So What Do YOU *HATE* about Facebook?

forgive my ignorance of reading only the first part of this thread, but i love Facebook and all other social sites, i would not be here if it was not for Facebool.

 

I hate that people have taken it from being used as a social network to being like mentioned above a journal of there life. Not to mention all the sexual content that on there now.

 

This will probably come as a shock to at least a few, if not most of you, but I do not have a facebook page. I have used facebook a handful of times, just creating a bogus account in order to get in touch with a couple of people from my past who had moved away. But even then it was just me messaging them to say "Hi! Call me." Other than that, I have avoided it like the plague for two basic reasons, the first being privacy concerns and the second being the behavior it inspires in its users.

Let me address the privacy issue first. Facebook records everything you ever write, and basically they own it to do whatsoever they please with it. That means they can take your private conversations and turn them over to the F.B.I., or to some market research firm. That really just does not sit well with me. It makes me incredibly uneasy to think someone is recording and possibly monitoring everything I say. And the fact that practically everyone is a part of this thing is a bit to 1984 for me. Just look at what someone posted earlier in this thread, about being turned away by an employer because he wouldn't share his facebook account. The fact that facebook has become so ubiquitous is what's really scary. People think you are weird or a social pariah if you don't have a facebook account.

Let me segue into my second grief; the behavior of the users. When it comes to privacy, the main reason there is none is because people share WAY TOO MUCH INFORMATION about themselves. Some people get on there like they are writing in a private diary and just spill out recklessly whatever emotion they are feeling at the time. hey don't think about the implications of what they are doing, that they are broadcasting themselves. Just because you have a thought or a feeling, doesn't mean you should share it. And in contrast to the lonely people who post their problems and inner conflicts constantly, are the people who air out all of their dirty laundry. It's just really sickening when people start broadcasting all of their personal and private grievances with one another for all of the world to see. Often times, they drag people through the mud who were no more than innocent bystanders. You see this happen to teenage or adolescent children who's parents are fighting on facebook.

And lastly, moving away now from the privacy issue, but sticking with behavior, is all of the drama. I find it extremely disturbing when i am trying to have a conversation with a grown man, and he keeps bringing up things that were said on facebook, especially when they are conflicts between people who you only really know through facebook. For example, "Oh, this girl I added didn't like this comment I made, so we argued for a long time, then I blocked her. That sure showed her!" I mean, this stuff should not be spill out into real life. It is so petty. And worse, it is so very common. Not to mention the avenues this opens up for children who may not have the coping skills to deal with certain things, especially bullying. A child can feel so overwhelmed when a group of people on facebook all decide they are going to pick on him, more so than in real life even, because facebook is such a significant part of people's social lives, and it follows you into the home.

So basically, people who use facebook to keep in touch with people are cool, and that's fine by me. But the people who become completely consumed by it, therein lies the problem. I just really hope it goes the way of myspace sooner rather than later.

 

People ON facebook are more annoying than anything about Facebook the website itself. I imagine that if my newsfeed was empty, I might enjoy Facebook quite a bit (not really but you get the point)

It's the other people that annoy me... not so much anything else.

 

I probably have one of the most non-facebook facebook accounts. I don't post ANYTHING on it. Everything is set for my eyes only. I only use it to make some logins to non-important sites faster. The thing I hate the most about facebook is how people use it so recklessly. It's like they're desparate for attention that they willingly compromise their own privacy as well as the privacy of their family and friends. I think it has become some type of social illness that future generations will study. I really have very little use for it.

 

I am one of the few people on Earth never to have registered an account on Facebook. I just knew from the beginning that it was not for me, I don't want people looking at my life through a microscope, neither do I want to see what other people are up to on a daily, or hourly basis.

I have sacrificed the opportunity to connect with old friends and family members, I know this. But I wont miss anything that I didn't have before, would I?

I don't want to be labelled as paranoid but I am concerned about the overall privacy issue about identities online nowadays, I think there is still some way to go before everything it made clear about what it right, or wrong.

 

In response to mythman, I understand that a person has the choice to keep things private and still participate in facebook. But many people don't, and they actually compromise the privacy of others. I'm sure you have seen the trend where parents use social media to shame their children publicly, like the guy who shot his daughters laptop or the woman who sold her daughter's Katy Perry tickets. The problem is how facebook has changed the culture. It is pushing towards an absence of privacy, especially with many businesses now basically requiring you to have an active facebook account in order to hire you. I'm not saying people shouldn't use it. I'm just saying that it shouldn't be so prevalent in people's lives.

 

I hate just about everything about Facebook. Starting with lame posts and pictures (who needs to see what you're eating for dinner) from my acquaintances and ending with the fact that we as users are not able to completely remove our posts and profiles. I'm serious. The only reason I haven't deleted it yet, is because it lets me keep in touch with friends who live in other countries or far away from me.

 

You can't compare it to running naked. While the internet is public it should also be private at the same time. I understand that the world is different today but it really shouldn't. I love talking on the internet more than I do IRL because of the fact that it's anonymous and it seems like now they try to take that away. This is why the internet has lost a lot of it's magic for me. I still use the internet of course and I enjoy it to a point but it's never going to be the same. Anonymity is what makes the internet so beautiful
Facebook on the other hand is more understandable because you use your real name on there and such so I don't like to post on it.

 

That everyone tries too hard to seem that they have it better than everyone else. If it is not that, then it is the constant complaints about the most petty things. I have not been on facebook for a couple years and I do not miss it. Instagram is the exact same, I really enjoyed it at first but then I just got fed up with everything. It makes no sense to enjoy the present moment when you are too focused on capturing the perfect shot.

 

I hate Facebook's ability to scour your email to come up with people you have not heard of in years. Every few days they would email me about people "I may know or would like to know." I changed to another email address, and changed the security settings on Facebook. Currently, I only hear from friends and relatives I have known for most of my life.
Yet, I am emailed daily about their comings and goings but I just delete it quickly.

 

I'm really upset that Facebook is essentially ignoring groups, and not giving them much-needed features. I am a member of several very large groups, and once you pass the ~400 member mark, the lack of any and all moderation options make them difficult to run. I understand that one of their star "products" is Messenger, but groups need some love. Quite frankly it's inexcusable that people are now starting to develop applications and extension in order to fix what Facebook didn't.

 

I don't hate anything about Facebook. I feel it is what you make it. Many people use it for many different things. I personally don't care what anyone else post because that's there image and right to do so. I choose to keep busy doing more productive things rather than being on fb enough to let any aspect of it creep underneath my skin.

 

What I don't like about Facebook is when people post pics of petty things, like what they ate before they ate them or even pictures of the sardines that they saw on the supermarket. Apart from that, browsing through photos can be really time-consuming and also a time-waster, that's why I seldom visit Facebook.

 

Well, obviously, I like a lot of people don't like not being able to "dislike" posts and comments. But I really don't like the arrangement of timelines on profile. It just doesn't look very organized and presentable.

 

I've honestly started to hate everything about Facebook. I really am starting to think social networking is not for me. I hate reading everyone's drama and daily BS. I also don't like that they apparently record every single thing you type. I bet most of you didn't know that even if you type a status or comment and then don't send it or change it- the stuff you typed first is still recorded into their system. I also don't like how everyone and their brother can find me.

 

I resisted Facebook for so long, but after a while this decision starts weighing heavily on your social life. I now firmly believe you can use Facebook and avoid its many drawbacks, like the average stupidity of the posts, the incessant advertising and the invasion on your privacy. You just need to take some small precautions.

First of all, be sure to choose your friends accurately. Don't accept everyone who makes a friendship request. Avoid those who post dumb things, or unfriend them if they're already your friend (you can also simply hide their posts). Try to keep level-headed, articulate people with great ideas and opinions. That does not mean to only have those whose opinion is similar to yours, creating an echo chamber is never useful.

Second, you can make most of the annoying ads and irrelevant content go away using things like FB Purity. It can really grate your nerves when you visit a band page once and you get concert ads for months.

Finally, understand well the concept of "public arena". Whatever you're posting is not private, despite all your settings and precautions. You won't always be able to decline a friendship request from an employer, people will make sure that picture of you planking will make the rounds, your parents will come to know you were drunk. Treat whatever you post as if you were on a stage, be presentable and polite. Leave your embarrassing moments to more private venues.

If you take those precautions you pretty much negate Facebook's drawbacks.

 

Yes, I forgot about the wall. It's so overwhelming that I want to leave right away. I didn't even like that many things but yet the wall still seems cluttered.