Foiling Facebook

Despite evidence to the contrary i don't mind Facebook. 

It's an easy way to 'catch' up with a whole lot of people you don't really want to catch up with and it means you never have to sit through another friends holiday slideshow or baby album ever again. A few quick likes and they all think you are genuinely interested. Rock!

Of course some people do have a few tiny secrecy concerns. "Bah humbug" says the man who hides behind the visage of a dwarf and the rank of Angry. Who really cares about a little bit of data mining when the phone in your pocket is providing far more information than Facebook would ever do? (and lets face it every thing you complained about a year ago you now don't blink an eyelid at now)

But despite my cavalier attitude the Captain has developed a few fun strategies to foil the information gatherers at Facebook.

1. Change location. I 'live' in Puerto Mejillones, Magallanes Y De La Antártica Chilena. Its sunny, a little latino and means none of my adverts are in English. Hola!
2. Be variable on your birthday. I like to have two a year. It not just for the fun of all the wall posts. My next is the 19th of November. I will be 19.
3. Change your school. I had a great time at MLC Ladies College and was known as Gherkin by the Gurls there
4. Ditto for university
5. Have a long and storied career at places you never worked in dates when you were too young to work there. 
6. Tag yourself in as many photos as possible except the ones you are in. It's good to create a high level confusion about what you look like
7. Whenever you get the 'so and so and so and so are now friends' message, comment "but why" admittedly this wont stop data mining but you gotta admit it's fun
8. Make as many of your friends part of your family. 

Of course the easiest way to foil facebook is to leave it  or 'leave' it which means you will be back in 8 months with some dodgy reason why "i came back for the chat function" 

and to finish with, here is a picture of a doggie with biscuits in its mouth.

http://bitsandpieces.us/2011/09/16/what-biscuits/

Farewell to facebook

It was all so good at the start, you posted your photo, caught up with some distant friends and joined a fun group or two. Who could forget such classics like "i go out of my way to step on an especially crunchy leaf" and the equally happy and friendly " i want to punch slow walking people in the head"

It was the best of times exploring this fun new world of social networking. It was My Space but for us older people who still used long words. Some people would complain about it and say "No i am never going to go on Stalkerbook" and then the next week you had a friend request from them. Oh how we laughed as we tagged each other photos and joined together in our fun world of sharing and caring.

Now we had an excuse to never go to another travel slide night or have to ask to see our friends babies photos. Our interteste could all be summed up with simple click of the 'like' button. Then the games appeared and they were fun. Like the Scrabble before the evil overlord of Hasbro came and took it back

and wasn't poking fun? Innocent. Pure. Simple. Fun

then it all went bad.

so very very bad.

People you had avoided for years popped up, you had to start joining groups so you wouldn't offend people and in return they spammed you with event after event after event after event. That is of course when they weren't asking you to look after their sheep, or send them some loot or how much money they had won on Poker. Now its all become a spiraling mess of befriending people you never really liked anyway who keep telling you everything you never wanted to hear any way and the status updates got more and more banal or in the extreme, messages of love between partners who needed to take it some where else.

then...

then our Mothers joined.

The end is here people, your mother is on facebook. Now we see ahead of us are constant mother comments after our confessions of debauchery, the world of our tagged youth is now open to them as is the access to the chat. It's bad enough we have to speak on the phone now they are going to find you online!

People think the security and Facebooks scant lack of interest it is the problem. And as Google street view becomes goggle wi-fi audit and I unlock my creepystalker badge on 4square I am not in the least worried about that. I am worried that my Mother is slowly befriending all of my friends and slowly becoming part of my social network. Where will this end? Who knows how many events she has rsvped to already!

Everyone knows Mothers should just be for Christmas and occasional Mothers Days when you are trying to make your sister look bad. It was hard enough when i got the "its your Mother on HER mobile" call. Now we all lost our "you weren't home" excuse for calling. So, she doesn't know where the caps button IS ON HER PHONE but hey she has it with her and on all the time. No excuse not to call her now.

Our Mothers are on Facebook and their numbers are growing.  The largest growth group of new Facebook users are over 55 year old women. So be prepared, Aunty Jill will be also looking at all of your tagged photos. And the rest of the Bridge club. You know what they are going to be talking about at afternoon tea tomorrow. As they sit round chatting and LOLing about what you have been doing.

Be prepared as a  maternal tsunami of super informed know-alls marching to the best of the communication super highway, ready to dispense advice, washes over us all. Be prepared for your mother issues to be relayed back to you as pithy retorts to your updates. And you do know all posts will be signed "love, Mum"

And where does it go from here? Look for your Mothers myspace page, their you tube channel with all your favourite home videos and of course their twitter accounts where they will dispense advice 140 characters  (131 once you have factored out "love, Mum" each tweet) And of course the inevitable invite to "Insert names Mother is best" fan page. What next? She'll discover skype!

It was all so good at the start

For those wanting to leave Facebook and reclaim their sanity. Instructions here

the end is well and truly nigh.(1)





(1) and we all thought Zombies (or Wombats) would be the reason for our doom

Virtual Friends

One day i will sit little Johnny Ranty Pants on my knee and say

" Johnny once upon a time people talked to each other. Yes they really talked to each other. People conversed. On the phone or in person. People would 'catch up' and interact. Stories, and conversations, debates and lively dialogue. Some people even read to each other at dinner parties. Things were different then"

and little Johnny will look into his old fathers eye and say

Who the hell are you freakboy. I need to log back on"

and he will drag his muscle wasted frame away and hook himself back into the world of his nearest and dearest....online

What the f**k has happened. It now seems we can't have friends we have to have 'friends'. Online buddies, and of course the more you have the better you are. We can sit at out computer and log-on with all our buddies, send them updates on our miserable existences, write them blogs, show them photos of yet another boring event we went to and never have to see their face again. Obviously it's neater never having to see friends and deal with them for a distance but is it so bad to sit and talk with someone? And yes i know phones aren't for talking they are for text messaging

and don't start me on the different types..myspace versus facebook. One a C grade celebrity hangout full of pervs, pornstars, unsigned crap musicians and peoples pets (pets! how the f**k are they typing people, tell me that. and if they are putting their own entries on shouldn't we all be scared. The world will be grim when we are ruled by Pomeranian's) versus a never ending photo gallery of ex college students waiting for their glory days to return (glory days of their first beer, seeing their first girl and the library never closing) Okay fight it out people, slap fight!

and people in second life..you may have weird heads, wings, be a funky new colour and making money from the fools buying real estate but you are still the same people who can accurately say how many hours it takes to watch all of the Star Trek, have an overcoat from your Sculley phase and start conversations about books, films, TV with the phrase "i don't want to spoil it but...."

When the revolution is downloaded you will all be against the wall!