To FB or not FB...

I've resisted Facebook this long. Friends and the wife have been encouraging me lately to get on board however. Mostly cause my 25th high school graduation is next year. I am leaning towards doing it, but my inner anarchist is holding me back. My biggest concern is time wasting and dealing with trivial crap associated with privacy, friending, etc. Those of you who do FB, how do you protect your privacy? I have read that you can limit a lot of the info and contacts but you have to go through a lot of keystrokes to do it. What do you recommend?

Besides I have the CWPSHLinking thread to waste my time!

Thanks

why not it's not that bad if you use Bookface for it's original purpose

I did FB. It's not so hard to keep your privacy under control. It's pretty much set-and-forget. There is more involved in turning off notifications, but again, once it's done, it's pretty done.

I don't waste a ton of time there on a daily basis (nothing compared to here) but I have in fact gotten back in touch with friends and acquaintances from long ago that I would never have talked to again without FB. overall it's been fun.

I use it for keeping in touch with friends across the country. I also use it for self promotion and networking. I stay away from the games and the stupid crap. I have basically turned it into a social newsfeed.

Facebook is a great tool and can be fun. I've met and re-connected with some great people. Then again the other day some guy threatened to come across the country to kill me because he misinterpreted a comment as an insult towards his wife. There are all types...

EDIT: I left in too much of Duke's text, so it was unclear which part I was disagreeing with...

Duke wrote: ...It's pretty much set-and-forget. There is more involved in turning off notifications, but again, once it's done, it's pretty done.

I have to disagree. It seems to me in the last year we had several episodes wherein a new feature was added, and the default was to allow access to more of your information to a broader range of entities, and you had to find out about it (not necessarily from an FB notification) and then track down how to turn it off.

Not the end of the world, but as privacy policies go, I'd have to say it's a pretty unsavory behavior.

BTW, when I saw the thread title, I assumed you were contemplating an early RX-7...

I too have not yet joined the book of all the faces. I have yet to find a real god reasons. I can think of 3 people who I would want to recontact but that is about it. I can think of even more who I would rather not be contacted by.

I have been on for a few years. It has had three purposes:

Stop my sister from annoying me (old friends were bugging her about me)

Finding one lost friend

Learning that a friend needed immediate help.

Just don't post anything - then it can never be an issue.

I too resisted it for years under a similar anarchistic ideal. I finally signed up last year so that I could keep up with what local music venues had going on and because I had a few local friends that I realized I hadn't seen in 9 months or more and they said that FB was the easiest way to stay in contact....turns out they were right.

You will not forfeit any portion of your soul or IQ by signing up. The apps and games are dumb so avoid them. After you are setup, if you are like me you might spend 5 minutes a day seeing what is going on.

My tip: If you get a friend request from someone you dont want then just refuse it. I for example have a zealously religious half to my extended family and I made the mistake of accepting a friend request from a few of them because I thought it would be rude not to. Now I live under the shadow of either having to read their vitriol or having them judge what I post. Time to man up and unfriend them I guess.

tuna55 wrote: Just don't post anything - then it can never be an issue.

Don't forget that other people can "tag" you in pictures. Fortunately, I tend to be pretty well-behaved EDIT: This almost makes me sound like I'm in the "if you're not doing anything wrong, then you have nothing to hide" camp on privacy. I'm not.

That doesn't stop it from always feeling a bit odd that there's this way for pictures of me, with me annotated, finding their way out there without any involvement from me. Still think it's a touch creepy.

ransom wrote: BTW, when I saw the thread title, I assumed you were contemplating an early RX-7...

Me too!

More than a little disappointed to find that it's about this facebook plague.

ransom wrote:

tuna55 wrote: Just don't post anything - then it can never be an issue.

Don't forget that other people can "tag" you in pictures. Fortunately, I tend to be pretty well-behaved

I just shut off all my pics so no one but me can see what i'm tagged in. I'd shut it down completely if it weren't family across the world I use it to speak to.

If you are a decent human being, you will have less to worry about than your average FBer. Just don't put anything in for your personal information that's not already all over the internet, actually put less.

Make it so the only time FB emails you to tell you something is when someone writes on your wall, sends you a message, or wants to be your friend.

And if someone sends you something unexpected, like a weird link, it's probably a virus or spam person hacked their account because of a weak password.

NickF40 wrote: why not it's not that bad if you use Bookface for it's original purpose

Which was to keep track of your classes, share notes, and form study groups with your classmates in college, actually.

But you young whippersnappers don't know any better.

You used to need a .edu address from a list of approved colleges to join Facebook.

I began using FB just to keep up with the kids but it's expanded to a number of people. As others have said it's as intrusive or non-intrusive as you'd like it to be.

It's amazing the good that can come of it. I've had 2 friends locate long lost whatevers and have happy reunions.

I've even started using it for my business and it's helped me stay in touch with customers plus disseminate new and vital information.

Best tool on facebook is the little "x" in the upper right corner when you hover you mouse pointer over something. Click it and it allows you options to block things like game requests, people, apps ect. Its great for keeping the ridiculous amount of clutter down.

I too resisted for years until I was suckered into joining to play a game. Since then I've found friends from when I lived in Japan business contacts, harbour freight coupons and rekindled old love affairs.

if you get on facebook do NOT install any software they want you to download. its spyware! even if its presented as a game or something else.

jrw1621 wrote: I too have not yet joined the book of all the faces. I have yet to find a real god reasons. I can think of 3 people who I would want to recontact but that is about it. I can think of even more who I would rather not be contacted by.

+1.

Although, I can't think of people who I would want to re-connect with that I am not already sending Christmas cards to.

also, instead of god reasons, I can't think of good reasons.

I'm on Facebook with an alias. I cannot be searched for unless one knows my alias. If one knows my alias, then one knows my friends. I have only 90 friends but I know each of them personally. All of my controls are set to "friends only," which means only those 90 people see what I post. I can seek out people I want to be friends with but only get friend requests maybe twice a year. Those are usually family as more and more of them join.

Once a month or so, I check my privacy settings to make sure they are still where I left them. Previous posters alluded to FB adding features and changing settings. Were it up to them, everyone would share with everyone.

If someone tags me in a photo, I can de-tag it or request that it be done. Since my universe is pretty small, I know they'll heed my request. Otherwise, I'll un-friend them.

If someone should stumble onto my profile, they get nothing. They see no photos except for the wall pic where I'm indistinguishable. I have no personal info listed at all. If one knows me, they know all that stuff anyway so why post it? Also, I don't want FB culling demographic data on me.

So even paranoids can enjoy Facebook. I have fun going back and forth with my friends and reduce the outside world as much as possible. I did get hacked once and got notes from friends regarding the ads for women's shoes. After that, I made the password much stronger.

I have a lot of skeletons in my closet and a lot of family that shouldn't see it... but I've been on FB for years.

Just like a forum or discussion board, you only have to give a screen name. You don't have to put "real" info in your profile unless you want to. You can also set it so that only friends can see your photos and info, so the only people who can see it are people you decide to trust.

I can understand the "fight-the-man" attitude toward resisting FB, but don't stay away for security/identity reasons. Don't go adding games and applications to it... those are just marketing crap. But, the worst they'll probably do is increase your spam.

I have a huge extended family that I see once a year. Its nice to just log in and see how they're doing instead of trying to keep up with them for the one week a year I actually see their face.

Oh Yea...

I've been using an alias as well. Its a good idea.

Maybe someday I'll check it out...probally sometime after I finally get a smart phone.

T.J. wrote: Maybe someday I'll check it out...probally sometime after I finally get a smart phone.

lol. i got on FB about 3 years ago when plans were being made for my 25th HS reunion. but i still don't have a smartphone.

AngryCorvair wrote:

T.J. wrote: Maybe someday I'll check it out...probally sometime after I finally get a smart phone.

lol. i got on FB about 3 years ago when plans were being made for my 25th HS reunion. but i still don't have a smartphone.

Missed my 25th, don't have FB, don't have a smartphone.

And it's not fighting the man I don't have either, I just don't see the point. For either.