When I first started using Facebook I naively thought that everything I did there would be private. I was under the impression that only people who I accepted as “friends” would be able to see my stuff. I was mistaken.
Over the years Facebook has made it increasingly difficult to manage our privacy settings. They want everything to be public, not private. You could say that Facebook has Twitter envy. For $$$ reasons, FB needs all your stuff to public. Why? Search.
If all your stuff is public, it can be searched. This would drive a lot of traffic from outside FB, say, from a Google search. If people from outside FB are clicking on links that lead them to FB then FB gets the sales advertisements and hopefully gains another FB user. It makes good business sense. But it’s bad for users.
Everything I’ve done on this blog is public. I always knew it would be public. I have written my posts accordingly. But not everything I’ve done on FB I want to public. Some things I’ve done on FB I intended only for a select group of people. I’ve had to maintain constant diligence to ensure that my stuff on FB remains private.
Well, I’m tired of wrestling with the FB privacy issue.
But wait, there’s more!
I’m also tired of all the drama on FB. There’s too much religion and politics (topics I’ve tried to avoid on this blog) on FB and all the arguing that goes along with it. And the weddings and baby pics. It’s the baby pics, most of all, that annoy me. Please no more baby pics.
Well, I’m done with Facebook. This is the end.
One of my New Years Resolutions was to learn to play the harmonica. That’s going quite well, actually. But that is a topic for another post. The main NYR was to quit Facebook, so that’s what I’ve done.
However, it wasn’t enough to just quit FB. With the constant intrusions to privacy I felt like I needed to erase everything I’ve ever done on FB. This required a lot of work.
There is no easy way to delete everything. I used FB for six years, and there was a lot of activity. The only thing I could do was delete every action, one by one. This took weeks of work and countless hours.
Every like, comment, post, photo, link, message, friend… everything. Everything I’ve ever done on Facebook I deleted, one by one. It was mind-numbing work. But I got it done.
When everything was gone I changed my name and e-mail address. I wish I could have just deleted my account, but FB won’t let you do that. They will only let you deactivate your account. You know, just in case you want to come back.
To all my Facebook friends: don’t take it personally. I didn’t just remove *you* as a friend–I removed everyone. It was an across-the-board nuking.
There is nothing for me to come back to. I have no friends and I have no history.
So, GoodBye FaceBook. So long and thanks for all the fish.
Good for you my friend! I understand completely. Although I’m sad to know that your comments on my pictures are no longer there 🙂 I’m kidding of course. I’m happy to read your blog again. And it’s nice to know I can still find you 🙂
This website has been my online presence for almost ten years (since October 2003) and will continue to be so! I have complete control over everything on teebiss.com which is just the way I like it.
Damn it, this comment field won’t let me post a baby picture.
Like
Oh, yes you CAN permanently delete your Facebook account. I have done it three different times with three different accounts! NOT DEACTIVATE. Absolutely DELETE. I’m amazed at how many people don’t think you can do that. I also eliminated as much stuff as I could before I deleted, and they do hold onto some stuff for their own uses, and there are other sites that scrape some of your material, but your FB account will be GONE, inaccessible in 14 days after you last log in after requesting deletion. You must be careful not to log in, or to get sneaked into FB by some app you’ve enabled. I have always waited two or three days AFTER the 14 day period to check, and have always asked a current FB friend or two to check for me first. Then it is GONE. You cannot find it no matter what you do. Please spread the word on this. Those who make this decision will be glad they did. Deactivation does nothing but make you disappear on FB for a while. You can still be tagged, etc. while you are deactivated. You want perm. DELETION.