5 WTFs: I Quit Facebook Today

As a birthday present to CEO Mark Zuckerberg, I deleted my Facebook account for good today. No, I didn’t deactivate it. I deleted it.

Epitaph.

Now, I know there are people who like to make a big show out of their quitting things, and I’ve especially noticed this happening when people decide to leave Facebook (or the Internet). I’ll let my leaving on Zuck’s birthday be the most “show” I make of this. However, I have spent roughly 5 years using the service (longer than I spent using the now-defunct umn.edu email address that served as my login), so I believe a few words are in order, especially given the recent round of commentary and controversy surrounding the latest (of the latest of the latest) changes Facebook has thrust upon its users. Also, five years is a long time to do anything, especially on the Internet, and that merits some reflection.

To structure my thoughts, I have decided to return to a motif I utilized in a speech I gave at the UWM OneWebDay celebration back in 2008, when I decided that the 5 Ws stood to be reinvented for the digital era as the 5 WTFs: who the fuck, what the fuck, where the fuck, when the fuck, and why the fuck.

At first I was going to hurl my WTFs at Facebook, as we have all undoubtedly logged into the service and thought “WTF?!?” at some point (“WTF is this Beacon thing? WTF is this NewsFeed thing? WTF how do I change my privacy settings this time? WTF is Farmville? WTF did my grandma just add me as a friend?”). But, to be fair, Facebook is getting a lot of WTFs thrown their way lately, and I don’t have the time or energy to get into that fray. Instead, I will turn the expletives towards Facebook’s users (in the most respectful way possible), still counting myself among them, as I’ve only just left. On that note…

Who the fuck are we?

Who the fuck turns over so much personal information to a third-party service? The answer is: everyone. We turn information over to third-parties all the time. We put letters in the mail. We send packages via UPS. We call each other over mobile networks. We tell so-and-so to tell so-and-so this or that. We pass notes. But relinquishing certain information to a third-party doesn’t mean we assume we’re relinquishing all expectations of privacy, too. If Sally takes my note for Billy and shows it to Suzy on the way, I may very well get upset. If my mail carrier opens my mail, I’d rightly be angry. See, the service doesn’t determine my privacy expectations (though, admittedly, it may influence it), the information does. If that note reads “macaroni on the menu today,” I’d probably be less upset than if it read “I think I’m going to ask Suzy out.” But Facebook has never truly understood this. They’ve paid lip service to the idea, but still obviously operate under the assumption that by simply logging into Facebook you’ve opted in to whatever they decide to do. “Everything is opt-in on Facebook,” Elliot Schrage, Facebook’s vice president for public policy, stated on NYT’s Bits blog last Tuesday. “Participating in the service is a choice.” Well, for that matter so is using the mail. Or passing a note. Or opening my mouth to speak. Now, I’m not totally discounting the role of personal responsibility, but there are contextual considerations surrounding our actions that are bigger than just “a choice.” We still maintain expectations of privacy – to varying degrees – even in public. Facebook doesn’t respect that fact, and it isn’t clear that they have any intention of ever respecting it. So, in that light, maybe we are “dumb fucks,” after all. But, if we are dumb fucks, it’s not for entrusting our information to a third-party. Rather, we’re dumb fucks for entrusting it to Facebook. Which begs the question…

What the fuck are we doing on Facebook? A common question among Facebook users contemplating quitting is, “where would we go?” No one wants to go back to MySpace. They’ll give you blank stares if you mention Orkut. They’ll laugh you out of the room if you say Friendster. But, the truth is, those services are all out there, and they all have privacy policies for you to consider (policies that are probably shorter than the US Constitution…unlike Facbook’s). So, there must be something else standing in our way. In my experience, those something elses are largely 1. “but everyone is here” and 2.”I like it.” As for the first one, that leads us to a bit of tautology, no? “Everyone is here because everyone is here.” If no one leaves, no one will ever be anywhere else. Which plays into the second part, “I like it.” Do you think Facebook got to be as useful as it is without the active participation of users? Absolutely not. Those of us who have used it since very near the beginning can tell you that the current iteration of Facebook, in terms of usability, is unrecognizable to the first iteration. The Newsfeed, Wall, comments, likes, suggestions, and apps are all useful tools developed in large part by analyzing user behavior (and, uh, other social networks) and developing new tools. It’s hard to believe now, but in 2005 the “poke” was one of Facebook’s most robust features. The poke! (And it actually got people laid back then, too. So, you can imagine the horror when my grandmother, four years later, used the feature to say “hello.”) If you give other sites a fair shake at developing useful tools for you, some of them will. And they might do it without slowly stripping you of your privacy either. So…

Where the fuck aren’t we spending our time? There are the aforementioned social networks. There’s Twitter. There’s Tumblr. There’s Posterous. There’s the entire fucking Internet. Blogs. Message boards. Commenting spaces. Now, I’m not saying that any of these are necessarily better at respecting you and your privacy than Facebook (though I’d venture to guess that a good many of them are), but they are there to check out. The problem is that we we get stuck in certain rhythms, don’t we? We develop habits, and Facebook is addicting. It is part of what a professor of mine calls “the social media timesuck.” It goes something like: Twitter to Facebook to email to chat to Twitter to Facebook to email to chat, etc…. We’ve all been there, caught in the same cycle of refreshing pages, rotating through the same Websites, wasting time. Let me say that I have nothing against this – I do it quite often myself! But, one day I realized that nothing about Facebook is integral to this cycle. There are millions of other Websites that, with just a little bit of effort, can take Facebook’s place in the timesuck cycle.  I tried this just over a year ago with Tumblr. I joined up and started using it more and more and, combined with Twitter, it all but eliminated Facebook from the loop…and I still waste plenty of time online. I’m just wasting it without forfeiting it to the Zuck. Now, I’m not saying Tumblr is the site for everyone, but it’s out there. It’s a big Internet, people! Go explore! That being said…

When the fuck are we going to leave? Sure, maybe Facebook will come around. Maybe Facebook will pull another about face on privacy and start praising its virtues again. But, as a wise man once said, “Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.” Not that I expect everyone to leave, nor do I necessarily think everyone should. In fact, during last week’s Privacy Week, I volunteered in a booth at UW-Milwaukee’s Gold Meir Library set up to distribute information to students about how to use their privacy controls on Facebook. There were handouts, and even live workstations where we helped people change their settings and opt-out of the new Instant Personalization service. One young girl, however, sat down and asked me to show her where her privacy settings were. Once I navigated her to the proper page, I noticed all of her settings were set completely public. When I informed her of this, she responded with: “Good. I want everyone to know who I am!” and promptly walked away. She’s probably not leaving Facebook anytime soon. But, if you’re still reading this, there’s a chance you might be. You’ve probably thought about it, and maybe considering a few of the things I’ve mentioned above will help. Think about their track record and ask yourself what it would take for you to leave. Explore the Web. Make an exit plan. Tell your friends. And, once we’ve all done that, the only question  remaining is:

Why the fuck haven’t we left yet?

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