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I object to Facebook making this decision for me. I _didn't_ add too many friends. My newsfeed _wasn't_ overrun. Yeah, I had to hide a few annoying Apps, but

I object to Facebook making this decision for me. I _didn't_ add too many friends. My newsfeed _wasn't_ overrun. Yeah, I had to hide a few annoying Apps, but no big deal. And then, one day, I stopped seeing posts from lots of people, including many of the people I most wanted to see posts from. It took a while before I even realized this was happening. Then I slowly had to go through and fix the settings for people to tell FB that "yes, really, show me all the posts". And, still, every couple of days Facebook forgets that I've set my sort to "Most Recent" and goes back to "Top Stories" and not showing me everything. This gets tiresome, to say the least.

enraged_camel 14y ago
>>I object to Facebook making this decision for me. Facebook makes a lot of decisions for you. It's a free service, so it's their prerogative. If you don't like it, you can always deactivate your account like I did.
- bostonpete 14y ago
  > If you don't like it, you can always deactivate > your account like I did. ...and he can also gripe about it in a public forum in the hopes that if enough people do so, Facebook will change it's behavior. It wouldn't be the first time FB changed their policies due to grumbling users.
  - enraged_camel 14y ago
    yawn You have to be delusional to believe that Facebook will change the functionality of a major feature because of a few people who are complaining about it on Hacker News.
    - scott_s 14y ago
      I don't think bostonpete was referring to this exact thread, but in the aggregate. That is, if enough people in enough places complain enough, it may change.
- martin-adams 14y ago
  For a free service is sure does come at a cost. I get people I don't know commenting on photos of my 1 year old because a friend posted it to their wall.
  - jamesjguthrie 14y ago
    If you don't like your friends sharing your photos you can disable sharing.
    - martin-adams 14y ago
      Maybe, but doesn't help when it's actually their photo, just a photo which I have a vested interest in who see it. It's also not my job to educate my friends how to share content because I'd only end up upsetting them.
  - thedudemabry 14y ago
    I agree. In a slightly different light, using Facebook is most definitely not free. You're entering a contract where they supply a valuable infrastructure, and you provide valuable, detailed, personal information. Information then sold to 3rd parties. When the user's perceived value received falls short of their perceived risk of releasing personal information, they should rightly be upset. And probably quit. But in terms of brands using Facebook, I'm not sure the same contract applies. They get valuable exposure using the infrastructure, but contribute nothing of value to Facebook. I have a hard time believing ordinary users would complain if all brand pages were suddenly dropped. Those users would continue to share branded content organically if they so desired. I don't believe that a one-sided beneficiary has much room to complain at all. If your business model is selling shit given to you for free, you'll have to find a new way to make money once your source changes his mind. One way to enter into a mutually beneficial contract is to purchase ads (or promoted posts). If they cost too much, then they've lost your business. But they never really had it in the first place...
afterburner 14y ago
"And, still, every couple of days Facebook forgets that I've set my sort to "Most Recent" and goes back to "Top Stories"" This is by far the most annoying thing for me. That and the likelihood that most people don't realize that setting is there, and assume they're getting posts in chronological order. EDIT: my solution, btw, is to make a bunch of my friends "close friends" and set Facebook to send me email notifications for updates from them. Bypasses the newsfeed, brings it back to email, where I like it.
- sharkweek 14y ago
  After college, I gave all my Facebook "friends" the grocery store test. If I would avoid them if I saw them in a grocery store before they saw me, I deleted them as a friend. Keeps my "top" and "most recent" stories pretty equal, tbh. And if any brand is overwhelming the newsfeed, it becomes pretty easy to make the decision to unlike their page
  - prof_hobart 14y ago
    Just curious - why did you add people you'd actively avoid in real life as friends on Facebook? I don't think I have, or have ever had, anyone in that category in my FB list.
    - sharkweek 14y ago
      Facebook came to my college my sophomore year -- It was pretty common to meet someone in class/at a bar/library etc and be like "add me on Facebook!" So by the end of school I ended up with far too many people I didn't really want to actually keep in touch with.
macspoofing 14y ago
>I object to Facebook making this decision for me. That's a funny way to characterize a SaaS service. They make service decisions for you all the time. Don't like Timeline? Too bad. Want the 2007 version instead of the current one? Too bad.
- quarterto 14y ago
  > a SaaS service A Software as a Service service?
  - tjr 14y ago
    Sounds like a perfectly Y-Combinatorish sort of thing.
- Evbn 14y ago
  What does SaaS have to do with it? It isn't Feature Decisions as a Service.

enraged_camel 14y ago

>>I object to Facebook making this decision for me. Facebook makes a lot of decisions for you. It's a free service, so it's their prerogative. If you don't like it, you can always deactivate your account like I did.

bostonpete 14y ago
> If you don't like it, you can always deactivate > your account like I did. ...and he can also gripe about it in a public forum in the hopes that if enough people do so, Facebook will change it's behavior. It wouldn't be the first time FB changed their policies due to grumbling users.
- enraged_camel 14y ago
  yawn You have to be delusional to believe that Facebook will change the functionality of a major feature because of a few people who are complaining about it on Hacker News.
  - scott_s 14y ago
    I don't think bostonpete was referring to this exact thread, but in the aggregate. That is, if enough people in enough places complain enough, it may change.
martin-adams 14y ago
For a free service is sure does come at a cost. I get people I don't know commenting on photos of my 1 year old because a friend posted it to their wall.
- jamesjguthrie 14y ago
  If you don't like your friends sharing your photos you can disable sharing.
  - martin-adams 14y ago
    Maybe, but doesn't help when it's actually their photo, just a photo which I have a vested interest in who see it. It's also not my job to educate my friends how to share content because I'd only end up upsetting them.
- thedudemabry 14y ago
  I agree. In a slightly different light, using Facebook is most definitely not free. You're entering a contract where they supply a valuable infrastructure, and you provide valuable, detailed, personal information. Information then sold to 3rd parties. When the user's perceived value received falls short of their perceived risk of releasing personal information, they should rightly be upset. And probably quit. But in terms of brands using Facebook, I'm not sure the same contract applies. They get valuable exposure using the infrastructure, but contribute nothing of value to Facebook. I have a hard time believing ordinary users would complain if all brand pages were suddenly dropped. Those users would continue to share branded content organically if they so desired. I don't believe that a one-sided beneficiary has much room to complain at all. If your business model is selling shit given to you for free, you'll have to find a new way to make money once your source changes his mind. One way to enter into a mutually beneficial contract is to purchase ads (or promoted posts). If they cost too much, then they've lost your business. But they never really had it in the first place...

afterburner 14y ago

"And, still, every couple of days Facebook forgets that I've set my sort to "Most Recent" and goes back to "Top Stories"" This is by far the most annoying thing for me. That and the likelihood that most people don't realize that setting is there, and assume they're getting posts in chronological order. EDIT: my solution, btw, is to make a bunch of my friends "close friends" and set Facebook to send me email notifications for updates from them. Bypasses the newsfeed, brings it back to email, where I like it.

sharkweek 14y ago
After college, I gave all my Facebook "friends" the grocery store test. If I would avoid them if I saw them in a grocery store before they saw me, I deleted them as a friend. Keeps my "top" and "most recent" stories pretty equal, tbh. And if any brand is overwhelming the newsfeed, it becomes pretty easy to make the decision to unlike their page
- prof_hobart 14y ago
  Just curious - why did you add people you'd actively avoid in real life as friends on Facebook? I don't think I have, or have ever had, anyone in that category in my FB list.
  - sharkweek 14y ago
    Facebook came to my college my sophomore year -- It was pretty common to meet someone in class/at a bar/library etc and be like "add me on Facebook!" So by the end of school I ended up with far too many people I didn't really want to actually keep in touch with.

macspoofing 14y ago

>I object to Facebook making this decision for me. That's a funny way to characterize a SaaS service. They make service decisions for you all the time. Don't like Timeline? Too bad. Want the 2007 version instead of the current one? Too bad.

quarterto 14y ago
> a SaaS service A Software as a Service service?
- tjr 14y ago
  Sounds like a perfectly Y-Combinatorish sort of thing.
Evbn 14y ago
What does SaaS have to do with it? It isn't Feature Decisions as a Service.