Facebook: Nothing But Trouble?

[JDGRUEN]

Facebook like Thaivisa is what you make of it. One can become addicted or one can take it or leave it. I found that I could make and maintain contact with long lost 2nd. cousins and other family menbers using Facebook. We exchange news of the family and share photos. It has brought a large segment of the extended family much closer together. Since we live all over the USA, FB has been a great venue to facilitate this.

A big trend with the use of Facebook these days is the use of Local FB Groups. The membership base for these FB groups may cover a entire small town, a county or adjacent counties, etc. One of these groups (in what is soon to be my former home area) has FB a membership that numbers about seven thousand... These groups offer 'Buy, Sell, Give Away Free" avenues to merchandise goods and services between and among people who very often know each other or know of each other via regular community ties. People offer things like cars, farm equipment, clothing, household items, real estate, job offers, job searches and much more. Recently I sold most of my home furnishings via a local FB group in preparation for leaving the country. I also have placed three cats in new homes using such groups. Other local groups function as Lost and Found or 'rehoming' cats, dogs, horses, goats, etc. One group only allows posts to give away items to needy people. For those who 'poo poo' Facebook - perhaps you haven't explored the more practical and useful uses of FB. There is nothing better than free advertising with photos directed to a thousands of people who live less than 25 kilometers from you.

[theblether]

Totally correct JDGRUEN......I mentioned the fb groups earlier, and many others agree that fb used correctly is a great tool. You have recently proven that to be the case.

[chonabot]

I created a facebook page for a talent competition I ran at my school, it was a great success.

Over 10000 likes and many clips uploaded, all of which I had admin rights over. One or two slagging matches between the groups, a few live concerts uploaded and all for free.

Great use of social media, and the bonus of pissing off the school director, nice

Edited April 5, 2013 by chonabot

[theblether]

I think beetlejuice is quivering in a corner licking his wounds. Don't worry BJ, I'm in Chiang Mai, I'll take you out for a beer.

[Beetlejuice]

I think beetlejuice is quivering in a corner licking his wounds. Don't worry BJ, I'm in Chiang Mai, I'll take you out for a beer.

Why would I be quivering?

All I am saying is, that these things are useful if used appropriately and in moderation.

I also use social media networks on rare occasions to communicate with distant family, friends and acquaintances, as I mostly use one to one emails to converse and on these social networking sites, I don`t publish details of my every hourly activities, what I last ate for dinner, publish photos of myself drunk and throwing up in the cat basket, informing everyone that I have a headache today and what time the hospital appointment is for my boil on the ass lancing operation.

And if did decide to meet you for a beer in Chiang Mai, you would probably inform all your farcebook friends of when and where we were going to meet. I prefer to keep these events strictly between myself and the persons I am with at the time.

As you may guess, I am not a social networking fan. It`s the good, the bad and the ugly.

My message is to all those who consider farcebook as a mainstream activity; Get A Life.

Edited April 5, 2013 by Beetlejuice

[theblether]

Awrite.....if I promise not to divulge our beer consumption anywhere on the internet, especially Facebook, will you come out for a beer? and I'll pay.

That way you'll find out that we Scots are not as tight as we're made out be.

[Thai Gibbon]

It's got worse since these FB apps have appeared on smart or iphones. It can't be avoided and people with net access on their phone can't resist. My sister is a pain with this, she's looking at her phone every 5 minutes for someones update so she can 'like' it or type 'lol' next it. I detest it.

How can folks say ''then why are you on thaivisa if you hate social media networks'' ..There's a huge difference. I can log out of thaivisa then leave the house and I'm free from it.

People are walking the streets on facebook. Eating at cafes or restaurants near my table, on facebook. Next to me at a bus stop on facebook.

Luckily still...nobody is on the London Underground on facebook sitting or standing next to me. I hope they keep it that way. Unlike certain underground metro systems where there are phone signals, like Japan or Thailand.

Riding the tube or sitting at home alone is the only peace I get these days.

Or sitting on a plane to some place.........

[theblether]

^^ Has nobody told Thai Gibbon about the Thaivisa App? We wouldn't want him to miss out on anything

[true blue]

i love facebook,keeps me in touch with friends and family all round the world,thaks so much facebook for such a wonderful network.

[chonabot]

Funny this complaining about fb on smartphones etc

I was a UNIX coder for 20 years and understand most IT applications. But on my phone, I have no camera, no Internet access, just a phone line.

I feel that many cell/mobile phone users who open up the floodgates with internet etc..would be better advised to stick with a basic, yet vital, service.

Leave the extras to people who actually enjoy it.

[phuketjock]

A couple of months ago I made the silly mistake of joining linkedin as I thought a friend had

invited me, within minutes I was inundated with e-mails from linkedin and I immediately tried

, in vain, to get my name removed from their site. I continued to, and still get, e-mails from them

and various people trying to sell rubbish to me via linkedin, I have not been able to stop it but

thank my e-mail for having a junk file.

I have a mobile phone, a computer with Skype and with these things I can communicate by phone

, e-mail and face to face with anyone in the world in real time. I can send and receive messages

photos, movies and converse. If I require something I cannot find in Thailand I can find, order and pay

for it in minutes on the internet.

Apart from bother me with more unwanted useless nonsense what can faceache do for me that the

above facilities cannot???

I would also be interested as posted by a previous poster, Chigog I think, how facebook can prevent

identity theft, I would have thought it was an excellent tool for identity thieves.

[phuketjock]

I set up a FB page with a fake name & an email address that was given to no-one I know.

It has no photos of people or anything that can be connected to me.

The list of 'people you could know' FB sends out to encourage linking regularly contains 8 - 10 people that I do know.

If I haven't used any even remotely identifiable details, and details that no-one I know could know, how does FB generate a list containing so many people that I do know from a DB of supposedly multi-millions of people?

The email being used has no people listed in the contacts, and does not connect to any of my regular email accounts.

All I can put it down to is some variant of spyware used by FB.

Anyone got any ideas?

Good question pgs I am sure the resident TV experts will come up with a fantasy good answer??

Edited April 5, 2013 by phuketjock

[ragamuffin]

Why do anyone need a facebook-account?? To share your pathetic lives with the rest of the world!

What purpose does it serve?

To stay in touch with friends and family all over the world?

[Beetlejuice]

i love facebook,keeps me in touch with friends and family all round the world,thaks so much facebook for such a wonderful network.

I just received a message from Mark Zuckerberg, who asked me to pass on his thanks and gratitude to you, true blue, for your promoting of his social networking site and helping him to increase his massive fortune with this people information business, personal information that people like you are giving him for free.

I guarantee that if I had knowledge of your real name, or email address, or mobile phone number and typed your details into Google, other search engines, people search sites or linkedin, that most of the stuff about yourself you have published on facebook, social networking sites and subscriptions would be on display to me within minutes, perhaps seconds. I would learn more about you, your lifestyle and activities than you probably know about yourself. IP addresses are easy enough to obtain and these days most of the photos people place online have a hidden exIF viewer that if you know how, will display when, where the photo was taken, including IP addresses and even the camera device details.

People business is big business, and if you have no concerns to whatever you participate online being public knowledge and published in the public domain for all and sundry to see and possibly shared with others and companies, then those who become addicted to this crap are mugs of the first degree.

If I want to contact local friends and family I use a phone or personally visit them. Those far away, I email, phone or Skype. Easy, peesy, no problem.

Mark Zuckerberg, no wonder he`s smiling.

[wooloomooloo]

...the keynote speech was about me. Half way through the speech the keynote speaker invited me to stand up and finish the story, which I duly did.

haha... and there I was, in the office, with the BB Leader with my trousers round my ankles.

[JLCrab]

I set up a FB page with a fake name & an email address that was given to no-one I know.

It has no photos of people or anything that can be connected to me.

The list of 'people you could know' FB sends out to encourage linking regularly contains 8 - 10 people that I do know.

If I haven't used any even remotely identifiable details, and details that no-one I know could know, how does FB generate a list containing so many people that I do know from a DB of supposedly multi-millions of people?

The email being used has no people listed in the contacts, and does not connect to any of my regular email accounts.

All I can put it down to is some variant of spyware used by FB.

Anyone got any ideas?

Good question pgs I am sure the resident TV experts will come up with a fantasy good answer??

I'm no techie but i would guess that it has something to do with the IP address that is somehow embedded in emails that you have sent and been received by persons who have given Facebook access to their email accounts -- rather insidious if that's the case.

Edited April 5, 2013 by JLCrab

[pgs]

I set up a FB page with a fake name & an email address that was given to no-one I know.

It has no photos of people or anything that can be connected to me.

The list of 'people you could know' FB sends out to encourage linking regularly contains 8 - 10 people that I do know.

If I haven't used any even remotely identifiable details, and details that no-one I know could know, how does FB generate a list containing so many people that I do know from a DB of supposedly multi-millions of people?

The email being used has no people listed in the contacts, and does not connect to any of my regular email accounts.

All I can put it down to is some variant of spyware used by FB.

Anyone got any ideas?

Good question pgs I am sure the resident TV experts will come up with a fantasy good answer??

I'm no techie but i would guess that it has something to do with the IP address that is somehow embedded in emails that you have sent and been received by persons who have given Facebook access to their email accounts -- rather insidious if that's the case.

Not an unreasonable concept.

While the PC's IP doesn't change on the network (and it's something that would be reflected on many home/soho networks), the modem's IP should change as I often turn it off for 2 - 3 days, causing it to reset it's external IP.

At least, that's how I understand it's supposed to work.

I might be in line for a new foil hat.

[pgs]

I set up a FB page with a fake name & an email address that was given to no-one I know.

It has no photos of people or anything that can be connected to me.

The list of 'people you could know' FB sends out to encourage linking regularly contains 8 - 10 people that I do know.

If I haven't used any even remotely identifiable details, and details that no-one I know could know, how does FB generate a list containing so many people that I do know from a DB of supposedly multi-millions of people?

The email being used has no people listed in the contacts, and does not connect to any of my regular email accounts.

All I can put it down to is some variant of spyware used by FB.

Anyone got any ideas?

Are your age and location entered crrectly

work or schooling?

Maybe using the same machine and having to do something with the other facebook cookies?

otherwise, it's tinfoil hat time

age and location are incorrect. Location they could get from the IP at time of setup.

NO information apart from the very basic falsehoods to setup.

Nothing about school, employment, friends, family, habits. hobbies - essentially nothing they can use for marketing.

[StreetCowboy]

A couple of months ago I made the silly mistake of joining linkedin as I thought a friend had

invited me, within minutes I was inundated with e-mails from linkedin and I immediately tried

, in vain, to get my name removed from their site. I continued to, and still get, e-mails from them

and various people trying to sell rubbish to me via linkedin, I have not been able to stop it but

thank my e-mail for having a junk file.

I have a mobile phone, a computer with Skype and with these things I can communicate by phone

, e-mail and face to face with anyone in the world in real time. I can send and receive messages

photos, movies and converse. If I require something I cannot find in Thailand I can find, order and pay

for it in minutes on the internet.

Apart from bother me with more unwanted useless nonsense what can faceache do for me that the

above facilities cannot???

I would also be interested as posted by a previous poster, Chigog I think, how facebook can prevent

identity theft, I would have thought it was an excellent tool for identity thieves.

I find LinkedIn quite useful, as my colleagues tend to change jobs and locations quite quickly... one step ahead, and so forth; I can't be bothered posting the musical links but I'm sure your imagination can fill in more details than I could ever provide... Anyway, LinkedIn is a fairly quick way to contact people whose emails may change, whose phone numbers may change etc.

[pgs]

I set up a FB page with a fake name & an email address that was given to no-one I know.

It has no photos of people or anything that can be connected to me.

The list of 'people you could know' FB sends out to encourage linking regularly contains 8 - 10 people that I do know.

If I haven't used any even remotely identifiable details, and details that no-one I know could know, how does FB generate a list containing so many people that I do know from a DB of supposedly multi-millions of people?

The email being used has no people listed in the contacts, and does not connect to any of my regular email accounts.

All I can put it down to is some variant of spyware used by FB.

Anyone got any ideas?

Most likely its information you entered. For instance, if you put where you work/worked it will seek out others that worked there too. Its all about the information you provide to them.

and multi-millions you say? not even close!

1.06 billion monthly active users (MAU) as of December 31, 2012

It has a fake name & an email address used for FB only.

No personal info - not even made up.

It contains nothing that can be connected to me.

As for their 1.06B users - I know sufficient that use several FB accounts/names, so multiply that out & the real mumber comes down a lot.

[theblether]

...the keynote speech was about me. Half way through the speech the keynote speaker invited me to stand up and finish the story, which I duly did.

haha... and there I was, in the office, with the BB Leader with my trousers round my ankles.

That's a wee shame son, have you had counselling for that?

[jcnbkk]

Facebook can be a great tool if you are not too daft to know how to use it and keep it from using you. Much less intrusive than email. Post it once and then it is up to the people in your group to view or ignore. Very easy and very simple.

Agree. A update goes out to all friends instead of multiple emails. And they can do the same. Just another -sometime- useful tool to stay in touch with friends.

[Pops]

Why do anyone need a facebook-account?? To share your pathetic lives with the rest of the world!

What purpose does it serve?

nothing wrong with FB, if you use it properly,

I have been taking to past friends I havent seen in 25 years, and wouldnt have known how to get hold of them...so from that perspective its good, but documenting every facet of your life every day...yes a bit pathatic, but the worst one is people posting photos of what they are eating at that specfic minute...I mean who gives a F what ya eating, but then again this is not just restricted to FB, have seen this on TV as well...children I can understand doing it, but middle/old aged men... ....very stange to me

The fact that you haven't spoken to them in 25 years and did not know how to get a hold of them, just shows you were not that close as friends in the first place.

It sounds like Facebook created the urge to all of a sudden talk to people that you did not have the urge to talk to in 25 years.

In my opinion, the only good thing about Facebook is that it allows people without a social life to finally have one.

And there are a lot of lonely people out there !!

[bendejo]

I have a fake FB account to be able to access info ("see our FB page for details"), no personal info, no activity save for page viewing. Every day I get at least three emails from them with crap like "Here's some people you may know" etc. I created an alternate spam filter for these.

What I really don't like is I have to keep add-ons to my browser to prevent FB from following me. I find that intrusive. At some point there will be a lawsuit regarding this "internet trailing" and we'll see what comes of that. If I had a brother-in-law lawyer I might do it myself.

[chonabot]

Funny this complaining about fb on smartphones etc

I was a UNIX coder for 20 years and understand most IT applications. But on my phone, I have no camera, no Internet access, just a phone line.

I feel that many cell/mobile phone users who open up the floodgates with internet etc..would be better advised to stick with a basic, yet vital, service.

Leave the extras to people who actually enjoy it.

I must have been pissed last night, I have no recollection of posting this load of twaddle - apologies

[mogandave]

If my friends want to know what I'm doing they can call, or better, just swing by the crib.

[phuketjock]

A couple of months ago I made the silly mistake of joining linkedin as I thought a friend had

invited me, within minutes I was inundated with e-mails from linkedin and I immediately tried

, in vain, to get my name removed from their site. I continued to, and still get, e-mails from them

and various people trying to sell rubbish to me via linkedin, I have not been able to stop it but

thank my e-mail for having a junk file.

I have a mobile phone, a computer with Skype and with these things I can communicate by phone

, e-mail and face to face with anyone in the world in real time. I can send and receive messages

photos, movies and converse. If I require something I cannot find in Thailand I can find, order and pay

for it in minutes on the internet.

Apart from bother me with more unwanted useless nonsense what can faceache do for me that the

above facilities cannot???

I would also be interested as posted by a previous poster, Chigog I think, how facebook can prevent

identity theft, I would have thought it was an excellent tool for identity thieves.

I find LinkedIn quite useful, as my colleagues tend to change jobs and locations quite quickly... one step ahead, and so forth; I can't be bothered posting the musical links but I'm sure your imagination can fill in more details than I could ever provide... Anyway, LinkedIn is a fairly quick way to contact people whose emails may change, whose phone numbers may change etc.

If someone changes their e-mail/phone number and doesn't tell you that would be a pretty clear

indication they don't want you to contact them no???

[Soutpeel]

Why do anyone need a facebook-account?? To share your pathetic lives with the rest of the world!

What purpose does it serve?

nothing wrong with FB, if you use it properly,

I have been taking to past friends I havent seen in 25 years, and wouldnt have known how to get hold of them...so from that perspective its good, but documenting every facet of your life every day...yes a bit pathatic, but the worst one is people posting photos of what they are eating at that specfic minute...I mean who gives a F what ya eating, but then again this is not just restricted to FB, have seen this on TV as well...children I can understand doing it, but middle/old aged men... ....very stange to me

The fact that you haven't spoken to them in 25 years and did not know how to get a hold of them, just shows you were not that close as friends in the first place.

It sounds like Facebook created the urge to all of a sudden talk to people that you did not have the urge to talk to in 25 years.

In my opinion, the only good thing about Facebook is that it allows people without a social life to finally have one.

And there are a lot of lonely people out there !!

Oh dear...would appear there are a lot of bitter little people out there as well

I am not sure how you equate this to a lack of social life, I have a full social life in Thailand and have had one in every one of the 10 so countries I have lived and working in the last 25 years or so, as have a lot of my friends over the same time period, people move on with their lives, but that doesn mean, some one is any less of a friend, a measure of friend is not being joined at the hip at all times

One of the measures of a true friendship IMHO is that irrespective of the time you last spoke to someone, when you do talk to someone, you can pick up from where you left off all those years ago.

Facebook certainly "faciltated" this for me in certain cases, I had a very good friend from years before who I had lost touch with and hadnt seen in 16 years, I had gone off and done what I do, and he had done the same...

made a re-connection on facebook and made arrangements to meet up over one christmas, which involved thousands of miles of travel for both of us, which we both did and after meeting up in a bar on the beach, after a few beers, the whole 16 years disappeared, yes the faces were older, the hair greyer, but back to were we were 16 years before, it was a good laugh

Facebook is good, provided you use it properly..

[StreetCowboy]

A couple of months ago I made the silly mistake of joining linkedin as I thought a friend had

invited me, within minutes I was inundated with e-mails from linkedin and I immediately tried

, in vain, to get my name removed from their site. I continued to, and still get, e-mails from them

and various people trying to sell rubbish to me via linkedin, I have not been able to stop it but

thank my e-mail for having a junk file.

I have a mobile phone, a computer with Skype and with these things I can communicate by phone

, e-mail and face to face with anyone in the world in real time. I can send and receive messages

photos, movies and converse. If I require something I cannot find in Thailand I can find, order and pay

for it in minutes on the internet.

Apart from bother me with more unwanted useless nonsense what can faceache do for me that the

above facilities cannot???

I would also be interested as posted by a previous poster, Chigog I think, how facebook can prevent

identity theft, I would have thought it was an excellent tool for identity thieves.

I find LinkedIn quite useful, as my colleagues tend to change jobs and locations quite quickly... one step ahead, and so forth; I can't be bothered posting the musical links but I'm sure your imagination can fill in more details than I could ever provide... Anyway, LinkedIn is a fairly quick way to contact people whose emails may change, whose phone numbers may change etc.

If someone changes their e-mail/phone number and doesn't tell you that would be a pretty clear

indication they don't want you to contact them no???

DOn't think so. It could mean they had gone to ground and were on the run from the long arm of the law.

or that their contract had ended and they'd moved on to a new country, a new address, a new phone system, a new company, a new email address - perhaps two or three times since we last met.

Or it could be an indication of the inadequacies of my directory management

SC

[StreetCowboy]

Funny this complaining about fb on smartphones etc

I was a UNIX coder for 20 years and understand most IT applications. But on my phone, I have no camera, no Internet access, just a phone line.

I feel that many cell/mobile phone users who open up the floodgates with internet etc..would be better advised to stick with a basic, yet vital, service.

Leave the extras to people who actually enjoy it.

I must have been pissed last night, I have no recollection of posting this load of twaddle - apologies

It was probably spy ware that posted on your behalf. You'll probably find you're now a paid-up member of the Conservative Party as well... just make sure the wife is not around when you open any brown envelopes - it might not be cash

SC

Edited April 6, 2013 by StreetCowboy