Facebook

[NbyNW]

My FB post this morning states:

I find it disturbing that, while looking on a Washington Post news site, I see WP articles posted on FB by FB friends. This demonstrates a much higher level of integration in nonaffiliated sites than I think is healthy....hmmmmm

I think I have a decision to make...even if I have nothing to hide, this seems intuitively dangerous

I've been wondering about this lately too. If you can figure out how to disable it, I'd love to know how!

[emily_in_nc]

I've got all Apps & Websites turned off in FB. It's under your account -> privacy settings, and should prevent the behavior you're concerned about, Mr. B.

[Mr. Bloom]

This happened on my iPad where I haven't found an ability to disable scripts but I'm still researching...

Here's the thing I see as dangerous:
- I get privacy issues...ironically this doesn't bother me since I'm not doing anything I'd be ashamed of...
- but, now that I've seen the "dots connected", I see an ability for an uninformed third party to draw incorrect presumptions about me simply by my association with folks who do certain things or post links to other things...

In a "McCartney-esk" world, this could be a bad thing whether or not I disable scripts or not...where I might be held accountable, by association, for the actions/beliefs of casual friends and acquaintances that I may share little in common with...except that I let them into my "FB tent"

[Mr. Bloom]

Thanks Emily. I was typing the last post while you posted yours. I've gone into the privacy settings and made changes, but I'm not sure yet that those changes address my concern...more to follow.

This may toll the end of my days on FB...I see it as that big an issue...not in the context of the world as it us, but rather a world that might be...

...maybe I'm just being too Orwellian

[OakLeaf]

Yeah, disabling apps won't stop the scripts from running, and you're right, I don't know any easy way to disable individual scripts on an iPad. I'm sure it can be done, but you might have to root the device, which would void the warranty, and is not for the faint of heart anyway.

You can disable Java entirely under your Safari settings, but there are a lot of sites that require it. The iPad doesn't do Flash, which is inconvenient sometimes, but is one less thing to worry about.

Also remember to delete your browsing and search history (also in Settings:Safari). One of the things that a lot of the tracking scripts do is read your history. The more often you delete it, the less they can see.

[WindingRoad]

Kinda glad I don't have my account any longer to worry about all of this I am amazed how much I accomplished this past weekend with no facebook to distract me! I seriously did not think FB was a problem but it can so easily get out of hand. Use it with caution. Unfortunately I am unable to do that so cold turkey seems the only approach for me. I deleted that app from my iPhone too and I find myself not having the urge to compulsively check my phone now. This was long overdue.

[shootingstar]

Here's the thing I see as dangerous:
- I get privacy issues...ironically this doesn't bother me since I'm not doing anything I'd be ashamed of...
- but, now that I've seen the "dots connected", I see an ability for an uninformed third party to draw incorrect presumptions about me simply by my association with folks who do certain things or post links to other things...

Yes, true. Alot of people on Earth have my name. My last name is the top 10 most popular Chinese last name in the world. I've seen what other women look like who share the same name set as I. There's enough that we could run a guessing contest..

This is why even if some people had small info. on my cycling hobbies, I don't mind.

Or maybe it's a good thing to have aliases.

[OakLeaf]

True that. No one who's actually looking for me on FB can find me because my name is so common.

My DH, who has a less-common first name and an extremely unusual last name, still has two other people on FB alone with his same name.

[GLC1968]

True that. No one who's actually looking for me on FB can find me because my name is so common.

My DH, who has a less-common first name and an extremely unusual last name, still has two other people on FB alone with his same name.

And on the flip side of this, my maiden name is so incredibly unique that a simple google search will reveal all you'd ever want to know about me, my parents, my deceased aunt and my brother (and to a lesser extent, his wife). The info I have on my Facebook account is already out there. *shrug* It's a damn good thing that I have nothing to hide!

[tulip]

There are maybe five people with my first name (that I can find), and I never heard of anyone with my first name until about 10 years ago. My last name is rare except in certain areas. No one has both my first and last names that I've ever found. I guess that makes me easy to find. So maybe I don't need Facebook to be found. Folks can just google me.

[emily_in_nc]

There are maybe five people with my first name (that I can find), and I never heard of anyone with my first name until about 10 years ago. My last name is rare except in certain areas. No one has both my first and last names that I've ever found. I guess that makes me easy to find. So maybe I don't need Facebook to be found. Folks can just google me.

And I'm just the opposite. My name (both first and last) are so common that I'm nearly impossible to find! I also set up FB so that my Facebook account can't be found in a google search at all nor in a FB search unless it's by one of my already accepted FB friends (and I only have seven). There are a ton of other people on FB with my same first/last name, and I didn't use my maiden name as my middle name so as to avoid friend requests from old classmates. If I want to find them, I will (most are already friends of my one FB friend from high school), but I don't want them to find me.

I set all my privacy settings to "friends only" or "only me" and disabled apps and websites. I've only been on FB for two weeks but so far nothing remotely worrisome has occurred...at least that I am aware of.

[channlluv]

I really admire you for recognizing the problem and shutting it down. Did you completely delete your account, or just deactivate it?

I have an account but I often forget to check in for several days. I get real-life friends who ask why I didn't respond to their such-and-such post/photo/video link, and it's just because I never saw it.

I keep up with a few real friends via FB, and family, but the rest is all pretty much just interesting chatter among professional contacts similar to what I'd hear at a conference, so it's fun and informative, usually, but nothing I need to check on every day.

I have addiction issues in my family, too, so I don't drink, have never done drugs. I'm glad technology isn't one of my personal demons. (Food is challenging enough.)

Roxy

[shootingstar]

For people whose primary paid jobs is to demonstrate how to manage information at an advanced level by using certain web technology tools, one does have abit of published stuff on the Internet. In my field, employers expect it and would question a candidate's basic technical as well as conceptual (by subject area) ability.

So I will say....blogging is a very simple content management technology, that does not offer the same robustness or scaleability as other content management software technologies. But I could only claim this the best...by actually blogging, using Wordpress and its different versions (.com vs. self-hosted .org versions) and comparing it with other technologies where I have both planning and implementation expertise.

So in a way for me not to use FB, I might be not enhancing my skill set since blog content can be pushed into one's own FB. However, I still think FB technology is more of a communication and distribution tool instead of a sophisticated content management tool. It appears to me, unless someone can tell me differently, that capacity to search FB content is extremely limited. Same for Twitter which is worse because of the 140 character limit which only creates cryptic messages of little value in a few months.

Certainly people's careers that involve marketing, they should become familiar with FB and Twitter (another tool, which has limited distribution capacity. It's greatest strength like FB is speed and ubiquity, provided the planned target audience also has FB and Twitter). I know that many of colleagues are Twittering from conferences, etc. Am I missing out on the scuttlebut? Well, I'm only interested, in the end, the published stuff or phone/face-to-face networking. Even on listserves, people on the job don't have time to use their professional association listserves, internet forums, etc.

Virtual collaboration and communication on the job and related to one's job, is great if there's time and if your employer pays you to use some of it, even if only in a targeted way.

I'm just explaining my position from a career/job standpoint as somone steeped in information management for most of my career.