So much equipment and money devoted for something as pointless as Facebook. I wish it could go for something cooler and more useful. Something that hasn't been shown in studies to make us feel lonelier.
I don't think it's fair to judge the merits of an entity purely by what it brings to the world, without also considering what it in turn takes from it.
- Saw the first pictures of her grandkids on FB
- Organized a school reunion in NY with people flying in from all over the world on FB
- Chats weekly with her daughter working on Singapore over FB messenger
- Writes crazy long prayers for sick friends on FB
- Found former students living locally on FB that she socializes with.
Whether or not FB makes you lonelier or not seems to really be situational and at least for auntie (and many others) they consider it a tremendous positive thing in their lives.
Some people have gone to jail for 30 years for liking the wrong post on FB.
Guess that's one way to get lonely.
There have been many similar cases, prison sentences ranging from 15 to over 30 years.
Facebook enables these people to express themselves, but it also helps the authorities to track down anyone who has the wrong opinion. If they really wanted they could do something about it.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/aug/07/man-jailed-for...
Edit: Here is the story about the single like: http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/thai-man-faces-32-years-prison-liki...
Irrespective of whether you find Facebook (the website) useful, Facebook (the company) is amazing. The technologies they have developed e.g. Hive, HBase, Cassandra, ORC now power the Big Data Analytics movement which is transforming enterprises around the world. And frankly nothing in IT is changing the world for more people across more facets of their life than that. Likewise their work on the maching learning front has been incredibly valuable.
And provided you don't make social media the core of your life then you will find it to be a useful tool.
I was curious about that as I'd say personally I've found the opposite effect that it lets you connect with friends more easily, so I tried to look up the studies.
Most articles seem to quote Ethan Kross who found people who reported they were lonely used Facebook more and concluded Facebook made them lonely but it seems to me cause and effect would be more likely to run the other way. I mean if I'm physically on my own I'll chat to friends online. I can't recall chatting online causing me to be physically alone.
There is the most recent one.
Sounds like fake news to me.