Steve Wozniak Says People Should Get Off Facebook Permanently
gizmodo.com
gizmodo.com
If I leave, not only do I lose the ability to participate in those conversations in a significant way - I lose awareness that they're even happening. The newspaper (what's left of it) certainly doesn't cover them. I have many friends who I see on a regular basis in person, but we don't always talk about all of them. And when we do, it's often inspired by conversations that were already happening on Facebook and a continuation of the conversations happening there.
We need a good replacement for this piece of it. Having an accessible, local town square where all the local activists, citizens, and officials can interact and dialog about local issues is really invaluable.
There are so many variants that could be done off of this too. A federation of these servers, as towns help one another balance and archive data. Or help communication between towns. I'm sure a discussion somewhere like HN could quickly improve on this idea in a way that would be robust and easy to implement (because a key thing is that we want to get small towns to be able to implement this)
Of course it could... but with tight public budgets it would likely be implemented so poorly as to be useless.
What about the US Digital Services? A WPA program for 21st century?
>> I'm sure a discussion somewhere like HN could quickly improve on this idea in a way that would be robust and easy to implement (because a key thing is that we want to get small towns to be able to implement this)
Yep, but most social platforms are not really tuned to being a town square, and instead are optimized for feeds and stirring emotions. They often rewarding behavior that's counterproductive to finding common ground. We need platforms like DinnerTable.chat [1] that is built around the idea of bringing people together across the spectrum and localities. DTC is an open community-driven live discussion platform that matches you one-on-one with others to playfully challenge perspectives, while unlocking achievements. It's been my passion project for the last two years, and since beta, we've been growing steadily.
To me it seemed like a decent introduction to a tool designed to help get people take a look outside of their bubbles.
> to playfully challenge perspectives, while unlocking achievements
Who's looking to "playfully challenge perspectives"? and "[unlock] achievements"? Discussions aren't generally a game, but this seems to pitch it that way. I don't know about you guys, but I think more often than not, discussions are a generally stressful thing that people do because they must. The description might benefit in changing to a somewhat more serious tone.
Also, talking of "unlocking achievements" gives the project a manipulative kind of feel. The description states what it offers to people, and in that is the mention of being able to obtain fake internet points in the form of achievements. Is fake internet points supposed to motivate one to join the project?
Anyway, I'm just trying to expand on what's probably cringey. It's still good work.
Also, the achievements angle is also cringe for me because achievements are a buzzword fad that makes me think the person behind this thing is not a very deep thinker, doesn’t appreciate the fact that it will look bad to advertise the achievements, and maybe is a person who has trouble thinking for himself and gets swept up into actually believing fads.
If I were going to write a description it would be something like this: a platform where people are given the opportunity to refine their opinions based on civil discussion with the assistance of a tasteful incentive scheme.
It seems to bring down to earth a bit. Reading criticism that is so personal can be upsetting. I genuinely hope that I have in no way upset this person. We all learn these hard lessons from time to time. I know I’ve had more than I can count.
"DTC is a community-driven live discussion platform that matches you one-on-one to challenge ideas. The experience is fun and quirky as users control talking virtual avatars and rate each other on their politeness. Achievements are earned for good behavior (via similar techniques Overwatch uses to curb aggressive behavior), while toxic behavior is flagged to be reviewed by moderators. Good behavior is also rewarded with points that allow further avatar customization and new environment unlocks."
Does this help?
when I think of a local facebook group for a neighborhood its a bunch of people helping each other or complaining. stuff like "we're those gunshots, road xxx is closed so is taco bell, my cat is missing, hey this event is happening this weekend, im having trouble making rent this month." it works, because everyone is on it. network effect + a lack of baked in structure.
Of course it would not be a perfect platform, but as an American, we need to start understanding and protecting the liberties and rights our own Constitution is providing us.
Peace.
I really wish it were somewhere else so I didn’t have to log on. I’m just not sure where else it would be and still see the same level of engagement.
As much as I would like this to be true, they said the same thing about XMPP.
If you want to “participate in government” nothing stops you from showing up to town or county council meetings, planning commissions, and so on, or from sending letters to your elected officials, or a phone call, or running for office yourself.
When the actual decisions are being made there. Many places have “open meeting” laws that require decisions be made out in the open.
Facebook is not the ballot box, it is not the county council, it is not the town meeting. It’s just a place where people can choose to talk to each other.
> Discussing town policy isn’t something that should be kept behind a gate, and especially not Facebook.
This is what freedom of association and freedom of speech is though. If your neighbors choose to talk to each other through Facebook, Nextdoor, a google group, an email list, a BBS, or in their own living rooms, you shouldn’t be able to stop them from doing that, whatever it is they prefer to do.
Plus, having the ability to plan, discuss, reference, lookup etc - _while_ discussing something, saves a ton of time and effort that would be wasted when speaking face-to-face.
But a couple people leaving Facebook isn't going to lead to it.
Ultimately, it is no more difficult to stay in touch with my real friends than it was with FB. I rely on text, phone calls, and emails. Occasionally, I will use LinkedIn to touch base with people, but primarily, I just text/call. And honestly, it's great.
I highly recommend cutting the cord.
Facebook does this really well for me. Before Facebook, I would have to "remember" to send an email, a MSN chat or even a postcard (around Christmas) to some of them. And the typical conversation through chat went "q: hey, anything new", "a: no.. no really". With FB I see when this people have had a noteworthy moment, and I can interact with them on that, even if it is just to say a quick hello.
I don't think Woz's payment solution to "light" social interaction is not really feasible though.
this is exactly why I deleted all my friends before I deleted my account.
One notable exception I'm considering making: a read-only twitter account to follow security professionals. I have seen most people with lists of recommended security pros to follow, and I figure it could serve as a sort of free, meta-bulletin for security. Haven't done it yet, but considering.
Twitter in particular has become a toilet, and there’s nothing about it I don’t miss.
Get back in touch with the real world, you’ll be a lot happier.
I do not post photos or interact with others except occasionally through messenger. I have started unfollowing everyone although I do enjoy Humans of NYC.
(only exception was the Go I recently sold and the Quest I might get in near future)
Ask your doctor if happiness is right for you.
Without it, I have no connection at all to some of my old friends. While I don't necessarily need to be connected to them, it's nice to see how people are doing every once in a while.
LinkedIn fulfills this desire in some ways, but I don't typically connect with my "outside-of-work" friends on LinkedIn. Plus, LinkedIn has its own host of privacy issues, so it's not really a great replacement in the sense of improving privacy.
There are also the useful community aspects. I often find out about local events through Facebook. I suppose Meetup or similar sites could replace that function. But my friends also use Facebook's events to organize parties and stuff - I don't know any good alternative that's nearly as convenient.
I'm not convinced that deleting your account helps all that much anyways. You do make it harder for Facebook to listen in from your phone and things like that, but I'm sure they still keep a detailed profile on you. And you can get those benefits just by deleting the mobile app, without deleting your account.
I think the better reason to delete Facebook is the mental health issues with the whole spotlight effect or whatever that's called (where you only see the highlights of other people's lives which makes you feel like your life is boring). As long as you regulate your usage in a healthy way, I think whether you delete your account or not doesn't make much of a difference.
For now I just throw on a handful of privacy extensions (uBlock Origin, PrivacyBadger, Decentraleyes, Facebook Container, etc.) and accept that Facebook is going to know many things about me.
As a point of reference - my age group started using Facebook around middle school. So I have a lot of "friends" that I would have no way of keeping up with otherwise, and I'm not used to not having that ability. I suspect the sentiment is different for older generations who are used to losing touch with people. My parents, for example, have a couple old friends from whom they haven't heard anything in many many years. That concept doesn't mesh with the lifestyle I grew up with. It's not that there are many specific people I want to keep up with all the time - it's just nice to get random updates on random people you used to know well.
It's actually the opposite for me. Facebook started nine years after I graduated high school. I was on it in the first year by using my college alumni email address, but most of my high school friends didn't show up until about five years after I joined.
And let me say that it's been amazing for me. I got to reconnect with a ton of people I'd lost touch with! We chat on messenger sometimes, have lots of interactions in each other's comments, and I get to see all the posts about their kids and what they are doing these days.
Some of these people were really good friends in high school but we had no easy way to keep in touch (no cell phones, only phone number we had was their parent's land line, etc).
I would be really sad to loose touch with them again by ditching Facebook.
Yeah, I could collect their current contact info, but as has been said elsewhere, Facebook is a more of a broadcast medium. If I have an update about my life, I'm not going to call 15 people to tell them about it. I'm going to put it on Facebook and let them see it when they have time.
Why do you choose not to call them and ask them how they are doing? I must admit, I do not really understand this "seeing how they are doing" statement, it confuses me as to why someone would spend time on facebook to see how another one is doing, but would not make the call to ask. Maybe I'm misreading it and the seeing part is the more relevant one.
Edit: anyone care to clarify what was downvote worthy about this comment? did it not contribute to the discussion in some way? if the answer is yes, I don't know why it didn't contribute to the discussion.
Calling is an active interest. It requires specific action from the caller, and potentially interrupts the callee (which may or may not be desirable).
Facebook and other social media allows a more passive interest. The information about how the person is getting on is passed on, but the "caller" isn't needing to worry about disturbing the "callee" and the callee is not interrupted.
Sometimes we don't call because we don't care, we don't call because we don't want to impose.
This passive information forwarding replaces to an extent the part of the "village" culture that has been lost a bit as our populations have grown more and more densely packed yet the people we care to "follow" are often spreading geographically further apart. Because not everyone knows everyone, the "oh, did you hear" conversations don't spread as they once did: there are wider air gaps (filled with signal noise, i.e. the rest of that dense population) between the connected nodes in the network.
Of course social media is emulating the worst parts of that village culture grape-vine, as well as the useful parts...
It's sort of like watching the news - realistically a lot of news doesn't affect our day to day, but it's just interesting to see things happen. Like yesterday USA won the women's world cup. Did that have any impact on my life? Not at all, but it was nice to hear about. In that sense, Facebook is like a more personalized feed of news that always features people I at least used to know. It feels a bit like a mild addiction since it's not totally rational to care about these tiny updates in the lives of people I'm unlikely to ever meet again, but at this point I only check Facebook a couple times a week so I don't worry too much about it.
FB has been a great way to not only maintain contact with people but to reunite with people I knew in childhood and adolescence that would have otherwise been lost to me. I don't spend much time in the app at all, but I appreciate being able to reach out or to offer emotional support (congratulations, condolences) in ways that would be impossible were I working my way through a phone book every month or so.
You might be interested to read an article⁰ where Sean Parker stated that they consciously designed Facebook to be addictive, by exploiting "dopamine-driven feedback loops".
⓪ - https://www.axios.com/sean-parker-facebook-was-designed-to-e...
For all we know, human groups have always used gossip as a way to bond. I guess these Facebook updates are addicting because they are a good implementation of something humans have always felt the need for.
I think it's a generational thing. I'm 36 and I see that most people over my age accepts phone calls to nonclose friends or acquaintances as normal or even desirable, as you do, while most people under my age instinctively avoid them.
Compare:
- Sending a post about your holiday experience to Facebook, vs.
- Calling a friend, engaging in small-talk about your holiday experience and how they've been lately.
That's a false choice, though; while I don't use FB, everyone I know who does still keep a few good friends that they meet and talk to regularly. You and I could be scrolling our FB feeds right now, instead of reading HN, without taking time from our existing friendships.
> They're also light on social interaction.
> Calling a friend, engaging in small-talk
If I want a deep conversation with somebody, I can message them on... FB messenger or something. Again, a form of communication easier to initiate than a phone call that they might not be able to pick up.
Or do you consider everything that is not face-to-face "socially-anemic"? Are you saying that conversations via chat are deeper than on the phone?
With a Facebook post one is essentially just dumping a complete story on the masses for them to consume. It's not personalized and people cannot interact by asking questions in between, or by adding their own stories ("Oh, I loved that part of the movie! Did you also think it has a deeper meaning to it?", essentially steering the conversation into another direction), or show you that they don't want to hear about something, for example.
(I don't understand why you're downvoted, so I upvoted you.)
But now: It used to be really fun to have online discussions with people who I used to know in real life, but because "life happened," I didn't get to see very often. That's why Facebook used to be fun, and why I politely disagree.
But, again, I think your viewpoint is totally valid and shouldn't be downvoted.
But there was one subtle interesting thing I noticed that nobody missed me on FB. Nobody was like, "wait, where did that guy disappear".
The people who mattered were always around me and are still around me.
Only after deleting FB I realized what a cancer FB was. I hear it has become even more cancerous.
The only thing I seriously want to give up is this Whatsapp app, especially because it is now FB product. Otherwise, the way I use Whatsapp, it doesn't pose much problem.
It's important to me for a number of reasons:
- Communities use it to communicate with their groups. I'm in business owner groups, collectives, local theater group, and some gaming/social groups that aren't as active.
- For many of these groups, FB is the ONLY way I'll get info about anything that is going on with them. And honestly, I don't mind. It works well.
- Businesses use it to send deals to their customers, notify them of events, post pictures, etc.
- I manage business Facebook pages as part of my business, so I can't get rid of my personal account.
- I also use the Marketplace a lot to sell off stuff from my house and it works brilliantly.
HOWEVER - I have technically stopped "using" Facebook.
For the last 3 years now, I've made my profile totally private. I haven't posted photos or shared stupid things. I un-followed (but stayed friends with) EVERYONE except my wife and parents and a close friend.
My news feed is empty except for posts from the groups I'm a part of and stuff from close family members.
And there's an added benefit - when I DO post something now, on a rare occasion, people actually take notice.
If everyone would only post when it's really important, the system would be useful and interesting. Otherwise, it's full of garbage.
Facebook is not all bad, but certain people ruin it with their constant garbage posting, and that's too bad.
I am so much more happier not being exposed to everyone thinking they're e-celebs, the back-patting, virtue signalling, constant outrage, pseudoscience, and all of that. I thought I'd be missing out on a lot by not being on Facebook, but people haven't forgotten me and now there's so much more to talk about when I actually meet people in person.
A private life is one of healthy solitude.
It's quite easy to avoid their tracking actually.
If only there were another technology one could use to distribute messages by electronic means from one computer user to one or more recipients via a network.
1. He’s a notable technologist (or whatever term you’d prefer to use for someone who is seen as intrinsically linked with the rise of computation tech) 2. It’s Gizmodo, they’re not exactly looking for revolutionary stuff here. 3. It’s your standard confirmation bias as well. Most people who read the article probably already have fairly strong anti-facebook-usage feelings to begin with. This reaffirms their stance and belief by presenting someone who isn’t a dickhead as being on the same side.
All of the above leads to a click and a comment, which is good for the ol’ bottom ad-dollar :D.
Community argument is compelling, but there are so many ways for communities to stay in touch now. I don’t think it has to come at the cost of so many Facebook negatives (privacy, addiction, mental health, etc.)
Where would families migrate to for communication/collaboration/community? The closest free alternative is of course Instagram, owned by Facebook.
Who can build a privacy oriented alternative that charges and also gains a sufficient network effect?
And please everyone, if only for the protection of your own privacy, consider thoughtfully whether a company promising "Private" "Social" networks makes any sense? Like dish washing detergents that promise to make your dishes virtually spotless, there is no promise at all actually being made.
These networks are fundamentally about sharing. Once you share something with someone, you can't really control what they are going to do with the screenshot of it. You're at the mercy of the mob.
The only real protection you can get is not from companies, but by having the government make a HIPAA like law with real teeth in it that punishes personal information sharing for commercial purposes. No real need for any new companies, because the new companies will just do the same thing. Pass a law that starts throwing people in prison for sharing, or receiving illegally shared personal information for commercial purposes, and you stop all of that nonsense in its tracks.
E.g., tracking users across the web at large, building shadow profiles of non-users, trying to obtain information about non-users through users, etc.
In my observation, most Facebook users share way more personal information than I ever did. Which makes me wonder, given how much information people are sharing willfully, why does Facebook feel the need to try to secretly collect even more information?
Scary.
Not sure what Facebook offers families more.
Facebook is great if you want to go beyond families and follow what your long-lost fourth cousin or way-back-when classmate from twenty years ago has been up to. I really wouldn't bother using it for immediate family.
Facebook has discussion forums, rich messaging, groups and events, classifieds, image and video editing/enhancement, and many more features all bundled into one platform. You'd probably need 15 other websites and services to replace it.
If we just had truly protective privacy laws and standards we could just use Facebook and enjoy what it is capable of doing without guilt.
I don't have a good suggestion, except if we could find somewhere to run a private forum.
Disclosure: I own a small amount of $SNAP.
The stock was in an insanely bad spot at the beginning of the year. It’s either an anomaly or shows again that Snap is really volatile, but not volatile enough to get really high for long. Also a lot of stocks were down (though not that much) at the time. Snapchat stock is doing okay. It isn’t going triple again or anything. It’ll be lucky if it stabilizes at IPO public opening price ever again.
Edit: I do think it’s entirely possible Snap goes up 50% again or something from where it is now for a short period during some earnings. I don’t think it’ll stay at that level for long any time soon though.
Facebook goes through all the data of Facebook users I know.
So I am sure I am tagged on photos and they might already know a lot about me.
And that's what I think is most evil about Facebook. Even people without an internet connection might have a profile.
A useful feature (albeit one that Facebook would never, ever implement, as it would facilitate people leaving their platform) would be to have closure page with a final statement or forwarding address, e.g.:
"I've decided to close my Facebook account. You can still reach me at: myname@emailprovider.com"
or do you mean the people with whom you don't regularly contact but might one day? i've found this is sort of an unwillingness to close doors type thing, hanging on to things that cannot be hung on to (especially true of more vagabond types, travelers, movers etc. who have a lot of these connections in areas they don't live).
the truly important people you can FB message with contact details, wait until they ack, then proceed.
But if you can't find the time/inclination/energy to keep in active contact with someone, no matter how infrequently, does a real relationship even exist with them?
I think advertisers are offering more money ;-)
Maybe the taxes should be higher for companies that make money from selling data.
I think it's actually pretty straightforward with regards to FB.
First of all if you find yourself scrolling through the news feed for anything that isn't relevant to your daily life, the argument is more about mental health than privacy here to stop excessive use like that. Same for Instagram, it's highly addictive, but you'll find you don't really need it in your life.
Secondly, use an alternative messaging platform for the small group of people you tend to talk to very often and closely with. Preferably encrypted. For everyone else, it matters a lot less that people might spy on your conversations so just be careful to not talk about radical or illegal things. The benefits of FB messenger are pretty nice in terms of convenience, but if you don't like having to censor yourself get the other person to join WhatsApp, signal, or iMessage.
Thirdly, if you're using FB in the sort of community oriented way with groups and the like, continue to do so freely! There's nothing wrong with doing this on FB, it's a great platform for that and rarely is your privacy going to be violated in this way. And if you think it might, then there are alternatives like a group chat on Signal, or an anonymous/private message board. Those are more sensitive cases which surely exist but I can't think of many situations where one needs to go to these lengths.
I think the way FB and IG make money incentivizes them to violate your privacy through clicks tracking. This only works if you're on the platform like a zombie, clicking for hours on news or influencers or whatever. Maybe some of that truly is useful to you, for example my girlfriend follows a lot of people who do physical activity and exercise routines on IG. And from a privacy perspective maybe it's not even that big of a deal, but I think most people might find they don't need to waste so much of their time on these apps anyway.
So at least for the case of FB, it isn't too hard to protect your privacy the ways it really matters and still get the benefits of FB apps.
This has to be an insane position to be in. If you're responsible for the PR (or anything else) of a company that an ever-growing number of people are starting to suspect shouldn't exist (at least in its current form), what do you do? Where you do you even start?
The only other such case I can think of is big tobacco. Facebook is (probably) not quite that harmful or toxic, but I imagine FB and Philip Morris would have a few things to talk about over dinner.
Maybe an alternative would be to setup a dedicated device with no video or audio for all your dealings with evil empires.
If there were a social network that charged an active fee, that I could say pay $20-40/year for myself and be able to invite maybe 10-15 others whose fees are covered by my own, that might get people to move. No ads, no selling customer data, minimal intrusion.
Why? Think back 10 years ago when everyone was designing their apps to be engaging, sticky, ect, and judging success based on how long people stayed on their app.
Facebook has turned into the internet equivalent of cigarettes.
What's really strange is the way we all make excuses to continue to use it, kind of like how many smokers make excuses about why they continue smoking.
We're all hooked, even me!
I see usage among my circle of even older folks fading fast. Updates are way less frequent.
Having said that, I kinda miss it being an option, for some of these folks I'll probabbly never know what is going on with them again.
- It is how I know what's going on in the lives of all of my friends. While the bulk of us still live within 20 miles of each other, we might see each other once a year (if that) because most of them are married with grade school aged children and when they do have free time, they're using it to take family vacations or day trips. With Facebook we know what is going on in each other's lives and still interact just like we did in high school, shooting the shinola on each others posts just like we used to in the hall between classes.
- As a strength athlete, it is how we find out about events. Take strongman, there are 200~ ish of us that are all mutual friends with the bulk of those being here in the United States. When someone creates a new FB event page for a competition, you find out about it because you see "friends a, b and c have expressed the are going/are interested in going" or someone tags you "you going to this?" or when the person putting the event on creates it, they tag 20-50 people that they know are likely to either compete or volunteer to work it. And during stuff like Arnold, those that are of the caliber to actually compete at the Arnold, we get play by play from the people competing and their coaches/handlers and those of us that aren't competing but went. When Jessica Fithen won the SHW championship belt in 2017, I was messaging her congratulations (and getting a reply) from my bedroom in Indiana about a minute before the online online feed even got to it.
There just isn't a way to replicate either of those things without a social media platform. I like know what is going on in my friends lives even though we just don't get to see each other that often. Do we trade some privacy for that? Sure. Do we waste more time on the platforms than we should, for the most part yes, but considering I do get to see what is going on in their lives without having to schedule months in advance an hour where we might get to cross paths if something doesn't come up, then it is worth it to me. And with the strength sports thing, we might be in the same location once a year, even those that are here in Indiana with me we might see each other a few times a year because we are spread out 120-200 miles but Facebook lets us bust each other's chops and support each other and carry on just like we do in person on our phones all day long.
A few weeks ago I was at an event volunteering and had a couple people walking by me "hey Mercer!" that I've never actually met but have this genuine friend/camaraderie connection with because we have this digital space where we are there for each other and do bust each others chops in a fun way.
You can still message people but it isn't addictive because there will be nowhere to scroll outside of messages.