9 ms·

Goodbye Facebook.

227 points by jackyyappp 14y ago

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
lukejduncan 14y ago
The anecodte the poster gives is spot on and huge. There have been many times I've thought "I wonder why I don't hear from this person anymore" and it was simply a matter of Facebook no longer prioritizing their posts in my news feed. Just because someones post isn't "liked" or clicked on in some way doesn't mean it's not valuable. It's a passive form of communication. I don't know if this is just my perception, and maybe Facebook doesn't prioritize things in the news feed. Regardless, it's a UX question that needs to be asked by their team.
- untog 14y ago
  But Facebook offers comprehensive controls that let you decide who appears on your news feed and who does not. You just need to use them.
  - briandear 14y ago
    Can you block sponsored stories? Besides, what good are controls if they keep 'evolving' and force you to actually maintain those settings. Settings and prefs should be fire and forget. I should not have to revisit settings in response to some new feature. For example, that jackass new @facebook email thing. Facebook is circa 1999 Windows.
  - planetguy 14y ago
    Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. Most facebook controls are buried three levels of counterintuitive links down in a locked filing cabinet in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the Leopard". Or to put it another way, if I can't figure out how to make facebook show me stuff that isn't shite, how are ordinary people going to figure it out? edit: Also I've figured out that the reason I no longer hear from an awful lot of my facebook friends is that I've probably set at least half of 'em to "ignore" due to 'em posting too much garbage.
nicky0 14y ago
It seems more and more people are realising it: if you value your friendships, get off Facebook.
- Kliment 14y ago
  I wrote something about this several years ago, when I got tired of repeating the reasons I wasn't on Facebook. Here it is if you're interested: http://everything2.com/title/Facebook+destroys+real+relationships http://everything2.com/title/Facebook+destroys+real+relation...
  - lathamcity 14y ago
    I didn't make it through two paragraphs. Can't I read a sentence without being linked to three other web pages?
    - Kliment 14y ago
      everything2 is weird like that. Ignore the links. They are a semantic graph pointer, not hypertext.
beehave 14y ago
The solution is peer-to-peer. We should all have direct connections to our friends. Facebook as a means of communication is weird. It's like sharing your private conversations with your friends with a bunch of strangers... Facebook employees, Facebook advertisers, and who knows who else. The latest email maneuver is yet another slap in the face. Facebook are snoops! Imagine if Facebook allowed you see who was accessing your profile. Some early social sites had that feature. It was useful and fun. But those sites were not like Facebook. Why do you think Facebook never will have this feature? Maybe because the people accessing your profile for information about you are not necessarily your friends or people you know? Lots going on behind the scenes that they do not want you to see. It all starts with Zuckerberg and his attitude. He's sociopathic at heart and as such he really has no business being in charge of so much personal information.
richardv 14y ago
Aside from the fact that this post is mostly pointless, it's also totally misinformed. The OP started off by stating his reasons for dropping FB in this "experiment".. namely losing touch with the people for which he originally signed up under. But he clearly doesn't engage with them if he's not seeing their updates. Your social graph needs fine tuning. It's like any good bayesian filter, it learns over time what interests you. You can of course give it a push in the right direction by putting people in acquaintances, or hiding specific people from your timeline. (People in your acquaintances don't show up as often in your newsfeed). This post just shows that you most likely don't understand the full feature set of Facebook and how to best optimize your social graph (not that this is your fault). Facebook has some of the best machine learning for figuring out what is relevant to me. I'd probably argue that you click on too many memes and don't interact with your friends as much if this is what it is serving you. Don't drop Facebook, just learn how to use it. I personally don't use Facebook for interacting with that many friends. I have about 96% of my friends as acquantiances. I have a small set of about 10 people as friends, and I subscribe to about 100~ people. My newsfeed is so rich with really good content.
- nicholassmith 14y ago
  I don't want to 'optimise my social graph'. Especially given it used to work properly and feed me the relevant content that I wanted about a year ago. You can try defend the social graph, how much Facebook has done to improve it and so on, but for a lot of people it doesn't actually achieve what it used to, and that's an issue.
  - johnchristopher 14y ago
    Isn't the fact we add too many contacts the core issue ? And then it turns out that it's easier to look at funny stuff posted by anyone than diving emotionnaly into the life turmoils of our real close friends ? I firmly believe the simple solution is to have more than one account.
    - nicholassmith 14y ago
obituary_latte 14y ago
My problem with fb and the reason I don't use it is simple: principal. I understand the model, and oblige with google (though not g+ as it is pretty quiet in my neck of the woods). But to not only give them the value of my data but also have them go around changing things like registered email without so much as a heads up is a slap in the face. It's like a conceited bus monitor that just goes ahead and "does what's best for me". I'm an adult; I know what email address I prefer to use. Not only that, but the utter lack of transparency is concerning to say the least. There is this monstrous set of data--PII--that this company holds and who's to say the bus monitor doesn't all of a sudden decide that's it's best for me if they provide this data to Experien. Or to the justice dept. The real problem is that people are addicted to distraction. Fb offers this droves. So much so that not only are people more than willing to hand over their data, they are willing to hand it over to someone who thinks you don't even deserve to know when they make sweeping changes to which parts of that data are displayed to the world. /rant
- panacea 14y ago
  I've seen comments such as "How do you know someone doesn't use Facebook? Because they'll tell you". As if the primary reason you're expressing your dislike for the service in a discussion about it, is because you wish to proclaim smug superiority. I think it's important for those who dislike the current platform, and are concerned about the future ramifications of it, to speak up in public forums. To state openly that they don't use Facebook for reasons of principal and also, because Facebook's actions have spoken louder than words numerous times and in my opinion, to continue to use the service is like staying with an abusive partner.
- planetguy 14y ago
  It took me a long time to figure out that you meant "principle" rather than "principal". For school teachers, perhaps the reason might be principal.
  - obituary_latte 14y ago
    Heh. Meaty fingers and no coffee make HN cell phone posts a rough time.
gooddaysir 14y ago
Facebook is the new television.
- Etab 14y ago
  Related: "I don't have a Facebook" is the new "I don't have a TV." For some reason, those who either refused to sign up or chose to deactivate their accounts feel the need to share this with everyone everywhere.
  - briandear 14y ago
    And people that do use Facebook feel it their duty to post status messages everytime they take a dump. Who's the real ass here?
chris_wot 14y ago
I have to agree with the sentiments here: it seems to me that my Facebook feed is much less useful than it was about a year ago. I don't know what they've done, but it's really not good.
tatsuke95 14y ago
Facebook will struggle to make the next leap (IMHO, of course) because there's a disconnect between how users want to use it, and how Facebook wants/needs you to use it. Outside of the sub-group of individuals who thrive on sharing every aspect of their life, most people want Facebook to be a fancy email. There's all your friends; you can talk with them and literally see what they're up to . And to be honest, the platform is great for that. Facebook, on the other hand, needs you to be an information sharing and data providing machine, talking about brands and products, all while doing whatever they can to entice (or trick) you into putting your information in the public domain. They want to you be connected with everyone. People are learning that's a lot of work. The problem is that the more Facebook pushes the latter, the worse the former -- the user experience -- has to get. Nobody wants to stare at ads and feel like they're being "watched" (by both Facebook and other connections) while they "engage" with friends. As the author discovered...it's odd.
- malarkeyking 14y ago
  Agreed. I think G+ could beat Facebook here as they don't need to directly monetise the service and can provide more of the platform people want. Whether or not they can get to a tipping point of users however is another question.
- JumpCrisscross 14y ago
  This is probably a generational thing, but I don't care about being watched. If I am, that information doesn't go on Facebook, in an email, in a text, and perhaps even not in a phone call. Facebook is getting impersonal without a competent list/circles system. I find myself texting or messaging content to people more than posting it on my wall because I want to be selective about who views it. Sometimes these are stories about the cute girl I talked to at Starbucks or a service I'm loving. Sometimes it's a personal story with little branding value. But I naturally have both types of conversations and so don't see the mutual exclusivity between encouraging conversation and getting data. Similarly, the problem with friending everyone goes away with a decent lists/circles concept - I add a lot more people on Google+ (granted, I don't post anything there. But I'd like to).
citricsquid 14y ago
> I want us to talk. I want a personal email. I want to find a way to share photos in a way that encourages us to talk about them with each other. Surely you can do this with or without Facebook. Maybe I'm a unique snowflake but Facebook to me is exactly the opposite of that: it's a way to give a quick (often meaningless) insight into my life, what I'm thinking or what I'm doing. It's a way to share something that maybe someone will be interested in, but probably not. If I share something to Facebook it's not because I want all my friends to see it, it's because I think those that might see it might find value in it and it represents what I'm doing/thinking/enjoying. If I want someone to see something or engage with me in conversation I send them a message. Facebook isn't a replacement for "normal" communication between friends, it's an extension. The only reason anyone would want to see complaints about someone's life falling apart is the same reason people watch train wrecks of car crashes. They don't care about the individual, they care about the spectacle. Using any one->many communication platform for complaints about life seems misguided. Maybe https://everyme.com/ https://everyme.com/ would fill the void he has in his life.
- itgoon 14y ago
  Exactly. If it replaces anything, it's because it is more efficient at it. This is all anecdotal, I know... Since Facebook, my email inbox is almost devoid of "RE:RE:FW:FW" broadcast messages. I still get plenty of email from family and friends, but they are more selective in what they send. Things that are personal, or detailed, or very specific to me. I still use my phone a lot, but spend less time telling people how great (or not) my weekend was. If they want to know, they can look. If they want details, they call and ask.
Afal 14y ago
Oh boy another internet "experiment" when someone gives up $technology and ends up saying absolutely nothing in their post. I sure do love reading these pretentious pieces of "intellectual" prose. In fact I shall start an "experiment" myself to see if replacing every instance of "experiment" in these kind of articles with "controversial decision" to see if they read better. I mean it's as if people use the word "experiment" to justify being avant-garde. Except in this case it's not even a controversial thing. People are leaving facebook for tonnes of reasons (fad has died, not finding its uses any more, don't want to be tied with a system that hoards personal data and sells them off to companies etc). Leaving Facebook isn't an edgy thing to do; not before and not now. Anyone I knew that announced that they're "leaving facebook" end up being rather smugly obnoxious when tech news headlines say "facebook did some things that people don't like. boooo facebook!" saying they "knew all along" and they were obviously smarter and more superior than the regular "tech weenie" still on their facebook. We all know what the result of this "experiment" is going to be. "My life was significantly improved thanks to not using facebook. Just as I thought! Aren't I clever?". There's no point denying it because that's what they're going to say. Just like I said I'll replace "experiment" with "controversial decision". I already know that I'm going to say "Nope. The posts were not better at all. Told ya!" because I know that when it's something I dislike in the first place I'm going to have a visceral reaction to hate it rather than say doing an ACTUAL experiment which doesn't have this cognitive bias. And I'm right, am I? I mean I'm not WRONG or something? Please someone validate my beliefs which I portray on the internet. I desperately need this!!!
- unimpressive 14y ago
  > And I'm right, am I? I mean I'm not WRONG or something? Please someone validate my beliefs which I portray on the internet. I desperately need this!!! I think that was supposed to be ironic. I think. Regardless, that's how it came off to me too. I still have no Facebook account, and I'm not getting one. If you're unhappy just leave, no need to make a big fuss out of it.
- basicallydan 14y ago
  Maybe that's how it came off, but if we look past the "look at me and my controversial decision masquerading as an experiment!" layer, and focus on his reasoning behind the decision: can you relate at all? I can. "Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook" is one of the phrases I've found myself and my friends saying over the past couple of years, and sometimes I don't like hearing it, even from my own mouth. Nevertheless, announcing it publicly as an "experiment" - it's debatable whether this has any value or point.
gedrap 14y ago
The arguments are valid here, not one more 'Zuck I HATE YOU, remove timeline' when actually timeline does not make any difference unless you are stalking some one every day :)) I like the idea of the news feed filter algorithm. Just implementation is not the best. The only way to 'fix' it is just to change friend status (acquaintance, friend, close friend, etc). But... I am not sure if the algorithm can be improved actually. It determines whether to show or not by how much do you interact with some one on facebook (more or less). And it's the only way to determine whether you might be interested or not. Because believe me, you wouldn't be happy if you could see what everyone is posting if you have 200+ friends.
markessien 14y ago
This is what many people use facebook group for. To keep in close contact with a group of like-minded individuals.
MortenK 14y ago
I really like the "Share to Facebook" button at the end of the post.
- malarkeyking 14y ago
  HA HA! I'm not using FB because people don't interact with me and feel my pain. HOWEVER, please show all of your intimate friends my blog post!
- Tooluka 14y ago
  Aren't they automatically added on every internet webpage?:)
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
crag 14y ago
Well the OP is right about one thing: Facebook has become less personal. I regret accepting old high school/college friends (who I haven't' seen in 25 years), army buds, and family members I didn't even know I had. Now I post, maybe once every 2 weeks. Usually something safe - like about the current game I'm playing. I don't dare get personal on FB now.
- antidoh 14y ago
  "I don't dare get personal on FB now." The irony.
  - mattgreenrocks 14y ago
    Indeed - the more 'connected' we are, the more socialized we're forced to be. Facebook is not the third place simply because there are too many appearances we're have to maintain.
- prostoalex 14y ago
  Just remove them. They'll still stay on as subscribers and see public posts.
CodeCube 14y ago
"Conversing with a friend, I start to share a story I’d earlier posted on Facebook. Since she didn’t comment or “like” the post I guessed she hadn’t yet seen it. Instead, she cuts me short: “Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook.”" lol, my wife does this to me all the time :) (or should the emoticon be :( )
bbrizzi 14y ago
So just because you don't have the proper settings on your news feed, you're quitting facebook altogether. I agree that facebook is a lot less personal than it used to be. Personally, I rarely update my facebook status or stare at the newsfeed. I use facebook to connect with "friends" whose phone number or e-mail address I don't have and to join or create events.Those two situations are perfectly well handled by facebook.
- antidoh 14y ago
  Not just proper settings on his news feed. He also felt like he had to filter himself for propriety, and found little worth in the communication that resulted through that facade. That's not a technical issue, it's his valid personal issue. He's not the only one with that view of facebook.
shmerl 14y ago
Facebook is defective by design as a social network. It's for profit driven, privacy abusing and etc. and etc. It's a pity that it became a virtual monopoly. Same bad as happened with Windows on the desktop.
moron 14y ago
Facebook has a feature specifically for this, so that you see every update posted by people on your "VIP" list. I only know this because they put the feature in my face, I didn't go looking for it. Come on.
planetguy 14y ago
I'm considering leaving facebook for the first time, because of the Sponsored Stories thing, which is showing up with disturbing regularity, and frequently winds up as ads for things that make me angry. Nowadays, if you "Like" something, then that something can pay for the privilege to insert whatever stories it likes into your friends' facebook feeds, under the heading "so-and-so likes such-and-such" followed by your own message. Interestingly the person whose name is being used for the advertisement has no idea what ads are going out under their name. Two of these in particular show up in my facebook feed several times a week and raise my blood pressure every time they do. One is a particularly annoying evangelical preacher slash motivational speaker who fills up my newsfeed with god-stuff due to the fact that a vague acquaintance I've met a couple of times happens to "like" him. Another is a political thing which fills up my newsfeed with posts I find highly disagreeable under the name of another friend of mine. What were they thinking? Facebook has designed a feature which makes me hate my friends.
- ovi256 14y ago
  Facebook already includes tools to solve your issues. Either unfriend the vague acquintances, hide all their posts from your feed, or hide the annoying posts following some criteria.
  - planetguy 14y ago
    Actually I've discovered that the ads keep appearing even if you do hide all their posts from your feed.
    - planetguy 14y ago
      Actually, I just discovered that ads keep appearing even if you defriend the person! I just defriended someone who works for a social game company because they were pushing waaaay too many ads through to my feed. I felt bad about doing it because I don't mind the guy on a personal level, but shit it was annoying. Anyway, having defriended him I reloaded my news feed only to find that the ad was still there! Now, maybe that's a one-off and the servers hadn't quite synchronized yet, but damn. Facebook makes me dump my friends to avoid ads and still gives me the ads!
superasn 14y ago
Yes, I too had the similar problem. I was missing out on updates from my brother while being bombarded with stupid gifs. But as pointed out in another comment it's just one day I had to sit for an hour and put everyone who I don't speak on phone regularly as acquaintances. Problem solved! It was a bit hard for me to do this though, nearly took an hour.. so here are two suggestions 1) Brute force: option to mark everyone as acquaintances in one go and then de-select the people back to friends. 2) More automated: Facebook should make a module where if a person allows the app access to the phonebook, it somehow recommends a list of people who are important to me based on my frequency of calling/speaking them offline. I know privacy conscious people would absolutely scream in horror so this is why it should be opt-in only. P.S. 3) Oh and timeline still sucks. It is just too hard to read, there ought to be a way to going back to the simple news feed.
- drcube 14y ago
  Facebook Purity http://www.fbpurity.com/remove-facebook-timeline.htm http://www.fbpurity.com/remove-facebook-timeline.htm
idleloops 14y ago
I have privacy concerns about Facebook, and resent the fact that it's such a silo, but in the main in succeeds where other technologies have failed. It's useful for finding people - a directory. If I want to get in touch with someone - and I don't have their contact details I can probably find them on Facebook and fire them a message. If email was just as easy, people would have probably taken to that. Which is a shame, because Email could have been that easy. Privacy used to be more of a concern, and spam drove people away from publishing their addresses in directories. I've left (privacy and personal reasons.) I since have missed the community. It's encouraged me to pick up the phone more, which is a nice thing. You just can't have the same rich interaction with people when typing compared to talking. But you can have a greater audience. Perhaps you communicate to more people with less content over something like Facebook, compared to having richer relationships with fewer people. It might all balance out. Ultimately time is a premium. I certainly don't think G+ is the answer - it's much of the same.
padobson 14y ago
Curation of social media is becoming a big problem that only occured within the last few years. Trying to solve it algorithmically with plus ones and likes and upvotes seems to work when the content is centered around a specific topic, but not something so general as your Facebook friends list or Twitter feed. And you can't just deny people you know from being your friend on Facebook. It's rude. If you're ok with being rude, this doesn't apply to you, but the quality of my Facebook stream is not worth sacrificing my manners - not when I can get better content elsewhere without having to do so. I haven't left Facebook, I just ignore it, because there's nothing interesting there. I don't want to clean it up when my accounts on Twitter, Quora, Hacker News, and Stack Exchange provide much more interesting content.
cs702 14y ago
As I see it, the seeds of this user's disappointment were planted as soon as she starting gaming the system: "my posts became more and more filtered as the 'Friend' list increased. Now, they were getting the facade, the highlights because I donned the 'happy' mask. My closer friends were still catching the true story through instant messaging, text messaging and phone calls..." The faint echoes of Gödel and Turing in the back of my mind say: no social algorithm can ever optimize its results to take into account how people will modify their behavior in response to the algorithm itself.
- calinet6 14y ago
  Her point still stands. I've been Facebooking since the start, so I don't necessarily alter my behavior much, I just use it to keep up with friends, post interesting tidbits about my life, and try to have real conversations happen. I still see the same problems. When I talk to people, it's always "oh yeah, I saw on Facebook that you got a new job," etc. etc. I went back and looked through my old e-mails from right before Facebook was becoming popular, early 2004. I once sent out one of those "My e-mail address is changing. Oh btw how are you?" e-mails to my whole list, and got back around 50 genuine responses that turned into conversations. Not "broadcast" style conversations, not public conversations, but real honest person-to-person human communication. It was brilliant. I realized that I had completely lost that. If I was doing it today, I could send the same e-mail but people would send nothing back; it would just be "Thanks" because they already know everything else there is to know about my life, and I theirs. It's a very strange and new way of connecting to people. On the one hand I have some deep insights into the lives of friends I might not otherwise talk to, or even those I do; on the other hand, I miss the humanity of one-on-one conversation. I'm yet undecided if this is a good thing. But overall, I think the article overblows the affect this has on relationships. Personally, I sort of like it. All the trivial stuff is known already. No one cares where you work or what you're doing anymore, they want to hear how you're doing and how your life is really going. It negates some shallowness and small talk. Not necessarily bad. But it is enormously complex. We still don't know how society will change as people become more connected in so many ways, but we do know it will change. Some might say it's the next level in our evolution; collaborative social evolution is the next step since biological evolution can't keep up. It'll be a fun ride.
ZanderEarth32 14y ago
I think people put too much emphasis on Facebook and what perceived problems it is 'suppose to solve' in their lives. You get out of it what you put it into it, just like anything else (mostly). If you don't feel connected with your friends, it's not FB's fault. FB to me isn't designed to make my connections with friends stronger, it's designed to keep lingering friendships going. On a side note, why is it so important to declare that you are no longer using or on Facebook. This isn't limited to the OP either. I've met people in real life, who take great pride in not using FB anymore. I find it in the tech & podcast world too. It's a strange type of snobbery, between 'those in the know who aren't on facebook' versus the 'sheep who are on facebook'. Well, I am no longer using brand name nasal spray. It wasn't fulfilling my life I like I thought it was supposed to. I used it like the bottle says too and while it does what it says it's supposed to, it's not what I want.
- Argorak 14y ago
  Oh, thats easy. Because there is a huge group of people that will view you as "off the norm" if you don't use Facebook. Which is snobbery as well. Every time i ride the bus, I hear the word "Facebook" at least once. So, the thing itself is a hot topic, so why not talk about it, even if you are not using it? Your nasal spray, however, is not a hot topic.
- jakejake 14y ago
  This is exactly what I was going to post, but you said it better. The "I'm quitting Facebook" declarations strike me as a sad cry for attention. Just stop checking your Facebook page and start hanging out more with friends in person. No need to be so dramatic about it.
kristiandupont 14y ago
Not being on Facebook seems to be the new "I don't even own a tv" http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly-mentioning-he-doesnt-own-a-tel,429/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly-mention...
- telepoiss 14y ago
  Now that Facebook is going downhill (for me at least) I'm again actually contemplating the idea of getting a TV.
duncan 14y ago
You'll eventually get over being "too cool" for Facebook. It's ok, I did it too. We'll welcome you back when you change your mind. Life is too short to worry so much about these things.
- briandear 14y ago
  Life's too short to be watching cat videos and sifting through sponsored stories.
  - duncan 14y ago
    All your friends do on FB is post cat videos? ..and this is Facebook's fault? Ha. Maybe it's time to make some new friends?!
nollidge 14y ago
This is fucking on-point. The Timeline is just completely useless anymore as a way of keep tabs on people I care about. I rarely care if my friend was tagged in a picture, and I never care that they commented on a wall post by some random person I've never met. I wish I could ditch it altogether, but the events and messaging are an integral part of my social life now.
godisdad 14y ago
I don't know why everyone takes Facebook so seriously. Well, actually I do but I don't want to dive into a long comment about how it's a voyeuristic, social panopticon and how easy it is to project your insecurities onto it. Well, I have a small and strange solution to staying in contact with your friends, do what I do: remove all your actual friends from your newsfeed. When you see them, you won't already have eagerly instantiated things to talk about, you won't jaw off about some article they posted about the latest bath salt murder -- you'll actually catch up and connect in genuine conversation. The site only has as much power as you give it, posting a long diatribe about how it has no power over you anymore because you deactivated is legitimizing its power over you.
personlurking 14y ago
I've gone "old school" (trying to connect to people in 'old fashion' ways) on many somewhat prolonged occasions and it doesn't work. It's a reflection of society not my particular grouping of friends. I spent a year writing many handwritten letters. People loved receiving them but seldom, if ever, returned the favor. I try and try again to meet with my friends to catch up (ie, going for coffee). Almost never happens, and when it does it's a chore to actually set up. Instead, it has to be an 'event' and it should be 'social'. I text my friends and they respond rather quickly...because I know if I call, many times they don't answer. Of course, all this means is that the LCD is either me or society.
- chipsy 14y ago
  I think it's a rational trend. Our direction has been towards more "omniscient/passive" forms of information, where you can update at your own pace, and others consume that information optionally. Doing this is cost-effective and allows people to prioritize their contacts by reading their feed occasionally, rather than by doing "pavement pounding" to make calls and arrange dates. In doing this we miss out on some deeper conversations, but I think we gain on balance because it allows people to _choose_ which conversations they want to pursue. That's the key thing here - if you aren't feeling a benefit from socializing, you aren't motivated to do it. Which inevitably leads to the conclusion that most people are finding each other boring, even if they're friends...
  - personlurking 14y ago
    "most people are finding each other boring, even if they're friends..." this kind of frightens me, even though I lean towards introversion.
    - pdonis 14y ago
      I more than "lean" towards introversion, and this doesn't really frighten me; it makes me a bit sad, that's all. But I doubt it's a new observation. I suspect most people have always found most other people boring much of the time, even if they are friends. It's just more evident now because people have more alternatives for spending their time that fill a need for "socializing" without requiring direct in-person interaction.
mixmastamyk 14y ago
Has some good points, but I think many get the wrong idea about facebook. It's a way to keep in touch with far off friends who you wouldn't hear from at all otherwise. It's never affected a real relationship for me in the slightest, other than, "I saw your pics." The news feed could be better, but it has become more relevant since I've silenced a few overposters and blocked apps, etc.
tgrass 14y ago
Many of the complaints could be resolved with more transparency on Facebook's part. The frustrations seem to be generally focused on managing communication: incoming and outgoing, an issue of curation. The problem is, despite Facebook having many tools to calibrate one's communications, Facebook is still a blackbox. We click the appropriate Account Settings radio button and like the good scientists we are, wait to see what happens. The fact of the matter is, we are pulling a lever and hoping it is attached to some mechanism on the other side. The same is true of Google and SEO. Odd that obfuscation is the hallmark of our internet experiences.
bhashkarsharma 14y ago
I did the same thing 2 weeks back. People whom I meet keep asking, but honestly, I haven't missed it for one second. I wrote a little something about it http://tumblr.bhashkar.me/post/23712148539/why-i-deactivated-my-facebook-account http://tumblr.bhashkar.me/post/23712148539/why-i-deactivated...
k2xl 14y ago
"One evening, over pizza and wine she’s telling me about a breakup and a poem she posted. I never saw the poem. When I visited her Timeline I realized she had been posting every day and it never once showed up in my Newsfeed. Instead I see a photo of someone I don’t know; gliding down my Newsfeed simply because one of my friends “liked” it and the original poster doesn’t have their privacy settings in place." Aye, totally agree. The day Facebook launched EdgeRank was the day Facebook started it's decline. In fact, there's a pattern that happens to companies that try and "assume" what their users want to see.
danso 14y ago
> Conversing with a friend, I start to share a story I’d earlier posted on Facebook. Since she didn’t comment or “like” the post I guessed she hadn’t yet seen it. Instead, she cuts me short: “Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook.” And that was it. No dialog, no joy at conversing with each other, just friends passively watching each other from a distance. I’m guilty, I’ve done it too. We’ve become quiet ships, passing by in the dark silence of the night. Hmm, that's just a tough anecdote to use to make his point...it could be that that his friend is not much of a conversationalist with him. But I admit to using FB to promote things that I don't feel like wasting real-time talking about...like projects or articles I liked...And everyone who's ever been on the receiving end of a mass-email is happy about that.
silentscope 14y ago
how about de-friending some people? I do it and it works pretty well.
nerdfiles 14y ago
Hold on. First off, you should have deleted your account years ago. "Connecting with friends" is a terrible point to make: e-mail has been around for decades. However, such a point does intersect with my main goal for making this post. People are lazy. Now programmers are saying it, and now everyone else will realize just how true it is, and being lazy has consequences. So, we've had e-mail for decades. Why won't people use it? Instead of wasted texting plans, etc.? You could always keep up with your friends and family through e-mail. But the interfaces were either ugly, inconvenient, or disorganized. It's beyond me that an {interface} should have to tell me to contact my mother or that an {interface} should compel me to "keep up with old friends." This. Is. Absurd. [Luddite Rant:] Sorry, but pick up the damn phone and call them. (Or click "compose" and just {try} to type out something meaningful.) I believe this finely leads into my next point: Not many of you have anything Gricean (http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/dravling/grice.html http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/dravling/grice.html) to say. What [would] you say in an e-mail to a friend? -- People don't have much to say anyway (and for my personal stake in it, it's because they're not reading anything interesting), and Facebook isn't going to change that. That, I think, is the point behind http://weknowwhatyouredoing.com/ http://weknowwhatyouredoing.com/. There's nothing-to-hide, and conversely, there's nothing-to-show either. FB is an enabler of oversharing, and it's allowing people to empty out too much without taking in substantive content. I'm going to say it engenders bad cognitive hygiene.
- ahelwer 14y ago
  How is it this same tired argument pops up every time quitting Facebook is discussed? The sweet spot for Facebook is acquaintances. People you would not usually email or call, and only hear about once in a while through the grapevine. It maintains familiarity. Subbed in a co-ed game of ultimate frisbee and met some people? Add them on Facebook.
  - nerdfiles 14y ago
    I think it's a "tired argument" because its not easily defeated. _Why_ wouldn't you "usually" e-mail or call? Why? Why would you? (This seems like Churchill's point: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.") E-mail didn't fail, this is why we're seeing a resurgence of it (http://three.sentenc.es/ http://three.sentenc.es/, 501 developers against e-mail bombardment, minimalism over e-mail organization, etc.). Why has FB suddenly become "the best we've got" when all people seem to argue for is particular features that could be replaced. FB is a mash-up; this has nothing to do with "maintainability of social grace." It's a mash-up; and consumers like mash-ups. Seriously: _Why?_ Why do we need we need a "social framework" that captures the rest of our human-interaction? We do we need a "social baseline"? Why do we need a system to maintain familiarity for us? I'm not even sure I understand the value of the point you've made, even if it is a good argument. _I_ maintain familiarity; Facebook is a tool for supporting what I do naturally. > It maintains familiarity. I'm not sure what this means. How does it do this? By making an API function do... What? > Subbed in a co-ed game of ultimate frisbee and met some people? Add them on Facebook. Add their e-mails? Organize your labels. The sweet spot for _who_? I'm telling others to drop it because you can achieve those goals through other interfaces; you're telling me that others shouldn't set their goals too high (acquaintances). My point still stands. E-mail [certainly] would make more sense within the "acquaintances" counterpoint. Facebook is a set of opinions as to how one should manage (or maintain?) one's social life. Isn't it clear that if one rejects that System, one might be expected to provide an alternative, or possibly simpler, solution? The argument cannot really be a surprise to you, surely. [EDIT:] I'm _struggling_ to understand the point about "maintaining" familiarity. I really do wish to understand it, as I feel it touches the heart of the matter. However, such an idea may require a break-down. I think the issue of "discovery" is an important one, but what actually am I discovering in this digital world? A portfolio? Or a person? To argue that FB's sweet spot is about acquaintances from the evidence that it's a good tallying tool, or a notes tool, for friends made in the physical social world, I think, is a bad argument, or at least it's not very compelling. I think such an argument only re-confirms the "tired argument" I initially presented.
zainny 14y ago
The problem seems to ultimately always boil down to "I added far too many people to Facebook as friends, and now Facebook is useless!" To which the solution is easy: cut down the number of people you are friends with on Facebook. For me, I have < 30 people I've friended on Facebook. But they're real friends and family, people I know and want to keep in touch with. And that's made all the difference to how I use Facebook.
bryanjclark 14y ago
I've been on the fence about quitting Facebook for a while. On one hand, it feels like junk-food-friendship: it feels like you're connecting and communicating, but in reality the time you spend scrolling lists on your phone could be spent with something far better: closing the FB app and calling a buddy. On the other hand, so many people use FB that it's tough to completely pull away from it. It's where my generational cohort shares photos, so I can't fully walk away unless I want to miss out on the photos from last week's camping trip, etc.
pasbesoin 14y ago
Without an analysis of causes, I can agree that my own FB "news feed" has been becoming consistently crappier. Especially since roughly the beginning of this year.
peterwwillis 14y ago
For all of you wondering "Can I really give up Facebook?" the answer is an emphatic "Of course, stupid." You got along fine before it existed and you'll forget about it once you're not refreshing your feed every 10 minutes. The other day someone sent me an e-mail or text (I forget) to invite me to an event. They knew I had abandoned Facebook and wanted to make sure I was included. I felt slightly honored that they would go "out of their way" to include me, and it was much more meaningful than the average Facebook invite-all event listing. Have you ever met someone you hadn't seen in a while, and they ask you what you've been doing, and you get a plethora of different reactions as you explain the ups and downs of your recent adventures? You don't get that if they're on Facebook. Human interaction is based on communication, and Facebook is not communication. It's the Reader's Digest version of The Truman Show. Maybe I am a luddite. But what i'm fighting against is the replacement of emotion and social interaction with technology. Maybe someday soon, Google Glass will become so ubiquitous that we'll all watch snippets of other people's lives instead of status updates, and we'll never have to live life on our own again; we'll just live through someone else.
- Karunamon 14y ago
  >the answer is an emphatic "Of course, stupid." Ignoring your patronizing, insulting tone for a bit, somehow I doubt it's that easy for most. If you're addicted to something (and I mean really, truly addicted), and it has negative consequences on your life, the answer is always "Well just stop it doing it, then". However, people do not work that way, and it's at the very least naive to assume it's that simple. >You got along fine before it existed and you'll forget about it once you're not refreshing your feed every 10 minutes. Applies to Twitter, email, SMS, basically any communication method ever. The fact that becoming addicted to a communication medium can have a negative impact on your life is not a valid argument against said communication medium, because it applies to all of them. >Facebook is not communication. What would you call it then!? It's a platform where you share and talk with friends. How is that not communication? >replacement of emotion and social interaction with technology. If you've never been emotionally impacted by a social interaction which did not occur with the person standing right next to you (i.e. via technology), I daresay you are either leading us on, or are not much of a communicator to begin with.
niels_olson 14y ago
Isolated and alone, other people making money off you, and your friends don't talk to you any more? Sounds like prostitution to me.
kin 14y ago
These posts are pretty common I feel in HN. Every time it just comes down to FB gets harder to use. I have a Close Friends tab and I put my close friends in it. That's it. I "Like" some pages but you can easily click on that drop down to unsubscribe. FB is pretty flexible on what content you want to appear in your feed and sometimes there are surprises but you can pretty easily scold it with a few button clicks and it'll fix right back up. Works for me. I understand there's a need for it to just work without the use of any interaction but then you'd lose a lot of features if you had that.
Karunamon 14y ago
I've really never seen a "facebook sucks" post that wasn't based on one of the following tired arguments: - Ludditism Usually of the form: Technology is *TEARING US APART* don't you see?! (Response: No, not really, perhaps you just suck at communicating?) - Ignorance of use Usually of the form: WTF I got fired for posting all those pictures of me using drugs?! (Response: Learn to use the privacy settings!) or: It's too noisy, all of these stupid game requests.. (Response: Block the offending apps and ask your friends to knock it off) - Bad connections Usually of the form: or: [annoying/offensive] $person keeps appearing in my news feed (Response: Block the offending person!) or: All of my friends post pointless, boring minuate of their lives! (I.e. the Twitter argument) (Response: Don't friend those people!) or: I don't want to turn down my Boss' friend request and look bad! I'm $sociallyUnfasionableThing! (Response: Use lists.) It was refreshing to see one that actually lays out with an actual example what the problem is, in this case, algorithmic changes which ruined his experience. He veered toward #1 above at the very end, but still this was interesting to read. Every single one of these things above, though, traces back to ignorance (usually) or cirucmstance. Could Facebook do a better job of making these things obvious? Absolutely. Facebook is not an intuitive site to use, and even when you have your head around it, they usually change something arbitrarily (the recent email thing comes to mind). However, that said, you really shouldn't dump on the site wholesale just because it doesn't work for you. It works for millions of other people just fine.
- Karunamon 14y ago
  Anyone care to rebut instead of downvote and run?
donniezazen 14y ago
I have taken about 2 weeks of Facebook fast. It was great. You are more peaceful. Their is no guilt about not being able to do all the things that you should to be doing. You save time. You have more intense face to face or phone conversation with your friends. I am back on Facebook because it is easier to connect to future-to-be-friends. You connect on Facebook and may be become good friends. I plan to slowly wind Facebook down and eventually leave it for good.
sarla999 14y ago
goodbye facebook. why?
mkramlich 14y ago
With Facebook you are not their customer, you are their product. If anything, if Zuck would like a way to monetize better without alienating users he should add some kind of Facebook Premium/Gold account upgrade. Where users can choose to throw a few bucks at them each month or year, whatever, in exchange for some cool extra features, and/or to be exempt from advertisements and privacy shenanigans. Money is money, so they shouldn't care exactly where it comes from. But if you give the opportunity for each user to decide for themselves whether they wish to be a product or a customer, I think it will lead to a better situation for everyone involved. Also better fits that market divide between the folks who want the cheapest experiences versus the best experiences.
geoka9 14y ago
Please, please, can you consider implementing a higher contrast color scheme for the text on your blog? It's really painful to read as it is now; I wanted to and tried but had to give up.
dkhenry 14y ago
So this is exactly the problem Google+ was designed to solve. Don't want your entire friends list to see a post only share with with a specific circle. Don't care to hear useless banter ? Don't include a person in your circle or turn down the volume on that circle. I had a good friend of mine from growing up who decided one day he was going to post nothing but memes. He went into the silent circle and I can check in on him every now and then if I so choose.

227 points by jackyyappp 14y ago

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

The anecodte the poster gives is spot on and huge. There have been many times I've thought "I wonder why I don't hear from this person anymore" and it was simply a matter of Facebook no longer prioritizing their posts in my news feed. Just because someones post isn't "liked" or clicked on in some way doesn't mean it's not valuable. It's a passive form of communication. I don't know if this is just my perception, and maybe Facebook doesn't prioritize things in the news feed. Regardless, it's a UX question that needs to be asked by their team.

untog 14y ago
But Facebook offers comprehensive controls that let you decide who appears on your news feed and who does not. You just need to use them.
- briandear 14y ago
  Can you block sponsored stories? Besides, what good are controls if they keep 'evolving' and force you to actually maintain those settings. Settings and prefs should be fire and forget. I should not have to revisit settings in response to some new feature. For example, that jackass new @facebook email thing. Facebook is circa 1999 Windows.
- planetguy 14y ago
  Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. Most facebook controls are buried three levels of counterintuitive links down in a locked filing cabinet in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the Leopard". Or to put it another way, if I can't figure out how to make facebook show me stuff that isn't shite, how are ordinary people going to figure it out? edit: Also I've figured out that the reason I no longer hear from an awful lot of my facebook friends is that I've probably set at least half of 'em to "ignore" due to 'em posting too much garbage.

nicky0 14y ago

It seems more and more people are realising it: if you value your friendships, get off Facebook.

Kliment 14y ago
I wrote something about this several years ago, when I got tired of repeating the reasons I wasn't on Facebook. Here it is if you're interested: http://everything2.com/title/Facebook+destroys+real+relationships http://everything2.com/title/Facebook+destroys+real+relation...
- lathamcity 14y ago
  I didn't make it through two paragraphs. Can't I read a sentence without being linked to three other web pages?
  - Kliment 14y ago
    everything2 is weird like that. Ignore the links. They are a semantic graph pointer, not hypertext.

beehave 14y ago

The solution is peer-to-peer. We should all have direct connections to our friends. Facebook as a means of communication is weird. It's like sharing your private conversations with your friends with a bunch of strangers... Facebook employees, Facebook advertisers, and who knows who else. The latest email maneuver is yet another slap in the face. Facebook are snoops! Imagine if Facebook allowed you see who was accessing your profile. Some early social sites had that feature. It was useful and fun. But those sites were not like Facebook. Why do you think Facebook never will have this feature? Maybe because the people accessing your profile for information about you are not necessarily your friends or people you know? Lots going on behind the scenes that they do not want you to see. It all starts with Zuckerberg and his attitude. He's sociopathic at heart and as such he really has no business being in charge of so much personal information.

richardv 14y ago

Aside from the fact that this post is mostly pointless, it's also totally misinformed. The OP started off by stating his reasons for dropping FB in this "experiment".. namely losing touch with the people for which he originally signed up under. But he clearly doesn't engage with them if he's not seeing their updates. Your social graph needs fine tuning. It's like any good bayesian filter, it learns over time what interests you. You can of course give it a push in the right direction by putting people in acquaintances, or hiding specific people from your timeline. (People in your acquaintances don't show up as often in your newsfeed). This post just shows that you most likely don't understand the full feature set of Facebook and how to best optimize your social graph (not that this is your fault). Facebook has some of the best machine learning for figuring out what is relevant to me. I'd probably argue that you click on too many memes and don't interact with your friends as much if this is what it is serving you. Don't drop Facebook, just learn how to use it. I personally don't use Facebook for interacting with that many friends. I have about 96% of my friends as acquantiances. I have a small set of about 10 people as friends, and I subscribe to about 100~ people. My newsfeed is so rich with really good content.

nicholassmith 14y ago
I don't want to 'optimise my social graph'. Especially given it used to work properly and feed me the relevant content that I wanted about a year ago. You can try defend the social graph, how much Facebook has done to improve it and so on, but for a lot of people it doesn't actually achieve what it used to, and that's an issue.
- johnchristopher 14y ago
  Isn't the fact we add too many contacts the core issue ? And then it turns out that it's easier to look at funny stuff posted by anyone than diving emotionnaly into the life turmoils of our real close friends ? I firmly believe the simple solution is to have more than one account.
  - nicholassmith 14y ago

obituary_latte 14y ago

My problem with fb and the reason I don't use it is simple: principal. I understand the model, and oblige with google (though not g+ as it is pretty quiet in my neck of the woods). But to not only give them the value of my data but also have them go around changing things like registered email without so much as a heads up is a slap in the face. It's like a conceited bus monitor that just goes ahead and "does what's best for me". I'm an adult; I know what email address I prefer to use. Not only that, but the utter lack of transparency is concerning to say the least. There is this monstrous set of data--PII--that this company holds and who's to say the bus monitor doesn't all of a sudden decide that's it's best for me if they provide this data to Experien. Or to the justice dept. The real problem is that people are addicted to distraction. Fb offers this droves. So much so that not only are people more than willing to hand over their data, they are willing to hand it over to someone who thinks you don't even deserve to know when they make sweeping changes to which parts of that data are displayed to the world. /rant

panacea 14y ago
I've seen comments such as "How do you know someone doesn't use Facebook? Because they'll tell you". As if the primary reason you're expressing your dislike for the service in a discussion about it, is because you wish to proclaim smug superiority. I think it's important for those who dislike the current platform, and are concerned about the future ramifications of it, to speak up in public forums. To state openly that they don't use Facebook for reasons of principal and also, because Facebook's actions have spoken louder than words numerous times and in my opinion, to continue to use the service is like staying with an abusive partner.
planetguy 14y ago
It took me a long time to figure out that you meant "principle" rather than "principal". For school teachers, perhaps the reason might be principal.
- obituary_latte 14y ago
  Heh. Meaty fingers and no coffee make HN cell phone posts a rough time.

gooddaysir 14y ago

Facebook is the new television.

Etab 14y ago
Related: "I don't have a Facebook" is the new "I don't have a TV." For some reason, those who either refused to sign up or chose to deactivate their accounts feel the need to share this with everyone everywhere.
- briandear 14y ago
  And people that do use Facebook feel it their duty to post status messages everytime they take a dump. Who's the real ass here?

chris_wot 14y ago

I have to agree with the sentiments here: it seems to me that my Facebook feed is much less useful than it was about a year ago. I don't know what they've done, but it's really not good.

tatsuke95 14y ago

Facebook will struggle to make the next leap (IMHO, of course) because there's a disconnect between how users want to use it, and how Facebook wants/needs you to use it. Outside of the sub-group of individuals who thrive on sharing every aspect of their life, most people want Facebook to be a fancy email. There's all your friends; you can talk with them and literally see what they're up to . And to be honest, the platform is great for that. Facebook, on the other hand, needs you to be an information sharing and data providing machine, talking about brands and products, all while doing whatever they can to entice (or trick) you into putting your information in the public domain. They want to you be connected with everyone. People are learning that's a lot of work. The problem is that the more Facebook pushes the latter, the worse the former -- the user experience -- has to get. Nobody wants to stare at ads and feel like they're being "watched" (by both Facebook and other connections) while they "engage" with friends. As the author discovered...it's odd.

malarkeyking 14y ago
Agreed. I think G+ could beat Facebook here as they don't need to directly monetise the service and can provide more of the platform people want. Whether or not they can get to a tipping point of users however is another question.
JumpCrisscross 14y ago
This is probably a generational thing, but I don't care about being watched. If I am, that information doesn't go on Facebook, in an email, in a text, and perhaps even not in a phone call. Facebook is getting impersonal without a competent list/circles system. I find myself texting or messaging content to people more than posting it on my wall because I want to be selective about who views it. Sometimes these are stories about the cute girl I talked to at Starbucks or a service I'm loving. Sometimes it's a personal story with little branding value. But I naturally have both types of conversations and so don't see the mutual exclusivity between encouraging conversation and getting data. Similarly, the problem with friending everyone goes away with a decent lists/circles concept - I add a lot more people on Google+ (granted, I don't post anything there. But I'd like to).

citricsquid 14y ago

> I want us to talk. I want a personal email. I want to find a way to share photos in a way that encourages us to talk about them with each other. Surely you can do this with or without Facebook. Maybe I'm a unique snowflake but Facebook to me is exactly the opposite of that: it's a way to give a quick (often meaningless) insight into my life, what I'm thinking or what I'm doing. It's a way to share something that maybe someone will be interested in, but probably not. If I share something to Facebook it's not because I want all my friends to see it, it's because I think those that might see it might find value in it and it represents what I'm doing/thinking/enjoying. If I want someone to see something or engage with me in conversation I send them a message. Facebook isn't a replacement for "normal" communication between friends, it's an extension. The only reason anyone would want to see complaints about someone's life falling apart is the same reason people watch train wrecks of car crashes. They don't care about the individual, they care about the spectacle. Using any one->many communication platform for complaints about life seems misguided. Maybe https://everyme.com/ https://everyme.com/ would fill the void he has in his life.

itgoon 14y ago
Exactly. If it replaces anything, it's because it is more efficient at it. This is all anecdotal, I know... Since Facebook, my email inbox is almost devoid of "RE:RE:FW:FW" broadcast messages. I still get plenty of email from family and friends, but they are more selective in what they send. Things that are personal, or detailed, or very specific to me. I still use my phone a lot, but spend less time telling people how great (or not) my weekend was. If they want to know, they can look. If they want details, they call and ask.

Afal 14y ago

Oh boy another internet "experiment" when someone gives up $technology and ends up saying absolutely nothing in their post. I sure do love reading these pretentious pieces of "intellectual" prose. In fact I shall start an "experiment" myself to see if replacing every instance of "experiment" in these kind of articles with "controversial decision" to see if they read better. I mean it's as if people use the word "experiment" to justify being avant-garde. Except in this case it's not even a controversial thing. People are leaving facebook for tonnes of reasons (fad has died, not finding its uses any more, don't want to be tied with a system that hoards personal data and sells them off to companies etc). Leaving Facebook isn't an edgy thing to do; not before and not now. Anyone I knew that announced that they're "leaving facebook" end up being rather smugly obnoxious when tech news headlines say "facebook did some things that people don't like. boooo facebook!" saying they "knew all along" and they were obviously smarter and more superior than the regular "tech weenie" still on their facebook. We all know what the result of this "experiment" is going to be. "My life was significantly improved thanks to not using facebook. Just as I thought! Aren't I clever?". There's no point denying it because that's what they're going to say. Just like I said I'll replace "experiment" with "controversial decision". I already know that I'm going to say "Nope. The posts were not better at all. Told ya!" because I know that when it's something I dislike in the first place I'm going to have a visceral reaction to hate it rather than say doing an ACTUAL experiment which doesn't have this cognitive bias. And I'm right, am I? I mean I'm not WRONG or something? Please someone validate my beliefs which I portray on the internet. I desperately need this!!!

unimpressive 14y ago
> And I'm right, am I? I mean I'm not WRONG or something? Please someone validate my beliefs which I portray on the internet. I desperately need this!!! I think that was supposed to be ironic. I think. Regardless, that's how it came off to me too. I still have no Facebook account, and I'm not getting one. If you're unhappy just leave, no need to make a big fuss out of it.
basicallydan 14y ago
Maybe that's how it came off, but if we look past the "look at me and my controversial decision masquerading as an experiment!" layer, and focus on his reasoning behind the decision: can you relate at all? I can. "Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook" is one of the phrases I've found myself and my friends saying over the past couple of years, and sometimes I don't like hearing it, even from my own mouth. Nevertheless, announcing it publicly as an "experiment" - it's debatable whether this has any value or point.

gedrap 14y ago

The arguments are valid here, not one more 'Zuck I HATE YOU, remove timeline' when actually timeline does not make any difference unless you are stalking some one every day :)) I like the idea of the news feed filter algorithm. Just implementation is not the best. The only way to 'fix' it is just to change friend status (acquaintance, friend, close friend, etc). But... I am not sure if the algorithm can be improved actually. It determines whether to show or not by how much do you interact with some one on facebook (more or less). And it's the only way to determine whether you might be interested or not. Because believe me, you wouldn't be happy if you could see what everyone is posting if you have 200+ friends.

markessien 14y ago

This is what many people use facebook group for. To keep in close contact with a group of like-minded individuals.

MortenK 14y ago

I really like the "Share to Facebook" button at the end of the post.

malarkeyking 14y ago
HA HA! I'm not using FB because people don't interact with me and feel my pain. HOWEVER, please show all of your intimate friends my blog post!
Tooluka 14y ago
Aren't they automatically added on every internet webpage?:)
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]

crag 14y ago

Well the OP is right about one thing: Facebook has become less personal. I regret accepting old high school/college friends (who I haven't' seen in 25 years), army buds, and family members I didn't even know I had. Now I post, maybe once every 2 weeks. Usually something safe - like about the current game I'm playing. I don't dare get personal on FB now.

antidoh 14y ago
"I don't dare get personal on FB now." The irony.
- mattgreenrocks 14y ago
  Indeed - the more 'connected' we are, the more socialized we're forced to be. Facebook is not the third place simply because there are too many appearances we're have to maintain.
prostoalex 14y ago
Just remove them. They'll still stay on as subscribers and see public posts.

CodeCube 14y ago

"Conversing with a friend, I start to share a story I’d earlier posted on Facebook. Since she didn’t comment or “like” the post I guessed she hadn’t yet seen it. Instead, she cuts me short: “Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook.”" lol, my wife does this to me all the time :) (or should the emoticon be :( )

bbrizzi 14y ago

So just because you don't have the proper settings on your news feed, you're quitting facebook altogether. I agree that facebook is a lot less personal than it used to be. Personally, I rarely update my facebook status or stare at the newsfeed. I use facebook to connect with "friends" whose phone number or e-mail address I don't have and to join or create events.Those two situations are perfectly well handled by facebook.

antidoh 14y ago
Not just proper settings on his news feed. He also felt like he had to filter himself for propriety, and found little worth in the communication that resulted through that facade. That's not a technical issue, it's his valid personal issue. He's not the only one with that view of facebook.

shmerl 14y ago

Facebook is defective by design as a social network. It's for profit driven, privacy abusing and etc. and etc. It's a pity that it became a virtual monopoly. Same bad as happened with Windows on the desktop.

moron 14y ago

Facebook has a feature specifically for this, so that you see every update posted by people on your "VIP" list. I only know this because they put the feature in my face, I didn't go looking for it. Come on.

planetguy 14y ago

I'm considering leaving facebook for the first time, because of the Sponsored Stories thing, which is showing up with disturbing regularity, and frequently winds up as ads for things that make me angry. Nowadays, if you "Like" something, then that something can pay for the privilege to insert whatever stories it likes into your friends' facebook feeds, under the heading "so-and-so likes such-and-such" followed by your own message. Interestingly the person whose name is being used for the advertisement has no idea what ads are going out under their name. Two of these in particular show up in my facebook feed several times a week and raise my blood pressure every time they do. One is a particularly annoying evangelical preacher slash motivational speaker who fills up my newsfeed with god-stuff due to the fact that a vague acquaintance I've met a couple of times happens to "like" him. Another is a political thing which fills up my newsfeed with posts I find highly disagreeable under the name of another friend of mine. What were they thinking? Facebook has designed a feature which makes me hate my friends.

ovi256 14y ago
Facebook already includes tools to solve your issues. Either unfriend the vague acquintances, hide all their posts from your feed, or hide the annoying posts following some criteria.
- planetguy 14y ago
  Actually I've discovered that the ads keep appearing even if you do hide all their posts from your feed.
  - planetguy 14y ago
    Actually, I just discovered that ads keep appearing even if you defriend the person! I just defriended someone who works for a social game company because they were pushing waaaay too many ads through to my feed. I felt bad about doing it because I don't mind the guy on a personal level, but shit it was annoying. Anyway, having defriended him I reloaded my news feed only to find that the ad was still there! Now, maybe that's a one-off and the servers hadn't quite synchronized yet, but damn. Facebook makes me dump my friends to avoid ads and still gives me the ads!

superasn 14y ago

Yes, I too had the similar problem. I was missing out on updates from my brother while being bombarded with stupid gifs. But as pointed out in another comment it's just one day I had to sit for an hour and put everyone who I don't speak on phone regularly as acquaintances. Problem solved! It was a bit hard for me to do this though, nearly took an hour.. so here are two suggestions 1) Brute force: option to mark everyone as acquaintances in one go and then de-select the people back to friends. 2) More automated: Facebook should make a module where if a person allows the app access to the phonebook, it somehow recommends a list of people who are important to me based on my frequency of calling/speaking them offline. I know privacy conscious people would absolutely scream in horror so this is why it should be opt-in only. P.S. 3) Oh and timeline still sucks. It is just too hard to read, there ought to be a way to going back to the simple news feed.

drcube 14y ago
Facebook Purity http://www.fbpurity.com/remove-facebook-timeline.htm http://www.fbpurity.com/remove-facebook-timeline.htm

idleloops 14y ago

I have privacy concerns about Facebook, and resent the fact that it's such a silo, but in the main in succeeds where other technologies have failed. It's useful for finding people - a directory. If I want to get in touch with someone - and I don't have their contact details I can probably find them on Facebook and fire them a message. If email was just as easy, people would have probably taken to that. Which is a shame, because Email could have been that easy. Privacy used to be more of a concern, and spam drove people away from publishing their addresses in directories. I've left (privacy and personal reasons.) I since have missed the community. It's encouraged me to pick up the phone more, which is a nice thing. You just can't have the same rich interaction with people when typing compared to talking. But you can have a greater audience. Perhaps you communicate to more people with less content over something like Facebook, compared to having richer relationships with fewer people. It might all balance out. Ultimately time is a premium. I certainly don't think G+ is the answer - it's much of the same.

padobson 14y ago

Curation of social media is becoming a big problem that only occured within the last few years. Trying to solve it algorithmically with plus ones and likes and upvotes seems to work when the content is centered around a specific topic, but not something so general as your Facebook friends list or Twitter feed. And you can't just deny people you know from being your friend on Facebook. It's rude. If you're ok with being rude, this doesn't apply to you, but the quality of my Facebook stream is not worth sacrificing my manners - not when I can get better content elsewhere without having to do so. I haven't left Facebook, I just ignore it, because there's nothing interesting there. I don't want to clean it up when my accounts on Twitter, Quora, Hacker News, and Stack Exchange provide much more interesting content.

cs702 14y ago

As I see it, the seeds of this user's disappointment were planted as soon as she starting gaming the system: "my posts became more and more filtered as the 'Friend' list increased. Now, they were getting the facade, the highlights because I donned the 'happy' mask. My closer friends were still catching the true story through instant messaging, text messaging and phone calls..." The faint echoes of Gödel and Turing in the back of my mind say: no social algorithm can ever optimize its results to take into account how people will modify their behavior in response to the algorithm itself.

calinet6 14y ago
Her point still stands. I've been Facebooking since the start, so I don't necessarily alter my behavior much, I just use it to keep up with friends, post interesting tidbits about my life, and try to have real conversations happen. I still see the same problems. When I talk to people, it's always "oh yeah, I saw on Facebook that you got a new job," etc. etc. I went back and looked through my old e-mails from right before Facebook was becoming popular, early 2004. I once sent out one of those "My e-mail address is changing. Oh btw how are you?" e-mails to my whole list, and got back around 50 genuine responses that turned into conversations. Not "broadcast" style conversations, not public conversations, but real honest person-to-person human communication. It was brilliant. I realized that I had completely lost that. If I was doing it today, I could send the same e-mail but people would send nothing back; it would just be "Thanks" because they already know everything else there is to know about my life, and I theirs. It's a very strange and new way of connecting to people. On the one hand I have some deep insights into the lives of friends I might not otherwise talk to, or even those I do; on the other hand, I miss the humanity of one-on-one conversation. I'm yet undecided if this is a good thing. But overall, I think the article overblows the affect this has on relationships. Personally, I sort of like it. All the trivial stuff is known already. No one cares where you work or what you're doing anymore, they want to hear how you're doing and how your life is really going. It negates some shallowness and small talk. Not necessarily bad. But it is enormously complex. We still don't know how society will change as people become more connected in so many ways, but we do know it will change. Some might say it's the next level in our evolution; collaborative social evolution is the next step since biological evolution can't keep up. It'll be a fun ride.

ZanderEarth32 14y ago

I think people put too much emphasis on Facebook and what perceived problems it is 'suppose to solve' in their lives. You get out of it what you put it into it, just like anything else (mostly). If you don't feel connected with your friends, it's not FB's fault. FB to me isn't designed to make my connections with friends stronger, it's designed to keep lingering friendships going. On a side note, why is it so important to declare that you are no longer using or on Facebook. This isn't limited to the OP either. I've met people in real life, who take great pride in not using FB anymore. I find it in the tech & podcast world too. It's a strange type of snobbery, between 'those in the know who aren't on facebook' versus the 'sheep who are on facebook'. Well, I am no longer using brand name nasal spray. It wasn't fulfilling my life I like I thought it was supposed to. I used it like the bottle says too and while it does what it says it's supposed to, it's not what I want.

Argorak 14y ago
Oh, thats easy. Because there is a huge group of people that will view you as "off the norm" if you don't use Facebook. Which is snobbery as well. Every time i ride the bus, I hear the word "Facebook" at least once. So, the thing itself is a hot topic, so why not talk about it, even if you are not using it? Your nasal spray, however, is not a hot topic.
jakejake 14y ago
This is exactly what I was going to post, but you said it better. The "I'm quitting Facebook" declarations strike me as a sad cry for attention. Just stop checking your Facebook page and start hanging out more with friends in person. No need to be so dramatic about it.

kristiandupont 14y ago

Not being on Facebook seems to be the new "I don't even own a tv" http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly-mentioning-he-doesnt-own-a-tel,429/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly-mention...

telepoiss 14y ago
Now that Facebook is going downhill (for me at least) I'm again actually contemplating the idea of getting a TV.

duncan 14y ago

You'll eventually get over being "too cool" for Facebook. It's ok, I did it too. We'll welcome you back when you change your mind. Life is too short to worry so much about these things.

briandear 14y ago
Life's too short to be watching cat videos and sifting through sponsored stories.
- duncan 14y ago
  All your friends do on FB is post cat videos? ..and this is Facebook's fault? Ha. Maybe it's time to make some new friends?!

nollidge 14y ago

This is fucking on-point. The Timeline is just completely useless anymore as a way of keep tabs on people I care about. I rarely care if my friend was tagged in a picture, and I never care that they commented on a wall post by some random person I've never met. I wish I could ditch it altogether, but the events and messaging are an integral part of my social life now.

godisdad 14y ago

I don't know why everyone takes Facebook so seriously. Well, actually I do but I don't want to dive into a long comment about how it's a voyeuristic, social panopticon and how easy it is to project your insecurities onto it. Well, I have a small and strange solution to staying in contact with your friends, do what I do: remove all your actual friends from your newsfeed. When you see them, you won't already have eagerly instantiated things to talk about, you won't jaw off about some article they posted about the latest bath salt murder -- you'll actually catch up and connect in genuine conversation. The site only has as much power as you give it, posting a long diatribe about how it has no power over you anymore because you deactivated is legitimizing its power over you.

personlurking 14y ago

I've gone "old school" (trying to connect to people in 'old fashion' ways) on many somewhat prolonged occasions and it doesn't work. It's a reflection of society not my particular grouping of friends. I spent a year writing many handwritten letters. People loved receiving them but seldom, if ever, returned the favor. I try and try again to meet with my friends to catch up (ie, going for coffee). Almost never happens, and when it does it's a chore to actually set up. Instead, it has to be an 'event' and it should be 'social'. I text my friends and they respond rather quickly...because I know if I call, many times they don't answer. Of course, all this means is that the LCD is either me or society.

chipsy 14y ago
I think it's a rational trend. Our direction has been towards more "omniscient/passive" forms of information, where you can update at your own pace, and others consume that information optionally. Doing this is cost-effective and allows people to prioritize their contacts by reading their feed occasionally, rather than by doing "pavement pounding" to make calls and arrange dates. In doing this we miss out on some deeper conversations, but I think we gain on balance because it allows people to _choose_ which conversations they want to pursue. That's the key thing here - if you aren't feeling a benefit from socializing, you aren't motivated to do it. Which inevitably leads to the conclusion that most people are finding each other boring, even if they're friends...
- personlurking 14y ago
  "most people are finding each other boring, even if they're friends..." this kind of frightens me, even though I lean towards introversion.
  - pdonis 14y ago
    I more than "lean" towards introversion, and this doesn't really frighten me; it makes me a bit sad, that's all. But I doubt it's a new observation. I suspect most people have always found most other people boring much of the time, even if they are friends. It's just more evident now because people have more alternatives for spending their time that fill a need for "socializing" without requiring direct in-person interaction.

mixmastamyk 14y ago

Has some good points, but I think many get the wrong idea about facebook. It's a way to keep in touch with far off friends who you wouldn't hear from at all otherwise. It's never affected a real relationship for me in the slightest, other than, "I saw your pics." The news feed could be better, but it has become more relevant since I've silenced a few overposters and blocked apps, etc.

tgrass 14y ago

Many of the complaints could be resolved with more transparency on Facebook's part. The frustrations seem to be generally focused on managing communication: incoming and outgoing, an issue of curation. The problem is, despite Facebook having many tools to calibrate one's communications, Facebook is still a blackbox. We click the appropriate Account Settings radio button and like the good scientists we are, wait to see what happens. The fact of the matter is, we are pulling a lever and hoping it is attached to some mechanism on the other side. The same is true of Google and SEO. Odd that obfuscation is the hallmark of our internet experiences.

bhashkarsharma 14y ago

I did the same thing 2 weeks back. People whom I meet keep asking, but honestly, I haven't missed it for one second. I wrote a little something about it http://tumblr.bhashkar.me/post/23712148539/why-i-deactivated-my-facebook-account http://tumblr.bhashkar.me/post/23712148539/why-i-deactivated...

k2xl 14y ago

"One evening, over pizza and wine she’s telling me about a breakup and a poem she posted. I never saw the poem. When I visited her Timeline I realized she had been posting every day and it never once showed up in my Newsfeed. Instead I see a photo of someone I don’t know; gliding down my Newsfeed simply because one of my friends “liked” it and the original poster doesn’t have their privacy settings in place." Aye, totally agree. The day Facebook launched EdgeRank was the day Facebook started it's decline. In fact, there's a pattern that happens to companies that try and "assume" what their users want to see.

danso 14y ago

> Conversing with a friend, I start to share a story I’d earlier posted on Facebook. Since she didn’t comment or “like” the post I guessed she hadn’t yet seen it. Instead, she cuts me short: “Yeah, I saw your post on Facebook.” And that was it. No dialog, no joy at conversing with each other, just friends passively watching each other from a distance. I’m guilty, I’ve done it too. We’ve become quiet ships, passing by in the dark silence of the night. Hmm, that's just a tough anecdote to use to make his point...it could be that that his friend is not much of a conversationalist with him. But I admit to using FB to promote things that I don't feel like wasting real-time talking about...like projects or articles I liked...And everyone who's ever been on the receiving end of a mass-email is happy about that.

silentscope 14y ago

how about de-friending some people? I do it and it works pretty well.

nerdfiles 14y ago

Hold on. First off, you should have deleted your account years ago. "Connecting with friends" is a terrible point to make: e-mail has been around for decades. However, such a point does intersect with my main goal for making this post. People are lazy. Now programmers are saying it, and now everyone else will realize just how true it is, and being lazy has consequences. So, we've had e-mail for decades. Why won't people use it? Instead of wasted texting plans, etc.? You could always keep up with your friends and family through e-mail. But the interfaces were either ugly, inconvenient, or disorganized. It's beyond me that an {interface} should have to tell me to contact my mother or that an {interface} should compel me to "keep up with old friends." This. Is. Absurd. [Luddite Rant:] Sorry, but pick up the damn phone and call them. (Or click "compose" and just {try} to type out something meaningful.) I believe this finely leads into my next point: Not many of you have anything Gricean (http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/dravling/grice.html http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/dravling/grice.html) to say. What [would] you say in an e-mail to a friend? -- People don't have much to say anyway (and for my personal stake in it, it's because they're not reading anything interesting), and Facebook isn't going to change that. That, I think, is the point behind http://weknowwhatyouredoing.com/ http://weknowwhatyouredoing.com/. There's nothing-to-hide, and conversely, there's nothing-to-show either. FB is an enabler of oversharing, and it's allowing people to empty out too much without taking in substantive content. I'm going to say it engenders bad cognitive hygiene.

ahelwer 14y ago
How is it this same tired argument pops up every time quitting Facebook is discussed? The sweet spot for Facebook is acquaintances. People you would not usually email or call, and only hear about once in a while through the grapevine. It maintains familiarity. Subbed in a co-ed game of ultimate frisbee and met some people? Add them on Facebook.
- nerdfiles 14y ago
  I think it's a "tired argument" because its not easily defeated. _Why_ wouldn't you "usually" e-mail or call? Why? Why would you? (This seems like Churchill's point: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.") E-mail didn't fail, this is why we're seeing a resurgence of it (http://three.sentenc.es/ http://three.sentenc.es/, 501 developers against e-mail bombardment, minimalism over e-mail organization, etc.). Why has FB suddenly become "the best we've got" when all people seem to argue for is particular features that could be replaced. FB is a mash-up; this has nothing to do with "maintainability of social grace." It's a mash-up; and consumers like mash-ups. Seriously: _Why?_ Why do we need we need a "social framework" that captures the rest of our human-interaction? We do we need a "social baseline"? Why do we need a system to maintain familiarity for us? I'm not even sure I understand the value of the point you've made, even if it is a good argument. _I_ maintain familiarity; Facebook is a tool for supporting what I do naturally. > It maintains familiarity. I'm not sure what this means. How does it do this? By making an API function do... What? > Subbed in a co-ed game of ultimate frisbee and met some people? Add them on Facebook. Add their e-mails? Organize your labels. The sweet spot for _who_? I'm telling others to drop it because you can achieve those goals through other interfaces; you're telling me that others shouldn't set their goals too high (acquaintances). My point still stands. E-mail [certainly] would make more sense within the "acquaintances" counterpoint. Facebook is a set of opinions as to how one should manage (or maintain?) one's social life. Isn't it clear that if one rejects that System, one might be expected to provide an alternative, or possibly simpler, solution? The argument cannot really be a surprise to you, surely. [EDIT:] I'm _struggling_ to understand the point about "maintaining" familiarity. I really do wish to understand it, as I feel it touches the heart of the matter. However, such an idea may require a break-down. I think the issue of "discovery" is an important one, but what actually am I discovering in this digital world? A portfolio? Or a person? To argue that FB's sweet spot is about acquaintances from the evidence that it's a good tallying tool, or a notes tool, for friends made in the physical social world, I think, is a bad argument, or at least it's not very compelling. I think such an argument only re-confirms the "tired argument" I initially presented.

zainny 14y ago

The problem seems to ultimately always boil down to "I added far too many people to Facebook as friends, and now Facebook is useless!" To which the solution is easy: cut down the number of people you are friends with on Facebook. For me, I have < 30 people I've friended on Facebook. But they're real friends and family, people I know and want to keep in touch with. And that's made all the difference to how I use Facebook.

bryanjclark 14y ago

I've been on the fence about quitting Facebook for a while. On one hand, it feels like junk-food-friendship: it feels like you're connecting and communicating, but in reality the time you spend scrolling lists on your phone could be spent with something far better: closing the FB app and calling a buddy. On the other hand, so many people use FB that it's tough to completely pull away from it. It's where my generational cohort shares photos, so I can't fully walk away unless I want to miss out on the photos from last week's camping trip, etc.

pasbesoin 14y ago

Without an analysis of causes, I can agree that my own FB "news feed" has been becoming consistently crappier. Especially since roughly the beginning of this year.

peterwwillis 14y ago

For all of you wondering "Can I really give up Facebook?" the answer is an emphatic "Of course, stupid." You got along fine before it existed and you'll forget about it once you're not refreshing your feed every 10 minutes. The other day someone sent me an e-mail or text (I forget) to invite me to an event. They knew I had abandoned Facebook and wanted to make sure I was included. I felt slightly honored that they would go "out of their way" to include me, and it was much more meaningful than the average Facebook invite-all event listing. Have you ever met someone you hadn't seen in a while, and they ask you what you've been doing, and you get a plethora of different reactions as you explain the ups and downs of your recent adventures? You don't get that if they're on Facebook. Human interaction is based on communication, and Facebook is not communication. It's the Reader's Digest version of The Truman Show. Maybe I am a luddite. But what i'm fighting against is the replacement of emotion and social interaction with technology. Maybe someday soon, Google Glass will become so ubiquitous that we'll all watch snippets of other people's lives instead of status updates, and we'll never have to live life on our own again; we'll just live through someone else.

Karunamon 14y ago
>the answer is an emphatic "Of course, stupid." Ignoring your patronizing, insulting tone for a bit, somehow I doubt it's that easy for most. If you're addicted to something (and I mean really, truly addicted), and it has negative consequences on your life, the answer is always "Well just stop it doing it, then". However, people do not work that way, and it's at the very least naive to assume it's that simple. >You got along fine before it existed and you'll forget about it once you're not refreshing your feed every 10 minutes. Applies to Twitter, email, SMS, basically any communication method ever. The fact that becoming addicted to a communication medium can have a negative impact on your life is not a valid argument against said communication medium, because it applies to all of them. >Facebook is not communication. What would you call it then!? It's a platform where you share and talk with friends. How is that not communication? >replacement of emotion and social interaction with technology. If you've never been emotionally impacted by a social interaction which did not occur with the person standing right next to you (i.e. via technology), I daresay you are either leading us on, or are not much of a communicator to begin with.

niels_olson 14y ago

Isolated and alone, other people making money off you, and your friends don't talk to you any more? Sounds like prostitution to me.

kin 14y ago

These posts are pretty common I feel in HN. Every time it just comes down to FB gets harder to use. I have a Close Friends tab and I put my close friends in it. That's it. I "Like" some pages but you can easily click on that drop down to unsubscribe. FB is pretty flexible on what content you want to appear in your feed and sometimes there are surprises but you can pretty easily scold it with a few button clicks and it'll fix right back up. Works for me. I understand there's a need for it to just work without the use of any interaction but then you'd lose a lot of features if you had that.

Karunamon 14y ago

I've really never seen a "facebook sucks" post that wasn't based on one of the following tired arguments: - Ludditism Usually of the form: Technology is *TEARING US APART* don't you see?! (Response: No, not really, perhaps you just suck at communicating?) - Ignorance of use Usually of the form: WTF I got fired for posting all those pictures of me using drugs?! (Response: Learn to use the privacy settings!) or: It's too noisy, all of these stupid game requests.. (Response: Block the offending apps and ask your friends to knock it off) - Bad connections Usually of the form: or: [annoying/offensive] $person keeps appearing in my news feed (Response: Block the offending person!) or: All of my friends post pointless, boring minuate of their lives! (I.e. the Twitter argument) (Response: Don't friend those people!) or: I don't want to turn down my Boss' friend request and look bad! I'm $sociallyUnfasionableThing! (Response: Use lists.) It was refreshing to see one that actually lays out with an actual example what the problem is, in this case, algorithmic changes which ruined his experience. He veered toward #1 above at the very end, but still this was interesting to read. Every single one of these things above, though, traces back to ignorance (usually) or cirucmstance. Could Facebook do a better job of making these things obvious? Absolutely. Facebook is not an intuitive site to use, and even when you have your head around it, they usually change something arbitrarily (the recent email thing comes to mind). However, that said, you really shouldn't dump on the site wholesale just because it doesn't work for you. It works for millions of other people just fine.

Karunamon 14y ago
Anyone care to rebut instead of downvote and run?

donniezazen 14y ago

I have taken about 2 weeks of Facebook fast. It was great. You are more peaceful. Their is no guilt about not being able to do all the things that you should to be doing. You save time. You have more intense face to face or phone conversation with your friends. I am back on Facebook because it is easier to connect to future-to-be-friends. You connect on Facebook and may be become good friends. I plan to slowly wind Facebook down and eventually leave it for good.

sarla999 14y ago

goodbye facebook. why?

mkramlich 14y ago

With Facebook you are not their customer, you are their product. If anything, if Zuck would like a way to monetize better without alienating users he should add some kind of Facebook Premium/Gold account upgrade. Where users can choose to throw a few bucks at them each month or year, whatever, in exchange for some cool extra features, and/or to be exempt from advertisements and privacy shenanigans. Money is money, so they shouldn't care exactly where it comes from. But if you give the opportunity for each user to decide for themselves whether they wish to be a product or a customer, I think it will lead to a better situation for everyone involved. Also better fits that market divide between the folks who want the cheapest experiences versus the best experiences.

geoka9 14y ago

Please, please, can you consider implementing a higher contrast color scheme for the text on your blog? It's really painful to read as it is now; I wanted to and tried but had to give up.

dkhenry 14y ago

So this is exactly the problem Google+ was designed to solve. Don't want your entire friends list to see a post only share with with a specific circle. Don't care to hear useless banter ? Don't include a person in your circle or turn down the volume on that circle. I had a good friend of mine from growing up who decided one day he was going to post nothing but memes. He went into the silent circle and I can check in on him every now and then if I so choose.