The train accident doesn't surprise me - but how the fark did it end up on Facebook?

Is Mr Zuckerberg's creation so ubiquitous that everything that happens in the world will eventually end up there?

I have a Facebook page which has little information about me - and I have been seriously considering closing it.

My 33 year old daughter in Oz seems to be totally consumed by it - where is it heading?

Do people realise that the more information they post there, the more they are exposed to the entire cyberworld?

I am interested in how others see Facebook, and their thoughts.

Facebook is evil.

Recall just a decade or more ago when loss of privacy was one of the most contentious issues surrounding the Internet. People (Americans) were fighting it tooth and nail. Now those same people and their kids are putting their entire lives online. Hell, Facebook even provides the US government with custom interfaces so they can data mine the lives and connections of everyone on it - and NOT on it but can be associated with someone who is.

For example, If I send an email to you, the header of that email contains identifying and linkable information about me. Because you are on Facebook, you gave permission for themto dig through your emails and contact lists. So Uncle Sam can pull my one email to you and from the header info, find my location and a lot more. They could also link the header info to anyone else on Facebook whom I emailed and get a near complete picture of everyone I know which helps them create a profile about me despite me not being on Facebook. They can dig through all their pictures AND all the pictures on their mobile device (yes, the ones they have not uploaded) and find pictures of me. Then, they can use anatomical references to search live camera streams and see me at the Chong Nonsi BTS station in Bangkok in real time.

And this is just a simple example of the long-known capabilities...

As for the train wreck, I have sympathy for the innocent daughter, but I see too many idiots trying to beat the train to have any sympathy for any driver. One less idiot to cause an accident for you and yours or me and mine.

OT went on Facebook for thirty seconds, found it to be rubbish, and removed himself from Facebook. My daughter was explaining to me that its inventor Mark Zukerberg made Facebook to talk amongst his friends in the playgound about a girlfriend that had jilted him.
Makes you feel like a bit of a pr1ck being suckered into using Facebook. Kids love it - leave it there.

When you get an e mail from Facebook saying "so and so wants to be your friend" they should have a "tell them to fcuck off" option. That would then make it more adult.

OT......................

Following on from the discussion of Facebook, I'm curious how many members use social media, and if it's worthwhile, useful, or simply a very insecure channel we should be careful with, and watch out for?

For example, which is better or safer? Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, GooglePlus, etc.?

Have you made friends, found friends, or gotten business from any of these sites? Maybe LinkedIn?

I was dragged in kicking and screaming, and basically just lurk keeping up a bit with what family and a few friends are doing.

I think if Google's involved, one should join and share at one's risk.

I'm sure others know more. What do you think?

Got in touch with a couple of ex mates from before I got married (the first time).
Can't see what all the fuss is about, if you don't do anything wrong, why the hell should you be worried about people knowing where you are and what your doing?

HOWEVER .......... If you 'as been fibbin' to the Inland Revenue /Social Security :-& /IRS etc; then

personally i think facebook is a great tool for keeping friends and family upto date on whats going on

i uploaded my entire lifes photo collection , memories if you like of years gone by, for free .. holidays to various countries , and different female companions of the time.. different businesses i have owned over the years, all digitised on facebook

i upload videos from my phone of my son, as he is growing up that would probably be lost if i didnt get them on the net ! .. for me , him and others to see in the future

i,ve got in touch again with old school friends and rekindled friendships

a mistake i made a couple years ago was joining a game called mafia wars that made you add friends to make your mafia stronger .. my real world friends, updates , were lost amongst the game garbage ! took me hours to manually delete , one by one my fake friends

as happens occasionaly , you fall out with friends or part company for various reasons.. when this happens i always remember to delete them from my account, not wanting them to have access to my information.. its very controllable as to who sees what .

the privacy settings i have selected , only allow people i choose to view my facebook account , and even then , i can control what % of my life , i give them access to

our house in Udon was burgled recently , and i lost amongst other things my phone .. i posted a message on facebook asking friends and family to email me numbers again..

running a business i regularly post on internet forums to promote my business using photos.
photos on forums need to be a specific size

uploading any photo to facebook, automatically gets reduced in size .. you can then download again at a size suitable for most internet forums.. for free

the movie , The Social Network (2010) gives the how, facebook was started story
a young man who in his 20,s became a billionaire

facebook has millions of users from all over the world.. obviously many people are pro facebook, myself included

thats my opinion anyway

Librarian

Like it or not, I think facebook is a generation determiner. You'd be as hard pressed to find a young person who doesn't like it as you would an older who does.....sort of like marijuana was back in the 60's/70's. And just like there are plenty of those younger folks who are today in their 60's/70's and still imbibe in a bit of weed from time to time, in 30 years, there'll probably be plenty of older folks who still do facebook or the next generation.
For me, I don't have the time.....but for someone who does, more power to them.
98% of the people who are logging on to the internet each day are giving away more private information than they would probably do voluntarily. It's the nature of the beast........but for me, I wouldn't trade the internet for my smith corolla for a $1000.

Librarian wrote:personally i think facebook is a great tool for keeping friends and family upto date on whats going on

I don't think anyone would argue about the utility of communication tools - and Facebook is certainly the leader there.

The question I ask myself is whether or not everything that you can do on Facebook can be done via other less-intrusive media - without revealing your whole life to all in cyberspace.

For example, are your photos geotagged - where people can tell when and where you were at a particular time, just by looking at the small file attached to a digital photo?

Without wanting to sound too crusty, I am happy to live the rest of my life without making it any easier for Big Brother (and Mark Zukerburg) knowing every detail.

The argument about not worrying if you have not done anything wrong does not hold water in my view - particularly if it is in the hands of someone else to make that decision.

All the concern about facebook privacy, yet a good number of people post their life diary on forums such as these. Even a guy like Ted Kaczynski who played hermit in the woods of Montana, yet published a manifesto, was outed by his brother. Had he just done the bombings and kept his views to himself, he could have probably continued on for much longer. But once you start gabbing, you lose your privacy.....and gabbing today includes twitter, facebook, sms, email, you name it.

OT came across an article in the paper today about Facebook Fanatics. Top of the list of users per 1000 people globally is Iceland with 688, which hardly surprised me considering its a bit chilly to go out. 2nd is Faroe Islands next Hong Kong, Singapore and Cyprus. 16th came in the UK (483 users per 1000 people) and 17th USA (477).
Completely unrelated, the article also mentioned that the Australians were the biggest boozers in the world with an average consumption of 99.4 litres sold per head of population ahead of Finland, Germany, Czech Rep and Austria. This was another thing that didn't surprise OT as the ozzies do make a nice pint.

OT................................

One of the many problems I have with social media sites is that whatever you put there is out there FOREVER. Do not ever believe that some delete key or button removes what is posted in cyberspace. It doesn't. Sure it might be trendy to put your family's lives online now, but what will be done with that information years or decades from now? Perhaps it will affect your kids' lives tomorrow when they become adults in ways you haven't considered or cannot fathom today. You think future employers, friends, enemies, or institutions are not going to have access to that info when you have long forgotten about it or kicked the bucket? If so, you need to rethink that.

I can google old aliases from long ago and pull up some pretty embarrassing and/or stupid stuff I would not want certain people to know or see. I sure as hell would not want whatever I do now to affect my kids later WHEN someone tries to surreptitiously access information about them. Controlling information about oneself or loved ones is tossed to the wind when one participates in these seemingly innocuous, but wholly sinister social media sites. There is an alterior motive behind every "fun" thing they offer visitors. Everything you do or people you associate with do contributes to the profile they have about you and dossier they are collecting on you.

Think about it: If some stranger asked you to supply that much information about yourself, friends, and family in paper form, would you give it to him? Would you give it to me? Because I have it or can get it. Linked to your daughter? Well, maybe I will find your home and park where I can watch her and your wife. How does the prospect of that happening work for you? Still feel good about it? Maybe you have pictures taken inside your home that show criminals exactly what they can get from your house in addition to the PC or laptop. They would know when to make a visit because you tell everyone when you are going on vacation and that everyone in the household is going along.

Another major problem I have with social media is people no longer pick up the phone or stop by for a visit. The sense of RL community is damaged. Instead of a cheerful voice, you get an SMS with a attached. Everyone expects that you are online and monitoring for messages ALL THE TIME. So, instead of calling with urgent and/or important information, they send a message. Then when you get it too late, the excuse is "check the timestamp - not my fault". Drives me up the friggin wall, that one.

I'm not a hardcore guy, but if Facebook and all the other social media sites and tools were babies, I would not feel bad if I read someone drowned and clubbed them all.

Finally (hopefully), another thing I hate about the sites is that the people you used to communicate with via phone or letter forget about you unless you are also on that site. So, you feel compelled to join or be left out in the desert. If that isn't wicked, then I do not know what is.

Do I have accounts? Unfortunately, yes. However, each and every one (including this one) contains false information and different email addresses. Even "real" pictures of me I send to people I meet online are fake - pulled from somone else's profile somewhere. Good luck to anyone with sinister intentions harming me or mine.

I think being aware of the ramifications of social media is a good thing,allowing individuals to make better choices.
Personally,I like the open transparency available and wish it was the standard way of life everywhere.I have many ''negatives'' in my past,but I don't hide them,I accept them ,learn and go on.To each his own.

I don't like military and intelligence sites hacked and revealed to the World either,but that makes me different than many people that think that is a good thing as long as their personal life isn't revealed

When i am sitting here 3 km outside the mainroad and 25 years lack of infrastructure, no phoneline, no broadband, i am happy that i can use my cellphone whit an extraantenna as an internet connector, facebook is for me the best and the cheapest way to socalize whit family and friends on the other side of the world. That doesnt meen i need to sell my self out to the world. I can keep my integracy bo shoosing who i let in on my FB site...its an easy task. I look the public thing and only friends can see what i am writing on FB and......i dont let friends of friends be my friend in real life so why on FB

That is my way to keep my integracy on FB....i dont go public but socialize whit real friends and thats great!!!

Anthony Weiner (Democrat, New York) didn't need a fancy social media site to crash and burn. A simple mobile phone was all it took. Ultimately, for me, it comes down to what you say.....the media, whether it be mobile phone, facebook, twitter, or udonmap, doesn't matter much. Check that......on udonmap, you don't even have to register to view 99% of the posts. And it wouldn't take much of a sophisticated detective to uncover the whereabouts of many of the members.
For those worried about privacy, I wonder how many worry about an unsecured wifi link that they share when out and about.

In general I have to say that I agree with most of the reservations and criticisms mentioned above.

However, as there are an ever increasing number of businesses that offer additional discounts for being ”liked” there does appear to be a sound financial case for creating and maintaining a “minimalist” Facebook page.

It can certainly be a good way for families and friends to keep in contact.

At the end of the day it should always be remembered that everything on the internet can be accessed by anybody with the technological capability - this could include your government, techno geeks, employers, anyone who may dislike you and most five year old kids

I think Facebook is a great tool for keeping in touch with friends and family when you're away from home, however I think there is a lot of time wasting rubbish on there. I never bother with all the apps and games, any new app that is sent my way is zapped straight away.

I limit the amount of private info I share so I'm not too concerned about security. There are quite a lot of people who are not so bothered about it and I'm amazed at the amount of stuff people share online.

Facebook is also useful for businesses to update their customers with what's going on at their business, it saves having to send out newsletters which most people bin.

i am trying to understand some others point of view.. even if i do not agree entirely

some are saying it is unwise, unsafe, etc etc , to post information on social media sites like facebook.

they are saying it is unsafe to post on sites like facebook , but expressing there opinion by using web forums like Udon Map to do so
Udon Map requires a minimal amount of information to post .. ie email addresses etc etc

so if i understand correctly, posting on web forums like udon map , where there are no privacy tools to restrict who can read what... is ok ... but posting on facebook , with a massive amount of privacy and restriction tools is not ok..

there is no logic that makes sense to me in these statements , apart from an argumentitive / unreasoned point of view , voiced without serious thought.

does this not sound a bit hypocritical ? well it does to me , but we are all entitled to our opinions and fair discussions are interesting

Librarian

Librarian, one (in my view, major) difference you may want to consider is that people normally run a Facebook account under their real name, whereas very few do so on UdonMap, or similar forums.

Makes plenty of sense to me.

ok Jack

for example.. by a simple click of your user name .. it has you as living in bang dung , and retired .. maybe that is false , maybe that is true . i have never met you i think ... but i imagine you probably do live in bang dung , you probably are retired and you may even be called Jack

the point i am trying to make.. which wasnt directed at you in particular by the way.. is how can people say for example , facebook is unsafe and evil etc etc

and yet use sites such as these on a regular basis , to give or obtain information , and each time giving a little bit away of them selves

i used the word hypocritical
1.
a person who pretends to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that he or she does not actually possess, especially a person whose actions belie stated beliefs.
2.
a person who feigns some desirable or publicly approved attitude, especially one whose private life, opinions, or statements belie his or her public statements.

because that is how i see it.. i am not asking for you to agree or disagree with my view .. i am merely voicing my opinion , in the same way that you voice yours

you started this thread on the 16th at 8.46pm .. and invited opinions of others .

on the 17th i put a link on a thread i started, to a photo set hosted on facebook.. because i am an obvious user of facebook i felt obliged to voice my opinion ( which seems in the minority ! ) on the benefits of sites such as these.

whilst i agree people abuse these sites , there are a great many who use them for the purpose they were intended. social networking.

i think in general , people who use the internet, should and do realise that what you say today , is here forever.. and as long as you post in a polite , respectful , reasoned and logical way , you have no fear of what the future may hold

have a peaceful Sunday afternoon .. on the lake

Librarian