Some years passed during which I considered it and considered it. Finally a couple of months ago I closed my Facebook account.
I don’t miss it a bit.
Now I never actually did anything with my Facebook account. Nothing at all. I never posted anything. Every now and then I would click “accept” on somebody’s “friend” request. Every now and then, not very often, I would go and look at somebody’s Facebook page. Never even once did I click a Facebook “like” on anything. Often some weeks would pass between times that I did anything with Facebook.
I guess what pushed me over the edge was a few months ago when I read some article that explained where you can click to generate a report from Facebook about all the web sites that were tracking me, everything that Facebook knew about me, something like that. So I clicked around and generated the report. It took half an hour for Facebook to generate it and mail it to me. And it took something like six single-spaced pages to print. This report listed web sites I had visited, banner ads that I had viewed, businesses that somehow had some connection with me. And easily three-quarters of the business and advertisers were companies that I had never heard of or that I didn’t actually want to have anything to do with, or that were actively creepy in one way or another.
I cringed to imagine what it would be like for a Facebook user who actually posts stuff on their Facebook page. I cringed to imagine what it would be like for a Facebook user who actually clicks “like” every now and then. If they were to generate this same kind of report, would it take all day for Facebook to generate it? Would it be a hundred single-spaced pages? What kinds of creepy stuff would that person find in their report?
So anyway I shut my Facebook account down a couple of months ago. I don’t miss it at all.
Oh and I changed the configuration of my blog so that it does not have a Facebook “like” button any more.
Here’s a good article on how to shut down your Facebook account.
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