27 ms·

Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook!" is missing the point. Please read this bit from the article: > Thing is I’m a Mum of two wh

Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook!" is missing the point. Please read this bit from the article: > Thing is I’m a Mum of two who has just moved to a new area. Facebook groups have offered me support and community, and Mums I’ve met in local playgrounds have added me as a friend so we can use messenger to plan playdates. Without these apps sadly my little social life becomes a lot lonelier, and harder. This is the pernicious effect of Facebook's dominance among social networks added to their policy of poor support. It's not really an "optional" social network if large swathes of your social circle have started using it for essential life functions, it's more like a utility and should be regulated like one. And no, telling all the mums at the playground about how Facebook's ban policies are bad and we should all use the Fediverse instead is not going to work for the average person. If anything, it's more likely to mark you down as one of those weird parents to avoid. It wouldn't be good for your power company to have the option of arbitrarily cutting you off as a customer, and never giving you a chance to get back your power. Similarly, we should regulate Facebook to the point where they are exposed to genuine regulatory consequences for disrupting people's lives.

PostOnce 4y ago
Facebook privatized the town square. They control the primary forum for local community chat, they control the swap-meet (facebook marketplace); I have no access to any of that anymore, it used to take place on many other forums, but it has centralized on facebook, which I don't use. A fair few local orgs use facebook exclusively for communication. Some of them have public pages, some don't. I don't really care, aside from missing the odd deal on the marketplace that I can't participate in, but I imagine this could be quite important to other people. There's got to be a better way, but I don't know what it is or how to get there.
- quadrifoliate 4y ago
  > A fair few local orgs use facebook exclusively for communication. I noticed that when vaccine availability in the US was constrained during the first few months of 2021 and local governments were organizing vaccination clinics, several of the events were announced only on Facebook pages. Several towns/counties didn't seem to have websites, or didn't put the events on the ones they had, instead preferring to announce them on Facebook. It was scary to think that folks locked out of Facebook for whatever reason did not have access to those notices unless informed by a friend or family member.
  - passerby1 4y ago
    Does it makes sense to push for representatives to discuss a law to forbid a city or state announcements to use any commercial platform for announcements?
    - PostOnce 4y ago
      I think it makes more sense to mandate they post on a govt-funded platform simultaneously with any other media. More media (Facebook etc) means reaching more people, that's not a bad thing, but it IS a bad thing for everyone else to get the info late if the govt only updates their "official" site once a week or something, but updates twitter every few minutes.
    - alistairSH 4y ago
      I'd prefer to see the primary content hosted on www.mytown.gov/announcements or similar. Then FB, Twitter, etc used to share/link that content.
  - autoexec 4y ago
    > Several towns/counties didn't seem to have websites, or didn't put the events on the ones they had, instead preferring to announce them on Facebook. Yeah, no government agency should publish anything (however trivial) exclusively over a private platform. As far as I'm concerned it should be illegal and anything they do post on social media should always be a mirror of the same content posted to a public platform and retained according to the laws that agency should follow for their documents. People should never have to worry about a private company being a barrier between them and their own government, and no private company should have the ability to pick and choose who can view what the government publishes, or to secretly modify that content (perhaps selectively), or to remove content that should stay part of public record.
    - afiori 4y ago
      > and retained according to the laws that agency should follow for their documents. Even ignoring all other issues, this alone should be enough.
- TrackerFF 4y ago
  Very much so. For the past 10 years, facebook has more or less dominated the market for everything related to rural places and smaller towns. This could very well be a geographical thing - but where I'm from, Norway, FB is the de facto platform for anything social in communities. I've heard that in other places of the world, people used WhatsApp, Discord, etc. - but where I'm from, it's FB. Local classifieds, local hobby groups, local community information, local sports, culture events, etc. Luckily there seems to be a push in moving people elsewhere - but with all the older folks primarily using FB, it's going to be hard. I think it's just fine for things like hobbies, classifieds, and such - but real infrastructure shouldn't use FB as their main platform for sharing information.
  - einpoklum 4y ago
    > WhatsApp, Discord Remember that WhatsApp is also Facebook. As for Discord... isn't it a gamer thing? > I think it's just fine for things like hobbies, classifieds, and such No, that's the point. If it's used for all of this stuff, then people "have" to be on it. Group interaction media _is_ part of the "infrastructure" of society.
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      > As for Discord... isn't it a gamer thing? No, that's a common misconception. I use Discord all the time and none of them are about games
    - TrackerFF 4y ago
      Discord pretty much replaced IRC. I remember, 20 years ago, a lot of people used IRC for chat. I think SoMe and the various chat apps more or less killed off IRC as a popular platform...then discord came along, and filled the niche for gaming chatroom. Now people use it for all kinds of stuff.
      - einpoklum 4y ago
        > Discord pretty much replaced IRC. Not in my personal experience. I see some pull to switch to Matrix, and some groups I know use Telegram (e.g. LibreOffice).
- dools 4y ago
  The hilarious thing is that any mention of a public utility supplied social networking site would be met with STATE CONTROL!!!1 GUBBMINT SURVEYLANCE!!1
  - hutzlibu 4y ago
    The sad thing with that, is that a state developed app certainly would have backdoors for police build in by design. And all the ither nice features people in power would like to have. So I am hoping for/dreaming of an international developed open source solution. But the existing ones I am aware of are unlikely to ever fill that role.
    - throwaway2037 4y ago
      First, I gotta say "GUBBMINT SURVEYLANCE" really made me laugh. I am a bit sad to see it downvoted, but here is not Reddit, so I understand. That said, reading so many good, thoughtful posts here... and then one more from you(!)... it made me think: Why isn't there a global "goverment/non-profit facebook"? Think: Strictly open source software. Hosted in "the cloud". Gov'ts can do: (1) on-prem, (2) public cloud (AWS/Azure/G), but they control the env, or (3) pay for a hosted solution (Oracle/SAP/Hitachi/whatev). #1 & #2 have infra run using gov't workers, but #3 is run by private company. A bit like hosted/cloud Wordpress vendors. The idea: Only gov't officials have accounts to post/update public info. There are no regular user accounts -- so no one can get banned. Then, if people want to have posting / chat rooms about a gov't facebook page, they can "reverse link" to a Discord, or something like it. Funny example: If you live in an area with a terrible dept of motor vehicles, the DMV gov't facebook page would publish the usual info about hours, locations, rules, etc. But then people would run Discords to argue/post about which DMV location has the worst customer service! Assume the Discord server is strictly independent of gov't facebook... so Discord admins can ban whomever they like (if people say offensive stuff). But no matter what silly things people say on a private Discord, they can never be "banned" from the gov't facebook -- it is public, just like Wikipedia, but no regular users accounts. And I can already think who already has the sales contacts and engineers to get it done: Microsoft. I can already hear the tomatoes being thrown at me... but it is true: They could do it, and it might be a huge money maker. Or SalesForce, because a lot of gov't website now need eforms to do online gov't stuff. Makes sense, I think. Two other orgs who could do it: Mozilla and/or Wikipedia. They don't have the sales contacts, but they are well-trusted by gov'ts around the globe.
deepsun 4y ago
I know several communities who happily moved off FB for discussions. They often don't care, and also heard how FB can be bad for your mental health. You just need to show a better way and help them convert.
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  You need a certain amount of "social capital" to do so which you won't have if you are "a Mum of two who has just moved to a new area". Furthermore, what else is there to move to that has the same UX as Facebook but none of the drawbacks? Proprietary solutions are paid (and too expensive for casual usage - Slack's lowest plan starts at around 6 bucks/month), free solutions are going to have the same problems as FB, FOSS solutions lack the UX and care more about the tech than the UX and solving the actual problem.
  - cowtools 4y ago
    >FOSS solutions lack the UX and care more about the tech than the UX and solving the actual problem. I read this sentiment all the time here but I am not sure it's true. Element works just fine. My family has moved from facebook to instant messaging over the years, the great thing about IM vs social media is that all IM is the same so there is no real switching cost platform-to-platform, whether you use whatsapp or matrix or whatever
    - akelly 4y ago
      Element for me occasionally says it can't decrypt my group chat messages. It doesn't exactly hold your hand through the setup, one of my non techie friends had to ask what to do. Logging in on new devices is needlessly complicated. And if you bridge Element to Slack, all element users have the element logo as their profile picture. A good example of the lack of UX polish in open source.
      - Zak 4y ago
        I agree the Matrix UX is a little rough, but I think it's more than just Element being unpolished. Matrix is solving a hard problem: it's federated, E2E encrypted, bridged to other protocols, and designed to allow multiple clients. It's much easier to have a smooth UX in a monolithic system with no security.
spicyramen_ 4y ago
maxehmookau 4y ago
This is heartbreaking in so many ways. I'm a trustee of a charity that relies on WhatsApp and Facebook to organise itself and a huge sceptic of Meta and keen for us not to rely on them. However, in local community groups it's hard to advocate for something because "better privacy" when the opposite argument is "everyone uses it". Meta's tools are somehow simultaneously inclusive and very exclusionary.
- wildfire 4y ago
  How did your charity function when Facebook "accidently" removed all AU-based pages during their fight with the Australian Government?
dsadsadsaddsa 4y ago
There's a lot to unpack here. First, this is a very clear example of how the manner in which Facebook operates has a very disproportionate effect on women. My wife followed me and gave up social media, and found it incredibly difficult, much more so than I. It was also notable that many people told me that I was doing the right thing, etc etc, but the general response my wife got was "how will anyone keep in touch with you?" >It's not really an "optional" social network if large swathes of your social circle have started using it for essential life functions Putting aside the trite observation that, for two years, young families being able to socialise was considered absolutely non-essential, Facebook is as essential as you make it. Ever since it took hold in universities, people have asked (with varying degrees of irony), "how do you exist without Facebook?". The answer is - just fine. >and no, telling all the mums at the playground about how Facebook's ban policies are bad and we should all use the Fediverse instead is not going to work for the average person. We generally don't mention it, and get on with having a good time with people (which includes arranging for social continuation - ie, meeting up again). >it's more like a utility and should be regulated like one. The idea that an online echo chamber is essential to life, is very depressing. Community exists in the incidental and in the repetitive rhythms of life. Edit: The response to this is very interesting. I am very glad I returned to my native country instead of trying to build a life in the US, as it seems that something invented as a way to keep up with college girls has become deeply ingrained as a social necessity in a very short space of time.
- watwut 4y ago
  > Putting aside the trite observation that, for two years, young families being able to socialise was considered absolutely non-essential, Facebook is as essential as you make it. For two years, those young families did a lot more socialization over internet - be it facebook, zoom or whatsapp. If anything more socialization and coordination move there. Also, this is not so much about young families, this is about primary caregivers. Most of their time is necessary spend alone and if they want to meet with anyone, they have to coordinate online.
  - dsadsadsaddsa 4y ago
    >For two years, those young families did a lot more socialization over internet Tell me about it. The number of very young kids I now see clutching a phone or tablet is heart-breaking. >If anything more socialization and coordination move there. I very deliberately decided to reject that "new normal". Do you think that it's a good thing? >Also, this is not so much about young families, this is about primary caregivers. Do young families not have a primary caregiver? The effects we are talking about apply equally well to both, if you insist on making that distinction.
rasz 4y ago
Pushing social media (mostly FB) got so bad that 10 years National Broadcasting Council of Poland (KRRiT, TV/Radio regulating body) released new set of rules concerning 'surreptitious advertising'. Rough translation: >They should not refer the recipient to the content posted on the Internet that is necessary for their understanding of the broadcast. The broadcast of the presence of the broadcaster on other portals and on social networking sites should be information devoid of any advertising features or promotion of the portals or services themselves - we read in the KRRiT statement. >We will react when there are elements of hidden advertising in the broadcasts when referring to social networking sites. It will not be that the sender must make the recipient aware of the fact that he is advertising a different website, but inviting to, for example, Facebook should not be common or too frequent - says Katarzyna Twardowska, spokesman for the National Broadcasting Council. >In the event that the National Council determines that the message actually contained an advertisement, the sender will face the consequences specified in the act. KRRiT may call for the cessation of broadcasting, and if that does not help, impose a penalty. However, such issues will be considered individually, usually as a result of complaints about specific cases - adds Twardowska. - It is worth noting that the matter concerning the promotion of social networking sites arose precisely from the complaint of the listener TLDR: If you keep telling viewers to visit FB it will be interpreted as hidden advertising for FB and you will get fined.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
> we should regulate Facebook to the point where they are exposed to genuine regulatory consequences for disrupting people's lives No. Regulatory consequences for transgression are ineffective. They are applied after the fact, when the damage has been done. The abusive company can still delay and disrupt the user, force them through lengthy and Byzantine arbitration and act like total cocks because the fines are fiddling small change. Instead of punitive measures Facebook and the other social media companies require technical regulation. We need forced interoperability. As a licence to operate, commercial social media sites larger than a few million users will be required to present a standardised API so that you don't need to be a member of Facebook to inter-operate with its users if they invite you to. It is Facebook's ownership and control over it's users that is the central problem, not any aspect of its quality of service per se. We need to move this whole "walled garden" problem to a new space, in which they are not "Facebook's users", but simply social media users who happen to be able to read/write Facebook assets, amongst many other alternatives that work together.
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  I both agree and disagree. Your proposed solution is a good one (for other reasons too) but regulatory consequences can be effective if those consequences are serious enough and are actually being enforced. After the first couple 100k$ fines per banned user I will bet you good money nobody will ever be banned.
  - mojzu 4y ago
    It does heavily depend on what form those regulations take though, I think there are valid reasons to ban users from a platform or prevent them from using it in particular ways (either for safety reasons or making the platform a more pleasant experience for everyone else). I can easily imagine some governments would co-opt this kind of regulation to benefit themselves or punish people and companies who aren't sufficiently supportive Personally I think the mandated interoperability/public API is a better solution, in the best case it could lead to some actual competition and if that didn't happen atleast people who chose to leave Meta/FB would have options for maintaining the social connections
ryandrake 4y ago
Facebook is not like the power company, or the water district. It is not an essential utility that people will die without. If Facebook suddenly disappeared from the Internet tomorrow, life would go on. This particular person might find it somewhat more difficult to socialize without it, but people have been socializing for decades without Facebook, and people will continue to socialize when it's dead. Just throwing up our hands and saying "we simply need Facebook" doesn't help anyone, and doesn't help to fight the pernicious effect of Facebook's dominance. I agree though, that some kind of regulation is part of the solution--but not because it's some kind of essential utility, but because of it's ill effects (like smoking). Despite her initial fears about being so dependent on it, this might actually have been a blessing in disguise--just the encouragement she needed to let go and move on from this harmful platform.
- J-Kuhn 4y ago
  While you have a point, people also have been living without electricity for several thousand years. Yet, we still regulate the utility company.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- david-gpu 4y ago
  A little empathy would go a long way. Surely "life would go on" if your kids' school closed down, or if your best friends relocated, or if your employer laid you off. But it would be a significant inconvenience, wouldn't it? She articulates well why losing her account is an inconvenience. We can at least acknowledge that her feelings are valid.
  - williamtwild 4y ago
    Comparing facebook to your employer is silly.
    - stavros 4y ago
jozvolskyef 4y ago
Your comment assumes a false dichotomy. Another option is to simply create a new account. If more people become blase about recycling Facebook accounts, it will paradoxically put pressure on Facebook to stop banning legitimate users.
- jraby3 4y ago
  It’s not that easy anymore. They frequently require ID verification these days.
- bedast 4y ago
  Creating a new account after being banned is often a policy violation in and of itself (ban evasion).
refurb 4y ago
You paint a picture like this person was tarred and feather and banished from town forever forced to eat bugs and cloth themselves in burlap. It’s Facebook, create a new account?
- bedast 4y ago
  Creating a new account after being banned is often a policy violation in and of itself (ban evasion).
  - refurb 4y ago
    Sure, it’s policy. I’ve never had an issue
vanilla-almond 4y ago
Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook! is missing the point I agree. Another example: Facebook is full of support groups for different causes or issues. There are thousands of groups helping people struggling conditions like cancer or other health issues. However much people might dislike that Facebook hosts these groups, the question remains: where else can people congregate online to discuss their conditions? Self-hosting a discussion forum is not an answer: ironically it excludes thousands (perhaps millions) of non-technical users who won't know how to install a discussion forum. I wish there was an alternative to Facebook, but for now Facebook is the friction-free option.
- dtech 4y ago
  Reddit is a decent alternative and has a lot of these. It's not strictly better, but at least it's more open without accounts.
  - dont__panic 4y ago
    It should be illegal for a company in the position of Facebook to hide pages behind a login, when an account requires me to submit proof of identification. Feel free to require whatever you want to participate in the conversation, but I should be able to read my local town's Facebook page without submitting my papers.
frankfrankfrank 4y ago
Your point is valid, however the bigger issue that you and likely most everyone else are not getting us precisely “Facebook's dominance” and the absolutely, classical abusive relationship the whole of society has gotten itself into with the dependence Facebook and others have created. There are frequently discussions here about how to address the particular abusive characteristics of one of the tech companies or sector with what I believe are solutions that are too high level. It is the authoritarian, centralized planning, communist mentality that current tech for some reason devolved into that is the problem, I don’t see how more specific planning is the solution. How many more authoritarian utopias have to end in misery before we stop letting abusive people ruin things and cause misery? What we need is what the government should only ever be doing s as it relates to this is, ensuring competition, which is done by imposing standards that prevent capture and lock-in. Yes, that is a tall order once the government is as corrupted and captured by the very corporations and sectors that are so abusive, however I believe the only way that can be addressed is precisely by pushing for keystone legislation that requires the whole industry to self organize specifications and standards and protocols that allow the seamless communications and transportation of data between systems and services, and makes all data and content the property of the creator, without extensive and burdensome regulatory requirements to transfer that ownership. We must end digital slavery! All these issues are actually rather easy to understand once one has been able to remove oneself from the toxic and abusive relationship that effectively the whole tech sector employs with its users. It’s all there, textbook abusive relationships 101. I would map all the common characteristics of abusive relationships to the behaviors of tech companies (or most companies theses days), but I think I’ll keep it shortish, even though I guess it may be helpful to see, for people who cannot see the abusive relationship of the tech sector because they’re in the abuse. Just one example that is relevant to your point; controlling access to loved ones … “you’re nothing without Facebook, now obey Facebook and how Facebook wants you to speak, think, act, and even dress. I wouldn’t need to control your speak and hurt you if you would just obey Facebook”. And of course many of the Battered Wife Syndrome sufferers rationalize with all kinds of things like “Facebook only beats me (controls speech and behavior, depersons, shadow bans, etc) because I misbehave and think wrong things, and it knows better what’s good for us all” on the left or “well, it’s a private company and they can do whatever they want to me because if I want to eat (be part of society ) I have to obey because my data and access to communications is a slave that is private property” Let’s end digital slavery, can we please!
kevincox 4y ago
I agree. Imagine if all of the phone companies suddenly decided that you were a bad customer and that they were terminating your line and you weren't allowed to get a new one. It would make life far more difficult. Facebook's properties are replacing the telephone for most people and now one company's algorithms can remove you from your communication tools because it feels like you are not valuable to its owner.
LightG 4y ago
Sorry, it absolutely is optional. But I also agree with your point on regulation.
IncRnd 4y ago
At a minimum, the author should demand the return of the funds that Facebook colluded with the 3rd party to steal - even after FB was notified. She doesn't need to listen to nonsense FB policies. Those do not override law.
usrn 4y ago
No, it will die the way myspace and others before it have. People are (slowly) moving to Mastodon each time this happens and eventually everyone will understand why things like Facebook don't make sense.
fortran77 4y ago
> Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook! I didn't expect anyone on Hacker News to say anything _but_ this. Even your take isn't quite right. You're saying it's all but mandatory in certain circles. Can't a person simply like Facebook for what it is?
- Zak 4y ago
  I think part of the discussion here is the important distinction between liking something and it having a significant impact on one's life. I like Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. The impact on my life if I suddenly couldn't watch it would be minimal. I'd have to find some other source of entertainment for an hour a week. Whether I like Facebook or not, people in my social circles use it for important communication and coordination. Getting cut off from that would be disruptive. I would have to take active steps to insure I continued to hear about upcoming events that are important to me. I would have to convince friends to communicate using something other than Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger (surprisingly hard given it takes under 60 seconds to install and activate Signal).
superkuh 4y ago
It is optional. No amount of whining will change that. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
- quadrifoliate 4y ago
  > It is optional. No amount of whining will change that. Would you be still saying this if your power, water, phone, and internet lines were permanently cut off because some random person hacked your account(s) for them? Those are private companies, and there are certainly people who manage to live in the woods without any of the utilities mentioned, so they are technically "optional" as well. We have schooled ourselves to think of social networks as optional, but in 2022 I'd argue that they are just as non-optional as the telephone; and perhaps even more so in certain ways. (e.g. What was the last time your local government called you over the telephone? But they are probably replying to Facebook comments.)
  - superkuh 4y ago
    Comparing Facebook access to a utility is pretty wild. It's more like how watching the $sportsball game is "not optional" if you want to hang out with a certain friends group.
    - quadrifoliate 4y ago
      People aren't usually banned from sportsball games (either in-person or televised) via an automated system. If they were, perhaps you'd see more of an uproar. Facebook is fundamentally new and different precisely because its scale is equivalent to something as large as a utility; but it gets that scale based on automated processes. Once the automated processes begin fucking up people's lives with no recourse, we should start bringing in regulations.
t0mmyb0y 4y ago
cronix 4y ago
> It wouldn't be good for your power company to have the option of arbitrarily cutting you off as a customer, and never giving you a chance to get back your power. Yes, they're a regulated utility like water, power, natural gas, etc., and can't discriminate services based on political beliefs, unlike regular privately owned companies who are protected by the first amendment (in the US). Why the internet isn't regulated like a "utility" is beyond me. It clearly is as just about everyone and everything relies on it now. Just like it's very hard to live and do business without power or water, it's just as hard/impossible to live normally without the internet.
wdb 4y ago
The person can always use NextDoor as alternative :)

PostOnce 4y ago

Facebook privatized the town square. They control the primary forum for local community chat, they control the swap-meet (facebook marketplace); I have no access to any of that anymore, it used to take place on many other forums, but it has centralized on facebook, which I don't use. A fair few local orgs use facebook exclusively for communication. Some of them have public pages, some don't. I don't really care, aside from missing the odd deal on the marketplace that I can't participate in, but I imagine this could be quite important to other people. There's got to be a better way, but I don't know what it is or how to get there.

quadrifoliate 4y ago
> A fair few local orgs use facebook exclusively for communication. I noticed that when vaccine availability in the US was constrained during the first few months of 2021 and local governments were organizing vaccination clinics, several of the events were announced only on Facebook pages. Several towns/counties didn't seem to have websites, or didn't put the events on the ones they had, instead preferring to announce them on Facebook. It was scary to think that folks locked out of Facebook for whatever reason did not have access to those notices unless informed by a friend or family member.
- passerby1 4y ago
  Does it makes sense to push for representatives to discuss a law to forbid a city or state announcements to use any commercial platform for announcements?
  - PostOnce 4y ago
    I think it makes more sense to mandate they post on a govt-funded platform simultaneously with any other media. More media (Facebook etc) means reaching more people, that's not a bad thing, but it IS a bad thing for everyone else to get the info late if the govt only updates their "official" site once a week or something, but updates twitter every few minutes.
  - alistairSH 4y ago
    I'd prefer to see the primary content hosted on www.mytown.gov/announcements or similar. Then FB, Twitter, etc used to share/link that content.
- autoexec 4y ago
  > Several towns/counties didn't seem to have websites, or didn't put the events on the ones they had, instead preferring to announce them on Facebook. Yeah, no government agency should publish anything (however trivial) exclusively over a private platform. As far as I'm concerned it should be illegal and anything they do post on social media should always be a mirror of the same content posted to a public platform and retained according to the laws that agency should follow for their documents. People should never have to worry about a private company being a barrier between them and their own government, and no private company should have the ability to pick and choose who can view what the government publishes, or to secretly modify that content (perhaps selectively), or to remove content that should stay part of public record.
  - afiori 4y ago
    > and retained according to the laws that agency should follow for their documents. Even ignoring all other issues, this alone should be enough.
TrackerFF 4y ago
Very much so. For the past 10 years, facebook has more or less dominated the market for everything related to rural places and smaller towns. This could very well be a geographical thing - but where I'm from, Norway, FB is the de facto platform for anything social in communities. I've heard that in other places of the world, people used WhatsApp, Discord, etc. - but where I'm from, it's FB. Local classifieds, local hobby groups, local community information, local sports, culture events, etc. Luckily there seems to be a push in moving people elsewhere - but with all the older folks primarily using FB, it's going to be hard. I think it's just fine for things like hobbies, classifieds, and such - but real infrastructure shouldn't use FB as their main platform for sharing information.
- einpoklum 4y ago
  > WhatsApp, Discord Remember that WhatsApp is also Facebook. As for Discord... isn't it a gamer thing? > I think it's just fine for things like hobbies, classifieds, and such No, that's the point. If it's used for all of this stuff, then people "have" to be on it. Group interaction media _is_ part of the "infrastructure" of society.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    > As for Discord... isn't it a gamer thing? No, that's a common misconception. I use Discord all the time and none of them are about games
  - TrackerFF 4y ago
    Discord pretty much replaced IRC. I remember, 20 years ago, a lot of people used IRC for chat. I think SoMe and the various chat apps more or less killed off IRC as a popular platform...then discord came along, and filled the niche for gaming chatroom. Now people use it for all kinds of stuff.
    - einpoklum 4y ago
      > Discord pretty much replaced IRC. Not in my personal experience. I see some pull to switch to Matrix, and some groups I know use Telegram (e.g. LibreOffice).
dools 4y ago
The hilarious thing is that any mention of a public utility supplied social networking site would be met with STATE CONTROL!!!1 GUBBMINT SURVEYLANCE!!1
- hutzlibu 4y ago
  The sad thing with that, is that a state developed app certainly would have backdoors for police build in by design. And all the ither nice features people in power would like to have. So I am hoping for/dreaming of an international developed open source solution. But the existing ones I am aware of are unlikely to ever fill that role.
  - throwaway2037 4y ago
    First, I gotta say "GUBBMINT SURVEYLANCE" really made me laugh. I am a bit sad to see it downvoted, but here is not Reddit, so I understand. That said, reading so many good, thoughtful posts here... and then one more from you(!)... it made me think: Why isn't there a global "goverment/non-profit facebook"? Think: Strictly open source software. Hosted in "the cloud". Gov'ts can do: (1) on-prem, (2) public cloud (AWS/Azure/G), but they control the env, or (3) pay for a hosted solution (Oracle/SAP/Hitachi/whatev). #1 & #2 have infra run using gov't workers, but #3 is run by private company. A bit like hosted/cloud Wordpress vendors. The idea: Only gov't officials have accounts to post/update public info. There are no regular user accounts -- so no one can get banned. Then, if people want to have posting / chat rooms about a gov't facebook page, they can "reverse link" to a Discord, or something like it. Funny example: If you live in an area with a terrible dept of motor vehicles, the DMV gov't facebook page would publish the usual info about hours, locations, rules, etc. But then people would run Discords to argue/post about which DMV location has the worst customer service! Assume the Discord server is strictly independent of gov't facebook... so Discord admins can ban whomever they like (if people say offensive stuff). But no matter what silly things people say on a private Discord, they can never be "banned" from the gov't facebook -- it is public, just like Wikipedia, but no regular users accounts. And I can already think who already has the sales contacts and engineers to get it done: Microsoft. I can already hear the tomatoes being thrown at me... but it is true: They could do it, and it might be a huge money maker. Or SalesForce, because a lot of gov't website now need eforms to do online gov't stuff. Makes sense, I think. Two other orgs who could do it: Mozilla and/or Wikipedia. They don't have the sales contacts, but they are well-trusted by gov'ts around the globe.

deepsun 4y ago

I know several communities who happily moved off FB for discussions. They often don't care, and also heard how FB can be bad for your mental health. You just need to show a better way and help them convert.

Nextgrid 4y ago
You need a certain amount of "social capital" to do so which you won't have if you are "a Mum of two who has just moved to a new area". Furthermore, what else is there to move to that has the same UX as Facebook but none of the drawbacks? Proprietary solutions are paid (and too expensive for casual usage - Slack's lowest plan starts at around 6 bucks/month), free solutions are going to have the same problems as FB, FOSS solutions lack the UX and care more about the tech than the UX and solving the actual problem.
- cowtools 4y ago
  >FOSS solutions lack the UX and care more about the tech than the UX and solving the actual problem. I read this sentiment all the time here but I am not sure it's true. Element works just fine. My family has moved from facebook to instant messaging over the years, the great thing about IM vs social media is that all IM is the same so there is no real switching cost platform-to-platform, whether you use whatsapp or matrix or whatever
  - akelly 4y ago
    Element for me occasionally says it can't decrypt my group chat messages. It doesn't exactly hold your hand through the setup, one of my non techie friends had to ask what to do. Logging in on new devices is needlessly complicated. And if you bridge Element to Slack, all element users have the element logo as their profile picture. A good example of the lack of UX polish in open source.
    - Zak 4y ago
      I agree the Matrix UX is a little rough, but I think it's more than just Element being unpolished. Matrix is solving a hard problem: it's federated, E2E encrypted, bridged to other protocols, and designed to allow multiple clients. It's much easier to have a smooth UX in a monolithic system with no security.

spicyramen_ 4y ago

maxehmookau 4y ago

This is heartbreaking in so many ways. I'm a trustee of a charity that relies on WhatsApp and Facebook to organise itself and a huge sceptic of Meta and keen for us not to rely on them. However, in local community groups it's hard to advocate for something because "better privacy" when the opposite argument is "everyone uses it". Meta's tools are somehow simultaneously inclusive and very exclusionary.

wildfire 4y ago
How did your charity function when Facebook "accidently" removed all AU-based pages during their fight with the Australian Government?

dsadsadsaddsa 4y ago

There's a lot to unpack here. First, this is a very clear example of how the manner in which Facebook operates has a very disproportionate effect on women. My wife followed me and gave up social media, and found it incredibly difficult, much more so than I. It was also notable that many people told me that I was doing the right thing, etc etc, but the general response my wife got was "how will anyone keep in touch with you?" >It's not really an "optional" social network if large swathes of your social circle have started using it for essential life functions Putting aside the trite observation that, for two years, young families being able to socialise was considered absolutely non-essential, Facebook is as essential as you make it. Ever since it took hold in universities, people have asked (with varying degrees of irony), "how do you exist without Facebook?". The answer is - just fine. >and no, telling all the mums at the playground about how Facebook's ban policies are bad and we should all use the Fediverse instead is not going to work for the average person. We generally don't mention it, and get on with having a good time with people (which includes arranging for social continuation - ie, meeting up again). >it's more like a utility and should be regulated like one. The idea that an online echo chamber is essential to life, is very depressing. Community exists in the incidental and in the repetitive rhythms of life. Edit: The response to this is very interesting. I am very glad I returned to my native country instead of trying to build a life in the US, as it seems that something invented as a way to keep up with college girls has become deeply ingrained as a social necessity in a very short space of time.

watwut 4y ago
> Putting aside the trite observation that, for two years, young families being able to socialise was considered absolutely non-essential, Facebook is as essential as you make it. For two years, those young families did a lot more socialization over internet - be it facebook, zoom or whatsapp. If anything more socialization and coordination move there. Also, this is not so much about young families, this is about primary caregivers. Most of their time is necessary spend alone and if they want to meet with anyone, they have to coordinate online.
- dsadsadsaddsa 4y ago
  >For two years, those young families did a lot more socialization over internet Tell me about it. The number of very young kids I now see clutching a phone or tablet is heart-breaking. >If anything more socialization and coordination move there. I very deliberately decided to reject that "new normal". Do you think that it's a good thing? >Also, this is not so much about young families, this is about primary caregivers. Do young families not have a primary caregiver? The effects we are talking about apply equally well to both, if you insist on making that distinction.

rasz 4y ago

Pushing social media (mostly FB) got so bad that 10 years National Broadcasting Council of Poland (KRRiT, TV/Radio regulating body) released new set of rules concerning 'surreptitious advertising'. Rough translation: >They should not refer the recipient to the content posted on the Internet that is necessary for their understanding of the broadcast. The broadcast of the presence of the broadcaster on other portals and on social networking sites should be information devoid of any advertising features or promotion of the portals or services themselves - we read in the KRRiT statement. >We will react when there are elements of hidden advertising in the broadcasts when referring to social networking sites. It will not be that the sender must make the recipient aware of the fact that he is advertising a different website, but inviting to, for example, Facebook should not be common or too frequent - says Katarzyna Twardowska, spokesman for the National Broadcasting Council. >In the event that the National Council determines that the message actually contained an advertisement, the sender will face the consequences specified in the act. KRRiT may call for the cessation of broadcasting, and if that does not help, impose a penalty. However, such issues will be considered individually, usually as a result of complaints about specific cases - adds Twardowska. - It is worth noting that the matter concerning the promotion of social networking sites arose precisely from the complaint of the listener TLDR: If you keep telling viewers to visit FB it will be interpreted as hidden advertising for FB and you will get fined.

nonrandomstring 4y ago

> we should regulate Facebook to the point where they are exposed to genuine regulatory consequences for disrupting people's lives No. Regulatory consequences for transgression are ineffective. They are applied after the fact, when the damage has been done. The abusive company can still delay and disrupt the user, force them through lengthy and Byzantine arbitration and act like total cocks because the fines are fiddling small change. Instead of punitive measures Facebook and the other social media companies require technical regulation. We need forced interoperability. As a licence to operate, commercial social media sites larger than a few million users will be required to present a standardised API so that you don't need to be a member of Facebook to inter-operate with its users if they invite you to. It is Facebook's ownership and control over it's users that is the central problem, not any aspect of its quality of service per se. We need to move this whole "walled garden" problem to a new space, in which they are not "Facebook's users", but simply social media users who happen to be able to read/write Facebook assets, amongst many other alternatives that work together.

Nextgrid 4y ago
I both agree and disagree. Your proposed solution is a good one (for other reasons too) but regulatory consequences can be effective if those consequences are serious enough and are actually being enforced. After the first couple 100k$ fines per banned user I will bet you good money nobody will ever be banned.
- mojzu 4y ago
  It does heavily depend on what form those regulations take though, I think there are valid reasons to ban users from a platform or prevent them from using it in particular ways (either for safety reasons or making the platform a more pleasant experience for everyone else). I can easily imagine some governments would co-opt this kind of regulation to benefit themselves or punish people and companies who aren't sufficiently supportive Personally I think the mandated interoperability/public API is a better solution, in the best case it could lead to some actual competition and if that didn't happen atleast people who chose to leave Meta/FB would have options for maintaining the social connections

ryandrake 4y ago

Facebook is not like the power company, or the water district. It is not an essential utility that people will die without. If Facebook suddenly disappeared from the Internet tomorrow, life would go on. This particular person might find it somewhat more difficult to socialize without it, but people have been socializing for decades without Facebook, and people will continue to socialize when it's dead. Just throwing up our hands and saying "we simply need Facebook" doesn't help anyone, and doesn't help to fight the pernicious effect of Facebook's dominance. I agree though, that some kind of regulation is part of the solution--but not because it's some kind of essential utility, but because of it's ill effects (like smoking). Despite her initial fears about being so dependent on it, this might actually have been a blessing in disguise--just the encouragement she needed to let go and move on from this harmful platform.

J-Kuhn 4y ago
While you have a point, people also have been living without electricity for several thousand years. Yet, we still regulate the utility company.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
david-gpu 4y ago
A little empathy would go a long way. Surely "life would go on" if your kids' school closed down, or if your best friends relocated, or if your employer laid you off. But it would be a significant inconvenience, wouldn't it? She articulates well why losing her account is an inconvenience. We can at least acknowledge that her feelings are valid.
- williamtwild 4y ago
  Comparing facebook to your employer is silly.
  - stavros 4y ago

jozvolskyef 4y ago

Your comment assumes a false dichotomy. Another option is to simply create a new account. If more people become blase about recycling Facebook accounts, it will paradoxically put pressure on Facebook to stop banning legitimate users.

jraby3 4y ago
It’s not that easy anymore. They frequently require ID verification these days.
bedast 4y ago
Creating a new account after being banned is often a policy violation in and of itself (ban evasion).

refurb 4y ago

You paint a picture like this person was tarred and feather and banished from town forever forced to eat bugs and cloth themselves in burlap. It’s Facebook, create a new account?

bedast 4y ago
Creating a new account after being banned is often a policy violation in and of itself (ban evasion).
- refurb 4y ago
  Sure, it’s policy. I’ve never had an issue

vanilla-almond 4y ago

Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook! is missing the point I agree. Another example: Facebook is full of support groups for different causes or issues. There are thousands of groups helping people struggling conditions like cancer or other health issues. However much people might dislike that Facebook hosts these groups, the question remains: where else can people congregate online to discuss their conditions? Self-hosting a discussion forum is not an answer: ironically it excludes thousands (perhaps millions) of non-technical users who won't know how to install a discussion forum. I wish there was an alternative to Facebook, but for now Facebook is the friction-free option.

dtech 4y ago
Reddit is a decent alternative and has a lot of these. It's not strictly better, but at least it's more open without accounts.
- dont__panic 4y ago
  It should be illegal for a company in the position of Facebook to hide pages behind a login, when an account requires me to submit proof of identification. Feel free to require whatever you want to participate in the conversation, but I should be able to read my local town's Facebook page without submitting my papers.

frankfrankfrank 4y ago

Your point is valid, however the bigger issue that you and likely most everyone else are not getting us precisely “Facebook's dominance” and the absolutely, classical abusive relationship the whole of society has gotten itself into with the dependence Facebook and others have created. There are frequently discussions here about how to address the particular abusive characteristics of one of the tech companies or sector with what I believe are solutions that are too high level. It is the authoritarian, centralized planning, communist mentality that current tech for some reason devolved into that is the problem, I don’t see how more specific planning is the solution. How many more authoritarian utopias have to end in misery before we stop letting abusive people ruin things and cause misery? What we need is what the government should only ever be doing s as it relates to this is, ensuring competition, which is done by imposing standards that prevent capture and lock-in. Yes, that is a tall order once the government is as corrupted and captured by the very corporations and sectors that are so abusive, however I believe the only way that can be addressed is precisely by pushing for keystone legislation that requires the whole industry to self organize specifications and standards and protocols that allow the seamless communications and transportation of data between systems and services, and makes all data and content the property of the creator, without extensive and burdensome regulatory requirements to transfer that ownership. We must end digital slavery! All these issues are actually rather easy to understand once one has been able to remove oneself from the toxic and abusive relationship that effectively the whole tech sector employs with its users. It’s all there, textbook abusive relationships 101. I would map all the common characteristics of abusive relationships to the behaviors of tech companies (or most companies theses days), but I think I’ll keep it shortish, even though I guess it may be helpful to see, for people who cannot see the abusive relationship of the tech sector because they’re in the abuse. Just one example that is relevant to your point; controlling access to loved ones … “you’re nothing without Facebook, now obey Facebook and how Facebook wants you to speak, think, act, and even dress. I wouldn’t need to control your speak and hurt you if you would just obey Facebook”. And of course many of the Battered Wife Syndrome sufferers rationalize with all kinds of things like “Facebook only beats me (controls speech and behavior, depersons, shadow bans, etc) because I misbehave and think wrong things, and it knows better what’s good for us all” on the left or “well, it’s a private company and they can do whatever they want to me because if I want to eat (be part of society ) I have to obey because my data and access to communications is a slave that is private property” Let’s end digital slavery, can we please!

kevincox 4y ago

I agree. Imagine if all of the phone companies suddenly decided that you were a bad customer and that they were terminating your line and you weren't allowed to get a new one. It would make life far more difficult. Facebook's properties are replacing the telephone for most people and now one company's algorithms can remove you from your communication tools because it feels like you are not valuable to its owner.

LightG 4y ago

Sorry, it absolutely is optional. But I also agree with your point on regulation.

IncRnd 4y ago

At a minimum, the author should demand the return of the funds that Facebook colluded with the 3rd party to steal - even after FB was notified. She doesn't need to listen to nonsense FB policies. Those do not override law.

usrn 4y ago

No, it will die the way myspace and others before it have. People are (slowly) moving to Mastodon each time this happens and eventually everyone will understand why things like Facebook don't make sense.

fortran77 4y ago

> Anyone saying "Good riddance! Go enjoy your life without Facebook! I didn't expect anyone on Hacker News to say anything _but_ this. Even your take isn't quite right. You're saying it's all but mandatory in certain circles. Can't a person simply like Facebook for what it is?

Zak 4y ago
I think part of the discussion here is the important distinction between liking something and it having a significant impact on one's life. I like Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. The impact on my life if I suddenly couldn't watch it would be minimal. I'd have to find some other source of entertainment for an hour a week. Whether I like Facebook or not, people in my social circles use it for important communication and coordination. Getting cut off from that would be disruptive. I would have to take active steps to insure I continued to hear about upcoming events that are important to me. I would have to convince friends to communicate using something other than Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger (surprisingly hard given it takes under 60 seconds to install and activate Signal).

superkuh 4y ago

It is optional. No amount of whining will change that. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

quadrifoliate 4y ago
> It is optional. No amount of whining will change that. Would you be still saying this if your power, water, phone, and internet lines were permanently cut off because some random person hacked your account(s) for them? Those are private companies, and there are certainly people who manage to live in the woods without any of the utilities mentioned, so they are technically "optional" as well. We have schooled ourselves to think of social networks as optional, but in 2022 I'd argue that they are just as non-optional as the telephone; and perhaps even more so in certain ways. (e.g. What was the last time your local government called you over the telephone? But they are probably replying to Facebook comments.)
- superkuh 4y ago
  Comparing Facebook access to a utility is pretty wild. It's more like how watching the $sportsball game is "not optional" if you want to hang out with a certain friends group.
  - quadrifoliate 4y ago
    People aren't usually banned from sportsball games (either in-person or televised) via an automated system. If they were, perhaps you'd see more of an uproar. Facebook is fundamentally new and different precisely because its scale is equivalent to something as large as a utility; but it gets that scale based on automated processes. Once the automated processes begin fucking up people's lives with no recourse, we should start bringing in regulations.

t0mmyb0y 4y ago

cronix 4y ago

> It wouldn't be good for your power company to have the option of arbitrarily cutting you off as a customer, and never giving you a chance to get back your power. Yes, they're a regulated utility like water, power, natural gas, etc., and can't discriminate services based on political beliefs, unlike regular privately owned companies who are protected by the first amendment (in the US). Why the internet isn't regulated like a "utility" is beyond me. It clearly is as just about everyone and everything relies on it now. Just like it's very hard to live and do business without power or water, it's just as hard/impossible to live normally without the internet.

wdb 4y ago

The person can always use NextDoor as alternative :)