3 ms·

That’s a very naive argument. If your friends and family are on Facebook, your work contacts across the country are on Twitter, the only forums left alive on th

That’s a very naive argument. If your friends and family are on Facebook, your work contacts across the country are on Twitter, the only forums left alive on the web are on Reddit, how can you not need them? These things have replaced existing connections you used to have via other channels. You can not step away without severing them now, it is no longer a matter of personal choice.

Forgeties79 4y ago
In what world are people only able to communicate with their family and friends on Facebook? Who only communicates with colleagues over Twitter?
- avereveard 4y ago
  Unless your family counts two you cannot possibly compare the time facetiming each one of them vs just scrolling an aggregated news feed
  - Forgeties79 4y ago
    Phone call, email, text message, Viber, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Telegram, actually interacting in person. Half my family isn’t even on Facebook and virtually none of us even use it anymore. If that’s the only way to keep up with family then don’t act like a complete jerk online, or you know don’t harass people, and you’ll be fine. Same as regular society. Contrary to popular belief, it actually takes a lot to simply get banned. Yeah there are cases like the post above, but the reason it is even here is because it is noteworthy.
    - OrangeMonkey 4y ago
      It does not take a lot to get banned - you just have to have a stated opinion that does not correlate with a large portion of the user base. If the civil rights movement was being organized on facebook today with the culture and beliefs of the 1950's as our users, I am very confident MLK would have been banned from every service. ... and someone, somewhere, would say 'don't act like a complete jerk online, or you know don't harass people, and you'll be fine'. I don't mean this pointed at you, I completely get the feeling, but I think ignoring history and the current in/out groups is likely to lead to conclusions that are not realistic.
      - Forgeties79 4y ago
        This is an accusation by American conservatives that has little to no basis in reality. It’s just an easy source of fake outrage they don’t have to back up. You won’t get banned for “wrong think.” Look how long it took Alex Jones to get de-platformed - the dude was literally starting witch hunts with his accounts. Look, I will be the first to say we need to rein in social media companies. Their ability to shrug and say “oh well!” with no repercussions as their vaunted algorithms (mis)handle the impossibly large scale of their businesses is wrong. No other industry gets away with so much except maybe religious groups and oil/gas. That being said, we should not conflate it with the incorrect and frankly dishonest cries of “censorship” by the right. Related note: I think you’ll find this Twitter bot very interesting: https://twitter.com/facebookstop10/status/1549786281177128961?s=21&t=nQ5wPDwQs1iLL5FIkkHc_A https://twitter.com/facebookstop10/status/154978628117712896...
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
- haswell 4y ago
  In the world we live in now. I knew a guy who was having serious financial trouble, and couldn’t afford to keep a phone line active. He relied on Facebook to stay in contact with his wife and son because he at least had access to WiFi. You can make a similar argument about phones. People can just reach each other via mail, or physically visit each other…but this doesn’t exactly constitute a healthy state of interaction. Use email you say! Almost every big email provider requires verification via phone or another email address these days. It’s legitimately getting harder and harder to communicate in these other ways. > Who only communicates with colleagues over Twitter? I don’t use Twitter much these days, but for a period of time, it was by far the easiest way to get/stay in touch with the communities I was organizing. I did dev advocacy, and if I ran a meet up somewhere, I didn’t want to just hand my phone number to a room full of people, but did want the option to stay in contact. Could I have found another solution? Yeah sure. But at the time, this seems pretty reasonable, and Twitter wasn’t yet banning people for inane things. If I lost that account now, it’d sever an entire community. Could I work around that? Sure. But downplaying the significance of these things seems short sighted. I rarely touch social media these days for many other reasons, but that is definitely an isolating choice to make in 2022.
leephillips 4y ago
“These things have replaced existing connections” I hear this now and then and it puzzles me. All my personal online and business communication is through email, with some friends and groups on WhatsApp and Telegram. People sometimes talk to me on Twitter but, if I want to talk to them, I steer them to email. I seems really risky, as we see in so many incidents reported here, to actually rely on platforms like Twitter for maintaining connections.
- OrangeMonkey 4y ago
  For users who are banned from these services, they have to do just what you say. Lets not confuse ourselves though - the vast majority of America does not feel the way you and I do. My kiddos swim team is on facebook, thats how we track and sign up for service, and if we lose our access we are excluded. Asking everyone on the team to move to email is a nonstarter.
- ricardobeat 4y ago
  Almost nobody in my circles uses email for personal conversations anymore. People don’t share their email when you meet at a conference. You don’t join the X tech discussion group over email (anymore). This also implies only talking to people you already know, no opportunities to join or start communities. And that’s still besides the point: just imagine that your email account is cancelled tomorrow because they don’t like something you said in a mailing list.
  - leephillips 4y ago
    I don’t doubt what you’re saying about your circles. I live in a different universe. If someone only communicates through Twitter, etc., that’s a useful filter for me. I don’t have a Facebook account. “only talking to people you already know” Far from it. For example, the contact information for an author on a scientific paper often includes an email address.
motoxpro 4y ago
But I "need" that restaurant because I am hungry, it's only a block away, I really love the pasta they cook, and the bartender I enjoy talking to only works at this particular restaurant :(
feurio 4y ago
If you get banned, just create another account and then don't do the thing that got you banned. It's really not that difficult.
- OrangeMonkey 4y ago
  Banned users creating new accounts is not a feature, its a 'bug' that the current platforms are trying to fix. Ever create a new facebook account? Even as a flesh and blood human being? Lots of folks have tried to do this for oculus and a great number of them were banned. It made the news on HNN. Facebook is fixing this bug now, and the other sites are trying to do the same. Eventually, when the big tech companies have 'fixed the bug' and your ban is - in fact - permanent and for life. . . what then? "Don't do bad things" - a simple question... if the 50's/60's civil rights movement was done today on facebook, would MLK have been banned from twitter/facebook/instagram? I think he would be. If you know a way to fix this, let me know. I think we - as humans - need to fix this sooner rather than later.
  - feurio 4y ago
    If it doesn't require you to prove your identity with a gov issued document then you'll be able to create a new account. My FB account certainly doesn't have my real name. If it does require you to do so then run away from that platform very fast. Yeah, a Million Man Meme is going to be so effective ... BLM & Antfi seem to have no problems organising themselves anyway and apparently they are practically terrorists according to the alt-right. If you want a way to "fix it" then vote for someone who will bring in regulation to crack down on the powers that tech companies have. And if you don't want to do that because you're a libertarian fan of light touch regulation of business, then you probably need to have word with yourself.
JackFr 4y ago
> If your friends and family are on Facebook, your work contacts across the country are on Twitter, the only forums left alive on the web are on Reddit, how can you not need them? You can absolutely step away from them and it’s not even hard. Call, text or email your friends and family. It’s far more intimate and frankly more satisfying. You lose the ability to broadcast a curated persona, but honestly in the grand scheme of things that’s better for both you and the rest of humanity.
- emn13 4y ago
  I did this for years. I regret it. It's overly simplistic to think this works well. The devil is in the details; and being a decent human being also means adapting to other's wishes, needs and habits. Being a small-scale dictator about modes of communication isn't great. You _will_ miss out of valuable personal communication if you choose to go this route. It's not just about an online curated persona.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
    I've been doing this since forever, and I don't feel I miss out on anything meaningful. Granted, I've never had that many friends to begin with, but the ones I do have haven't given me any trouble about not being on social media or whatever. In my experience these online platforms cater to shallow communications of dubious value.
  - Forgeties79 4y ago
    > Being a small-scale dictator about modes of communication isn't great. Oh come now, isn’t this a little dramatic? If I was forcing them to use one app I want in order to stay in touch you’d have a point, but isn’t that also functionally what you’re saying we should have to deal with? Meeting someone all the way, only on ONE mode of communication they demand? This also doesn’t address how niche this situation is. There can’t be that many people who can only talk to their family on Facebook messenger. This can’t possibly be a major issue.
    - emn13 4y ago

Forgeties79 4y ago

In what world are people only able to communicate with their family and friends on Facebook? Who only communicates with colleagues over Twitter?

avereveard 4y ago
Unless your family counts two you cannot possibly compare the time facetiming each one of them vs just scrolling an aggregated news feed
- Forgeties79 4y ago
  Phone call, email, text message, Viber, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Telegram, actually interacting in person. Half my family isn’t even on Facebook and virtually none of us even use it anymore. If that’s the only way to keep up with family then don’t act like a complete jerk online, or you know don’t harass people, and you’ll be fine. Same as regular society. Contrary to popular belief, it actually takes a lot to simply get banned. Yeah there are cases like the post above, but the reason it is even here is because it is noteworthy.
  - OrangeMonkey 4y ago
    It does not take a lot to get banned - you just have to have a stated opinion that does not correlate with a large portion of the user base. If the civil rights movement was being organized on facebook today with the culture and beliefs of the 1950's as our users, I am very confident MLK would have been banned from every service. ... and someone, somewhere, would say 'don't act like a complete jerk online, or you know don't harass people, and you'll be fine'. I don't mean this pointed at you, I completely get the feeling, but I think ignoring history and the current in/out groups is likely to lead to conclusions that are not realistic.
    - Forgeties79 4y ago
      This is an accusation by American conservatives that has little to no basis in reality. It’s just an easy source of fake outrage they don’t have to back up. You won’t get banned for “wrong think.” Look how long it took Alex Jones to get de-platformed - the dude was literally starting witch hunts with his accounts. Look, I will be the first to say we need to rein in social media companies. Their ability to shrug and say “oh well!” with no repercussions as their vaunted algorithms (mis)handle the impossibly large scale of their businesses is wrong. No other industry gets away with so much except maybe religious groups and oil/gas. That being said, we should not conflate it with the incorrect and frankly dishonest cries of “censorship” by the right. Related note: I think you’ll find this Twitter bot very interesting: https://twitter.com/facebookstop10/status/1549786281177128961?s=21&t=nQ5wPDwQs1iLL5FIkkHc_A https://twitter.com/facebookstop10/status/154978628117712896...
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
haswell 4y ago
In the world we live in now. I knew a guy who was having serious financial trouble, and couldn’t afford to keep a phone line active. He relied on Facebook to stay in contact with his wife and son because he at least had access to WiFi. You can make a similar argument about phones. People can just reach each other via mail, or physically visit each other…but this doesn’t exactly constitute a healthy state of interaction. Use email you say! Almost every big email provider requires verification via phone or another email address these days. It’s legitimately getting harder and harder to communicate in these other ways. > Who only communicates with colleagues over Twitter? I don’t use Twitter much these days, but for a period of time, it was by far the easiest way to get/stay in touch with the communities I was organizing. I did dev advocacy, and if I ran a meet up somewhere, I didn’t want to just hand my phone number to a room full of people, but did want the option to stay in contact. Could I have found another solution? Yeah sure. But at the time, this seems pretty reasonable, and Twitter wasn’t yet banning people for inane things. If I lost that account now, it’d sever an entire community. Could I work around that? Sure. But downplaying the significance of these things seems short sighted. I rarely touch social media these days for many other reasons, but that is definitely an isolating choice to make in 2022.

leephillips 4y ago

“These things have replaced existing connections” I hear this now and then and it puzzles me. All my personal online and business communication is through email, with some friends and groups on WhatsApp and Telegram. People sometimes talk to me on Twitter but, if I want to talk to them, I steer them to email. I seems really risky, as we see in so many incidents reported here, to actually rely on platforms like Twitter for maintaining connections.

OrangeMonkey 4y ago
For users who are banned from these services, they have to do just what you say. Lets not confuse ourselves though - the vast majority of America does not feel the way you and I do. My kiddos swim team is on facebook, thats how we track and sign up for service, and if we lose our access we are excluded. Asking everyone on the team to move to email is a nonstarter.
ricardobeat 4y ago
Almost nobody in my circles uses email for personal conversations anymore. People don’t share their email when you meet at a conference. You don’t join the X tech discussion group over email (anymore). This also implies only talking to people you already know, no opportunities to join or start communities. And that’s still besides the point: just imagine that your email account is cancelled tomorrow because they don’t like something you said in a mailing list.
- leephillips 4y ago
  I don’t doubt what you’re saying about your circles. I live in a different universe. If someone only communicates through Twitter, etc., that’s a useful filter for me. I don’t have a Facebook account. “only talking to people you already know” Far from it. For example, the contact information for an author on a scientific paper often includes an email address.

motoxpro 4y ago

But I "need" that restaurant because I am hungry, it's only a block away, I really love the pasta they cook, and the bartender I enjoy talking to only works at this particular restaurant :(

feurio 4y ago

If you get banned, just create another account and then don't do the thing that got you banned. It's really not that difficult.

OrangeMonkey 4y ago
Banned users creating new accounts is not a feature, its a 'bug' that the current platforms are trying to fix. Ever create a new facebook account? Even as a flesh and blood human being? Lots of folks have tried to do this for oculus and a great number of them were banned. It made the news on HNN. Facebook is fixing this bug now, and the other sites are trying to do the same. Eventually, when the big tech companies have 'fixed the bug' and your ban is - in fact - permanent and for life. . . what then? "Don't do bad things" - a simple question... if the 50's/60's civil rights movement was done today on facebook, would MLK have been banned from twitter/facebook/instagram? I think he would be. If you know a way to fix this, let me know. I think we - as humans - need to fix this sooner rather than later.
- feurio 4y ago
  If it doesn't require you to prove your identity with a gov issued document then you'll be able to create a new account. My FB account certainly doesn't have my real name. If it does require you to do so then run away from that platform very fast. Yeah, a Million Man Meme is going to be so effective ... BLM & Antfi seem to have no problems organising themselves anyway and apparently they are practically terrorists according to the alt-right. If you want a way to "fix it" then vote for someone who will bring in regulation to crack down on the powers that tech companies have. And if you don't want to do that because you're a libertarian fan of light touch regulation of business, then you probably need to have word with yourself.

JackFr 4y ago

> If your friends and family are on Facebook, your work contacts across the country are on Twitter, the only forums left alive on the web are on Reddit, how can you not need them? You can absolutely step away from them and it’s not even hard. Call, text or email your friends and family. It’s far more intimate and frankly more satisfying. You lose the ability to broadcast a curated persona, but honestly in the grand scheme of things that’s better for both you and the rest of humanity.

emn13 4y ago
I did this for years. I regret it. It's overly simplistic to think this works well. The devil is in the details; and being a decent human being also means adapting to other's wishes, needs and habits. Being a small-scale dictator about modes of communication isn't great. You _will_ miss out of valuable personal communication if you choose to go this route. It's not just about an online curated persona.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
  I've been doing this since forever, and I don't feel I miss out on anything meaningful. Granted, I've never had that many friends to begin with, but the ones I do have haven't given me any trouble about not being on social media or whatever. In my experience these online platforms cater to shallow communications of dubious value.
- Forgeties79 4y ago
  > Being a small-scale dictator about modes of communication isn't great. Oh come now, isn’t this a little dramatic? If I was forcing them to use one app I want in order to stay in touch you’d have a point, but isn’t that also functionally what you’re saying we should have to deal with? Meeting someone all the way, only on ONE mode of communication they demand? This also doesn’t address how niche this situation is. There can’t be that many people who can only talk to their family on Facebook messenger. This can’t possibly be a major issue.
  - emn13 4y ago