I thought Craig was a nice person

[shopperholic]

What I am interested to know, and hopefully all you FB users can tell me ; is, I've heard that once you register on Facebook, its impossible to cancel your account, so all photos and information are 'out there' for eternity.

Yes I've heard that and just posted a link to say that information stays after you delete your account https://en-gb.facebook.com/help/224562897555674. This is one of the reasons I'll never join it, and I mean never. I've also read that FB read what you put, it'll be like you're on Big Brother. No, I'd sooner Face Time, meet up, ring, anything basically than Facebook, but that's obviously just my opinion.

 

[Scout]

Not true. Unless I've read it wrong it says at the end that information remains after you close your account.
https://en-gb.facebook.com/help/224562897555674

What it's saying is that if you send a private message outside your account to somebody else, and they keep that message, the message will still be in their account after your account is deleted. But that's obvious and is the same anywhere. If you send people emails and then close your email account, you wouldn't expect all the emails you've sent to people to disappear from their Inboxes would you? Private messages on FB are the same as sending emails or posting a letter to someone, once you send them you can't get them back.

 

[Scout]

. . . . . I've also read that FB read what you put, it'll be like you're on Big Brother. No, I'd sooner Face Time, meet up, ring, anything basically than Facebook, but that's obviously just my opinion.

Everything we do online is monitored, we have no privacy online. How else do you think the police can get copies of our emails, addresses of the websites we visit, and details of everything we download if they want them? From the second we log on, nothing we do is private.

 

[Brissles]

I'm going to be one of the few remaining customers who is really going to be stuffed when the last of the High St banks close (hopefully not in my lifetime)- because I have absolutely no intention of doing on-line banking - tooooo risky. My fear of where my money is if my laptop crashes mid transaction fills me with goosepimple horror !

 

[shopperholic]

Everything we do online is monitored, we have no privacy online. How else do you think the police can get copies of our emails, addresses of the websites we visit, and details of everything we download if they want them? From the second we log on, nothing we do is private.

Yes thank you I know that, what I meant is they read everyday things, private things not just look when the Police need to look. To me that's a massive invasion of privacy, anyway I'll still never be a facebooker so I suppose it's never going to be my problem.

 

[donna255]

everything you do online will be there forever somewhere. I know quite a few of the tinfoil hat brigade are still foaming at the mouth over Windows 10 which gathers info. My view if you are not a ****, criminal, terrorist of some sort you have no need to worry. Microsoft with billions of users will not be tracking every word you write.

Same with Facebook, they are not monitoring every uses comings and goings on the site. Just set yourself to private and unless hacked shouldn't worry. Life is too short.

 

[shopperholic]

everything you do online will be there forever somewhere. I know quite a few of the tinfoil hat brigade are still foaming at the mouth over Windows 10 which gathers info. My view if you are not a ****, criminal, terrorist of some sort you have no need to worry. Microsoft with billions of users will not be tracking every word you write.

Same with Facebook, they are not monitoring every uses comings and goings on the site. Just set yourself to private and unless hacked shouldn't worry. Life is too short.

Thanks Donna, I'm not worried, I just don't like Facebook it's not for me. I prefer the more face to face interaction with my friends and family. I'm not some scared little creature who wants every aspect of my life private, my family and friends know everything about me right down to what coloured knickers I've got on. It's not for everyone, but each to their own eh? :mysmilie_14:

 

[Glittergirl]

Thanks Donna, I'm not worried, I just don't like Facebook it's not for me. I prefer the more face to face interaction with my friends and family. I'm not some scared little creature who wants every aspect of my life private, my family and friends know everything about me right down to what coloured knickers I've got on. It's not for everyone, but each to their own eh? :mysmilie_14:

Seeking out people and 'friends' mainly ones you've never met before is blinking freaky! Maybe sad to say but they obviously don't have any 'real friends' in their current life! Tell me different but still don't get it and why would you, LMAO! :mysmilie_8:

 

[shopperholic]

Seeking out people and 'friends' mainly ones you've never met before is blinking freaky! Maybe sad to say but they obviously don't have any 'real friends' in their current life! Tell me different but still don't get it and why would you, LMAO! :mysmilie_8:

No I don't get it either, I personally find it a waste of time. If you want someone to know what your cat did a week last Friday, ring friends and family up and tell them. :mysmilie_13:

 

[maymorganlondon]

To facebook or not facebook is a personal choice, and we might find it hard to understand others' decisions to join or abstain, but either choice is equally valid. Same with other forms of social media.

I do think they are used in a wide variety of ways and for those who find it valuable it's a worthwhile thing to get involved in. Some are able to use social media as a force for good, but there will always be those who use social media for malign purposes... just the same as in everyday life.

It is generating another form of social exclusion, but those who opt out do so with their eyes open, I think, to what they won't have.

Personally I'm not comfortable with it. Posting on forums is about as much as I'm comfortable with. That may change in the future, but not anytime soon.

 

[loveallthingsitalian]

It's the posts -
this is my RJ plant food in a big blue tub
These are my 48 Charlie bears
This is a bit of toast which looks like .......

That do my head in - why in gods name do you think that is worth the effort it took to post.

I can totally get Vienna's situtation with her son but otherwise would you not just email friends and family you aren't able to meet?

Just me I think

 

[Totally Loopy Lou]

What I am interested to know, and hopefully all you FB users can tell me ; is, I've heard that once you register on Facebook, its impossible to cancel your account, so all photos and information are 'out there' for eternity.

Well.... I was pestered by pals years ago to join Facebook, which I did and used it for a few years. But because I'm ill, I found it hard to see everyone I know getting married, having babies and going on exotic hoidays - and generally doing all the things, even the mundane little things, that I cannot do (don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled for my close friends but it was just having it all in your face and not being able to 'keep up'.
So, I considered doing a full delete of my account and never using it again (there is an option when you do this to have certain data, such as your photos etc emailed to you before/as you do this, so I'm told)... But I think at some point I may wish to join in again so I simply de-activated my account.
After about 4 years away, I fancied having a peek at what would happen if I re-activated my Facebook so I did so one night (in the early hours partly so that no one would be online and notice!
So I signed in and it was as if I'd never left! Photos and messages etc all there as before. However, when I de-activated it for a second time, it was as if I'd never been on Facebook.
I admit it's slightly disconcerting that one's data still exists somewhere out there but that was my choice and I could do a full delete if it bothered me that much.

And I have to say there were things I could have done to my account to make it work a bit better for me, for example making my privacy settings even tighter (I always had it set so that only friends could see anything I added or posted (and I couldn't be found if I was searched for via google etc). And I could've reduced the number of friends to only the closest and family (I did have a rule of only adding people I would tell or show stuff to in real life!)

So basically, if you want to be able to see other people's photos, and not to feel left out you can definitely make Facebook work for you, and I personally don't think there's any harm in it at all - it all depends how you use it! (In fact it's making me wonder if I should re-activate my own account and just use it on v low key level...!)

 

[Scout]

I really don't know why some people here are fixated on FB only being about talking to family and friends when millions of people are using it for things completely unrelated to friends and family. None of my offline friends or relatives have any access to anything I do on FB, so they can't see a single word I post. As for some people being paranoid about their posts being read by FB, that's just laughable when you consider their ISP will be reading their private emails and the entire world can read everything they post here. ISPs don't only check emails when the police ask them to. Posting to FB is only posting to various forums exactly as we do here, but the difference is that we can choose who reads our FB posts but we can't choose who reads our posts here. So FB is actually much more secure than this forum.

 

[shopperholic]

Not paranoid. Not worried. Not fixated. Just not interested.

 

[CallMeQ]

Not paranoid. Not worried. Not fixated. Just not interested.

Ditto!
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram... None of them interest me at all, I personally don't care what a person is doing, eating or what the inside of their mouth looks like when they're at the dentist. Posting here is the only sort of social media thing I do. I have a Twitter account which I've used only a handful of times as I must admit it was very handy when I needed to get help from beats by dr dre. I've also used it to write a complaint to 2 companies. I have no followers and I don't follow anyone... As for the others never registered and never will.

 

[maymorganlondon]

I think the point with a forum such as this is that we all know it's open, and that anyone can read it. You therefore (generally) post accordingly. If you are posting on a social media site and have set privacy settings, you may assume that your interaction is only visible to those you have in your social/contact circle... but it also surely relies on the others you are in contact having similarly secure settings, and their contacts as well.

I'm not for one moment denying that it can be used as a considerable force for good when used appropriately. But there are downsides and it can have a detrimental effect on real life relationships, even leaving cyber-bullying, cyber-stalking and trolling out of the equation.

We each make a choice about whether to engage with social media, and if so to what extent. Nothing wrong with that.

 

[Totally Loopy Lou]

I really don't know why some people here are fixated on FB only being about talking to family and friends when millions of people are using it for things completely unrelated to friends and family. None of my offline friends or relatives have any access to anything I do on FB, so they can't see a single word I post. As for some people being paranoid about their posts being read by FB, that's just laughable when you consider their ISP will be reading their private emails and the entire world can read everything they post here. ISPs don't only check emails when the police ask them to. Posting to FB is only posting to various forums exactly as we do here, but the difference is that we can choose who reads our FB posts but we can't choose who reads our posts here. So FB is actually much more secure than this forum.

Don't think anyone was denying that Facebook is used for many other activities - from advertising and marketing to health and campaigning to countless other reasons - but the original question was about using Facebook to connect with family and friends!

Also a bit alarmist to say this forum is much less secure than Facebook - it depends entirely what one posts on either. And I'm not surprised people are very concerned about what can be seen whilst using Facebook, it's a fair question.

I do agree it's disconcerting to think about what data our ISP's have on us, and can access via email and more (best not to think about it!!) But the thing on a forum such as this is that it no-one is using their own name (mainly pseudonyms I think and avatars instead of profile pics!) and is only telling others limited very limited personal information (or not, as they choose).

If anything you've just made me feel more paranoid about this forum!

 

[yorkrose26]

I agree, which is why I and everyone I know use their FB settings to stop strangers seeing anything they post. My posts can only be seen by those I specify, and none of my personal details can be seen by anyone but me. If anyone here looked at my FB page, for example, all they'd see is a blank page.

I very briefly used FB and Twitter, as part of a course I was on had to show that you could actively use Social Media accounts, I briefly stayed with FB, but when I started reading posts about someone I vaguely new, daughter had started to use the potty, I thought there must be more to life than this. Two years later I now post on forums, I think the words 'pot', 'kettle', 'black' spring to mind. Though I am not saying FB can't be useful as the posting from 'scout' proved, just not by bag!

 

[Glittergirl]

Ditto!
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram... None of them interest me at all, I personally don't care what a person is doing, eating or what the inside of their mouth looks like when they're at the dentist. Posting here is the only sort of social media thing I do. I have a Twitter account which I've used only a handful of times as I must admit it was very handy when I needed to get help from beats by dr dre. I've also used it to write a complaint to 2 companies. I have no followers and I don't follow anyone... As for the others never registered and never will.

Don't do much either but each to their own! Social Media can be good in a changing world but seeking out and befriending people is totally beyond me and not ma thing! When you have a loving family and close friends then surely that's all you need? Sure it must have it's uses and constant promos is not one of them, so basically it's just a Marketing Tool! Sad but true :mysmilie_1:

 

[Brissles]

Today its been announced that the founder of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg has been 'hacked' ! ok, its his Twitter account, but it proves even the best are vulnerable at being 'got at'.