way associated with facebook"), then he's got no problem. It's not against the law to employ someone else's trademark. It's obviously legal to say that your product is "compatible with Microsoft Windows", and it's perfectly fine to publish a book "Adobe Photoshop for Dummies". This site is analogous to that.
ggchappell 16y ago
> Thirdly, why would people living in urban areas be less literate than people from rural areas? Usually, people from urban areas are better educated than people from rural areas. Hmmmm .... Certainly the high end (in education) of the population will be better educated in urban areas. And I imagine that will make the average better for urban areas. On the other hand, virtually everyone living in a rural area is going to be an independent businessperson, in some sense, thus establishing a minimum baseline requirement for literacy. In a city, one can be a cog in a huge machine, leaving the reading for someone else. So while I would expect the literacy highs to be higher in a city, I would also expect the lows to be lower. But what about some data? I did a few quick searches, but urban vs. rural literacy data for the U.S. seems to be a bit hard to come by. I did find this map showing illiteracy rates for Texas. http://www-tcall.tamu.edu/docs/09illitmap.html http://www-tcall.tamu.edu/docs/09illitmap.html The main trend the map shows, is for illiteracy to increase to the south & west. However, there is a big blob of illiteracy around Houston. On the other hand, there is not really any significant blob for the Dallas area. Go figure. More data would be appreciated, if anyone can find it.
- _pius 16y ago
  On the other hand, virtually everyone living in a rural area is going to be an independent businessperson, in some sense, thus establishing a minimum baseline requirement for literacy. As someone who grew up in a rural area, I can assure you that this is false. As in urban areas, most people in rural areas work for someone else.
  - ggchappell 16y ago
    Alas, another beautiful theory ruined by ugly fact.
drdaeman 16y ago
> First of all, facebook is going to contact you shortly because you are infringing on their trademark. Lawsuits those days... The insanity of them goes so beyond imagination, people are starting to think it's even forbidden to mention Facebook®™ without Their Majestic Permission. OH WAIT--

Sandman 16y ago

What happens when people get past the login screen? If they need help with logging in, how will they ever be able to actually use the site?

eitland 16y ago

Using firefox or chrome, if you just type facebook into the url field as far as I know it will do a "I'm feeling lucky" search and send you to the first website in the search results. My guess is a lot of the "searches" for facebook or other well known brands are not from computer illeterate people (they use bookmarks) but from lazy people like me just typing the first part of it and hitting enter. (If you use safari however and just type some domain name without the .tld part you may be in for a surprise. From what I could see it just adds .com, which may or may not be what you're looking for. IE used to be the same, but I haven't seriously used it for a few years so I don't know.)

w1ntermute 16y ago
> Using firefox or chrome, if you just type facebook into the url field as far as I know it will do a "I'm feeling lucky" search and send you to the first website in the search results. Not really relevant. Most of these people are using IE, and I'm pretty sure it doesn't have that feature.

aw3c2 16y ago

Since you say you are doing it for a purely samaritan cause, could you "open" it? For example share traffic statistics. edit: Saw your answer to maxklein, thanks!

sliverstorm 16y ago

I tried to include several versions of the misspellings How about Logon (Log on) instead of Login (Log in)? I never really knew which was what was why.

magicofpi 16y ago
I think it makes more sense for "log in" - there's even a site explaining why: http://loginisnotaverb.com/ http://loginisnotaverb.com/ Basically, only "log in" makes sense as a verb (because could you say you "logined"?). Although as a noun, it's okay.

pmorici 16y ago

Do illiterate people have a preference for ugly websites? Why not make it at least not look like a scam. On another note, how many illiterate people do you suppose use ad blocking software?

blehn 16y ago

Now from where I sit, I can already hear the outrage. How could I "domain squat" on Facebook?!? How could I be so dastardly? Don't I know that I'm just polluting the internet? What kind of trash am I? To those people, all I have to offer is my good intentions. Wait, what? Good intentions? The top search result for "facebook login" (and relevant misspellings) is facebook.com/login.php. That's what it should be. Whatever your intentions are, you are polluting the internet as far as I'm concerned. I don't see any real benefit to anyone in doing this.

jrockway 16y ago
He's not really polluting the Internet, right? Some people may want to read about logging in to Facebook rather than actually doing it. (Learn by reading instead of learn by doing.) His site is about that. To me, there is no ethical issue here. It's a website with information about stuff. Do I need information about said stuff? Nope. But apparently someone does.
- blehn 16y ago
  I don't see how having "information about stuff" qualifies a website as non-polluting. efreedom, mahalo — they have tons of information and are almost pure pollution.
  - jrockway 16y ago
    We're not talking about efreedom and mahalo. They republish other people's content (perhaps legally); this is original content. Is this really more "pollution" than people's blogs about how they went drinking with their friends last night?
    - blehn 16y ago
      Yes, because those blogs aren't located at drinking-with-my-friends-last-night.com, and the posts don't reference "drinking" and "friends" a combined 61 times.

jcfrei 16y ago

I like what he's doing. Running a few quality keyword targeted content sites might be more lucrative and helpful than trying to invent the next facebook or twitter. It's by no means as glorious or innovative, but it's pragmatic, provides you with revenue and in his case might actually help some people.

btipling 16y ago
Basically Mahalo's business plan.

elvirs 16y ago

can anybody sum up the article for those who are too lazy to read the longest version of a simple story.

cookiecaper 16y ago

Interesting perspective. I agree with maxklein that the login help page is not really helpful to your target audience of illiterate people because of the preponderance of text. It's also reasonable that your target audience probably is not using Facebook all that much anyway. Perhaps a more useful website would explain how to use the browser's address bar or bookmarks? Then you won't be targeting literally illiterate people, but just people who don't really know how computers works, which is a much larger group than the group that can't actually read. You could also create "advanced courses" that teach people not to use IE. Not that something shouldn't be created for illiterate people, but I think they'll need a solution that involves more of the stack than a simple login help page, like an alternate interface for Facebook that emphasizes images (something like what we see on consoles; Wii and Xbox Live both have very visual interfaces) and has icons on the main tabs (video camera by videos, worksheet by info, etc.).

purephase 16y ago

I know it sounds snarky to ask, but how did that site take two weeks to put together? There is not much to it.

sdghjtykty 16y ago

------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec -------- ------- http://simurl.com/voblec http://simurl.com/voblec --------

u48998 16y ago

I have a side question if anyone knows. How does Facebook know contacts from my email address book even though I have not given them permission to search friends in my email? I created a fresh FB account, and right away saw suggested people showing up in FB and these people are all in my Gmail address book. How is it possible that FB know this?

slig 16y ago
Your contacts have your email on their list, and they gave permission to facebook look at it.
- u48998 16y ago
  You mean, people in my email address book gave permission to FB to show themselves up when I get on FB? If this is correct, how do I prevent this for myself? How do I not give permission to FB, prevent myself from showing up in someone else' FB profile when they get on FB?
  - lwhalen 16y ago
    The only winning move, is not to play. Facebook-free even in 2011, and I still have friends, a social life, and all the perks of 'being human', with none of the Facebook privacy problems. :-)
    - u48998 16y ago
      The only reason I'm messing with it is because Nintendo DS XL has partnered with FB to let me upload my photos to FB. I don't have a stinking SDHC card reader and I need to take my photos out of this device.

bambax 16y ago

> There are no tricks involved, although the site involves AdSense. (Which you never have to see if you use AdBlock or something like that) Is the target audience of that site likely to use AdBlock...?!? Edit: my point is, it doesn't seem consistent with the stated goal of "helping" those people to send them off on wild goose chases with ads (a number of which may advertise the same kind of service).