Why you should deactivate your Facebook Acct

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

I understand that Facebook works for communication, I just don't understand why email or skype wouldn't work.

Because that is more intrusive. Skype disturbs people and do not let them communicate when they want. Email is for some people more intrusive in the way that they think they have to answer. And for younger people it is something they do not use or do not use regularly so it can be used for communication.

Also it does not work to communicate with 200 people.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

What makes email more personal than Facebook?

Isn't it obvious? Email in email to one person it to me trivially more personal than a status update on Facebook that people can choose to read if they want.

[SouthernSun]

Originally Posted by tompe

Isn't it obvious? Email in email to one person it to me trivially more personal than a status update on Facebook that people can choose to read if they want.

You can send people private messages on Facebook which function in the same manner as an email - private and one-on-one.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by SouthernSun

You can send people private messages on Facebook which function in the same manner as an email - private and one-on-one.

This is what I use when I need to send something private. Like it was said in the post above young people do not use email at least none of my nieces or nephews do.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Well for one you would need their email address. If I ask for it they would just say leave me a message on Facebook. One thing I hate about email is getting a bulk email. Nothing irritates me more and if you do a BBC it will go into your spam box. On Facebook you post one message and everyone on your friends list sees it.

But this thing with everyone on your friends list seeing what you post is like writing an email with that list on BCC.

Originally Posted by tompe

Because that is more intrusive. Skype disturbs people and do not let them communicate when they want. Email is for some people more intrusive in the way that they think they have to answer. And for younger people it is something they do not use or do not use regularly so it can be used for communication.

You can be "invisible" on Skype. If someone wants to talk to you they can just ask if you are there, or to leave a message when you get back to your computer. Having applied for jobs by email, I can tell you that people don't think that they have to answer. And people definitely don't think that they have to answer immediately.

Originally Posted by tompe

Also it does not work to communicate with 200 people.

It was pretty fun to talk to my family at Easter, because I couldn't visit them, but I could visit a cousin that lives in a country close to the one I live in, so I know that Skype can be a very nice way of communicating with large groups of people. And businesses are capable of using email for communication between hundreds of people.

Originally Posted by tompe

Isn't it obvious? Email in email to one person it to me trivially more personal than a status update on Facebook that people can choose to read if they want.

You can choose not to read emails. Is it as easy to ignore something that people write on your wall?

[tompe]

Originally Posted by SouthernSun

You can send people private messages on Facebook which function in the same manner as an email - private and one-on-one.

Sure, but you cannot use email as you use a status update on facebook.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

You can choose not to read emails. Is it as easy to ignore something that people write on your wall?

I think that is extremely bad behavior since email for me is a channel that should work more surely than other channels. People that just do not read there email or remove all their email when getting back from vacation should not have an email address at all.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

And businesses are capable of using email for communication between hundreds of people.

But that does not work if everybody write 10 emails per day. That only works for specific communication were the volume is so low that everybody have time to read everything.

That is not how communication using status updates works.

We have an email list at work with maybe 200 people on. If a discussion occur there with maybe 50 email per day people will complain and threaten to not read it. Which happened so now it is forbidden to discuss things and the list should only be used for very important information.

[theinfamousj]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

I understand that Facebook works for communication, I just don't understand why email or skype wouldn't work.

I just had this conversation and it comes down to scale. Facebook is a fast means of mass communication of thoughts, ideas, or events.

I am pregnant, I got a raise/job/promotion, the baby was just born, etc. are all concepts that need to be communicated to a /vast/ number of people (parents, grandparents, siblings, cousins, friends near and far, coworkers, etc.) at a time when time, itself, is at a premium due to this new thing in your life. You simply do not have time for 50+ half-hour-or-longer "catch up" phone calls before someone is upset that it took you so long to reach them. You can replace "phone calls" with Skype conversations, if you will. And if you don't think these things take at least a half-hour, then I am going to wager that you either have never done this or are male and think that the abbreviated conversing with other males is the norm.

Mass emails and blog posts are analogous to Facebook. All are impersonal mass-means of communication. The advantage to Facebook and blogs-with-comments is that sometimes coordination and conversation can take place in the comment section. What started as a one minute post by me to alert my nearest and dearest (and anyone else who cares on the Internet) that I am sitting bedside with my brother who has been hospitalized suddenly for reasons yet to be determined can turn in to my friends arranging to take my mail and bring me food... All from the same information location so as to improve efficiency and remove redundancy.

Mass communication has its place and Facebook is simply one "color" of mass - communication "socks". The color doesn't make the thing inherently evil, just simply not /your/ taste; which is fine.

[Katsunami]

Why could we do all this just fine, about 10 years ago?

At that time, if I wanted to tell something to many people at once, I wrote an e-mail, and selected my "everybody but the uncle I hate" e-mail list as a recipient.

Why is it expected that I now use a third-party website to announce stuff such as this?

[theinfamousj]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Why could we do all this just fine, about 10 years ago?

At that time, if I wanted to tell something to many people at once, I wrote an e-mail, and selected my "everybody but the uncle I hate" e-mail list as a recipient.

Why is it expected that I now use a third-party website to announce stuff such as this?

It isn't necessarily. It is just one option among many.

However, if most of the people I want to communicate with are on Facebook and they don't or won't check their email, then sending an email doesn't actually accomplish the job of communicating anything with anyone.

You fit the tool to the job at hand.

But as I said previously, having the comments feature has unintended positive consequences.

I have been on the 'net since the old days of BBS, for what it is worth. I have been pulled kicking and screaming into having more accounts on things than I would like. But the masses won' t change their habits for me, so if I want to get information to them, I have to do it the way they expect to receive such information.

Or, in short: social inertia.

[Stitchawl]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

.....Having applied for jobs by email, I can tell you that people don't think that they have to answer. And people definitely don't think that they have to answer immediately.

Businesses and strangers don't feel any need to answer, or answer immediately. In the case of job applications, they are sending you a very definite message by NOT responding. They are saying you are not worth replying to... Proper manners would dictate that they at least contact you to say 'sorry but...'
Family and friends do need to reply. That's what family and friends are about; communication.

It is rude to not reply to 'most' e-mails from a friend. Even if it is just a one-word post, you MUST reply. It's bad manners not to. And that's a pretty pushy way to just make a comment they can just as easily see on Facebook WITHOUT forcing them to reply.


Stitchawl

[DuskyRose]

Originally Posted by theinfamousj

It isn't necessarily. It is just one option among many.

However, if most of the people I want to communicate with are on Facebook and they don't or won't check their email, then sending an email doesn't actually accomplish the job of communicating anything with anyone.

You fit the tool to the job at hand.

This.

I have only a few friends on Facebook. One, my son who is across the US from us and in the military, isn't much of a communicator. He hardly ever thinks to call home, so seeing his FB postings let us know he's alive and well, and just getting on with things.

Another is my daughter. She doesn't post a lot of personal stuff on FB, but just broke up with her fiancee, a guy she's been with for five years. We've talked in person and on the phone, and at this point she's all talked out about it. By her FB postings I can see she's getting out again with friends, and healing. I can relax.

For the others, nice to see what people are up to without having to drag up a conversation is great. Some of them I'm not really that close to, but do want to know what their kids are up to. I don't want to email or call, because they tend to dump hours of their life on you if you give them a chance. I don't care *that* much, so a FB note I can safely ignore is more than enough.

Like anything else, you have to tweak FB to how you want to use it. Don't post what you don't want to be public. Don't add everyone on just for high numbers unless there's a reason you're interested in that person.

It's a tool. Tweak it to your own advantage.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

But this thing with everyone on your friends list seeing what you post is like writing an email with that list on BCC.

Yes exactly! Which is why it's great. Sending a mass email is just bad manners. No wants their email address visible to 30 people they don't know. It's a great way to get a virus or worm sent to you. It use to be that they said to avoid that use BBC but now spam filters will think it's spam and you will never see that email.

This is why in the old days we used Yahoo groups to communicate to many people at once. Before Yahoo groups I own discussion mailing lists and a few forums to do mass communication.

Now it's easier with Facebook and other social media through apps or your web browser.

[delph]

Originally Posted by DuskyRose

Like anything else, you have to tweak FB to how you want to use it. Don't post what you don't want to be public. Don't add everyone on just for high numbers unless there's a reason you're interested in that person.

It's a tool. Tweak it to your own advantage.

Not always an option to not add people you're not interested in. Try ignoring friend requests family members some time.

On a more serious note, I of course can of course just respond to a friend request and then unsubscribe from their updates. My biggest problem that I have with Facebook is that it's turned into a wasteland of the mass emails from last decade. Most of what I see these days are lots of re-sharings of silly images (not photos, mind you), recipes, and other fluff. This just isn't stuff that I'm interested in. I'm also incredibly annoyed that for some people for whom I subscribe to everything (like my sister), I still don't see everything they post in my feed. This happens even if I change from top stories to recent. Half the time, the mobile app ignores my site settings entirely, making me grit my teeth even more if I'm trying to find out how people are actually doing.

So really, I've just given up on Facebook as anything resembling an efficient form of communication.