Facebook Starts Mandatory Profile Linkage to Public Pages | Hacker News Reader

Facebook Starts Mandatory Profile Linkage to Public Pages

blog.louisgray.com

22 pointsbrlewis18 comments

This title is completely misleading. There is nothing mandatory about Facebook's prompts for you to link items in your profile to public pages. I was able to click 'ask me later' and the prompt went away. Next time it shows up I'll wind up looking into how to disable it from ever showing up again.

I did that once. Then the second time I was asked I had no "Ask me later" option and had to choose on the spot between connecting my profile or having it wiped.

From what I've seen, it's mandatory in that you are no longer able to edit your 'Info' page without linking everything on it to pages.

Also, it seems this is being rolled out to different people at different times -- I saw it a couple days ago, but other people still haven't gotten it.

If it's not mandatory, it's at least a strong push, and if you don't comply, your profile could be made empty.

if you don't comply, your profile could be made empty.

I just did it. It makes the profile mostly empty. If you don't comply, it will delete your hometown, current city, employer, schools, and interests, It leaves family connections, quotes and contact info.

However, fB keeps that stuff behind the scenes so you can re add it later...

If you haven't seen the prompt yet, had a lot of stuff on your profile, and want a majority of it deleted: facebook doesn't provide an "uncheck all" button.

When I saw it, it was in its own window, not a modal - so I don't know if this will work or not. Feel free to try. But this'll uncheck all of them for you so you can selectively choose which ones to make public (instead of which ones to delete):

javascript:(function(){var c = document.getElementsByTagName("input"); for(var i = 0; i < c.length; i++) { if(c[i].checked) { c[i].checked = false; } } })();

They do provide an uncheck all button. Check the "check all" checkbox, then uncheck it. That checkbox drives all the others.

Urgh. What a weird paradigm.

I'm guessing that a large part of this is about SEO.

Rather, it's about data-mining for advertisers.

hmm certainly.. thats def the idea behind it

They still try to increase PageRank while they already have more visits than Google.

In other words: they don't rest on their laurels.

Does anyone know how to get my facebook page for the Happy Hour Finder to be the default for people who like happy hours?

this is annoying. they make it mandatory and the only way to get out of it is to reload the page and hope it doesnt show up again. a) i dont really want to do this b) if i ever do, i just dont have the patience to pick+choose that im linking the right stuff.

What about the experience gives you the impression it is 'mandatory'? It's a great example of opt-in. Granted, there is no 'don't ever show me this box again' checkbox, but if Facebook would have taken this approach with their Open Graph initiative they wouldn't be having the same level of criticism laid into them by privacy groups, congress, their users, etc.

Try editing your profile if you don't think it's mandatory.

Yes, it's opt in. You either opt in to having your interests link, or you opt in to have your interests deleted.

im a firm believer in avoiding to provid any content on your profile that may be easy to datamine, therefore no comma separated interests. i usually just ask people to ask me if they really wanna know.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com