Finalizing the Breakup with Facebook
Do You Know What Your Friends and Family are Doing Right this Minute? Will You ask Them in Person or Consult Facebook?
A Little More About Social Networking
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Facebook? Why Bother?
After three years on Facebook and this brand of social networking, the thrill was gone for me. Around Christmas of last year, I vowed to start the New Year right. I am not one to make New Year’s resolutions, but I vowed to break up with Facebook. I was determined to begin 2012 without it.
I did get my wish. More than halfway through this month, and after my 14-day waiting period ended, I was done with Facebook. I got together with a friend for lunch, and we got to discuss our lives in suburbia. Over a plate of gyros and fries, I talked to Betty about keeping up with people she knew. You see, Betty was never a Facebook follower. By talking to her, it was then that I realized that I had done the right thing for me.
Facebook, after signing up to permanently delete my account and waiting the 14-day period of not checking in, was now my past. I was told by my former Facebook friends that you cannot bring up my name, but my name remains on a gamer’s list with my name and a question mark beside it. If this means I had broken up with Facebook, that’s good enough for me.
“I stay at home all day and don’t know anyone in my neighborhood,” Betty confessed. “But Jackie, who lives down the street, knows everything about everybody living there.”
“You sound like me,” I replied. “I don’t care what my neighbors are doing, and I’m not going to find out.” In my neighborhood, I am one of the few people who are retired and stick around my house most of the day.
“But can you believe it?” asked Betty. “Jackie works full-time and still knows everything about everyone. I don’t have the time. If you ask me, I think she’s losing it. I can’t believe one person can keep track of that many people.”
But isn’t that what Facebook is for? To keep track of people in the easiest and convenient way possible? So this is why Facebook never quite suited me. Now that I waited out the required 14-day period before my Facebook account was permanently deleted, I still don’t know what most people are doing, and I don’t care about the “sharing” they bring to Facebook. I’m not sharing anything I do, either. Although this online site is highly touted as a social network, I never quite bought into that, too. In the beginning, it was fun at first, when a friend and two family members introduced me to Facebook as a fun way to keep in touch. But as the months went by, Facebook was just another thing in my already busy life to tend to.
Facebook people are predictable. Unless you have a celebrity in your group of family, friends, and business acquaintances, Facebook people usually experience the same activities. Similar activities reported at different times of the year.
Facebook wants you and doesn’t want to let you go. And, over the months, as I lost interest, I seldom logged on. To my surprise, Facebook kept leaving emails for me. “You have a friend who has a birthday this month” or “A friend left you a message.” It was all about keeping me and getting me to log into the site regularly.
A lack of interest and a dwindling Facebook account. My account dwindled down to 13 Facebook friends because of my absence, and the Facebook friends who “unfriended” at least did not leave me an email telling me so. You might say I had been spared some hurt feelings, and at the same time, I did not tell anyone on my Facebook account that I was “unfriending” them, either. By permanently leaving Facebook, I spared my Facebook friends the fact that I was leaving them or quietly dumping them. Take your pick. As long as you leave Facebook, you are leaving your Facebook friends behind. But your real family and friends on Facebook are still your friends. There may be hope that you will contact them in person.
Am I dealing with actual “friends” on this site or are they people who like to talk about everything they do? I already know that some of them keep me as a friend because I am part of their Facebook games. I may not play the games anymore, but the number of friends on your side mean a lot if you’re a Facebook gamer.
I didn’t think much of what would happen if I dumped my Facebook account. For months, I didn’t have to practice living without it because I didn’t check in. In fact, I did not have a desire to check in. But when Facebook first came out, I was checking my account every day.
But when I think about it, Facebook is no longer an online novelty. In fact, it has been rated as one of the worst businesses on the Internet when it comes to customer service and satisfaction. When you are away from Facebook long enough, you will forget your password. I used to post photographs and described our vacations. Absence from Facebook does not make the heart grow fonder. If you’re lucky, you may realize that you do have a life, and you can live without Facebook.
In the beginning, when I created my Facebook account, I was addicted to their games like Farmville and Mafia Wars. I had two accounts on Facebook to build “my online people,” but Facebook frowns on people mixing business with pleasure. They want you to have only one account. Somewhere down the road, the second account I had created to build my games was deleted by Facebook.
So what now? Since I retired and was finally able to return to writing, I wasn’t interested in Facebook as a place to showcase my creativity. When I began my blog and began posting my work on my Facebook page, I had very little response. I truly believe that my friends and family were only interested in viewing photographs or leaving quick comments. They had no time to read.
I had joined (and then quit) a local writing group because I found the writers and wannabe writers cannibalistic. But before I left the group, I was told to establish my writer’s platform using Facebook, Twitter, a blog, and a website. One buffoon bragged that he used LinkedIn and was traveling to Los Angeles for formal dinners with the rich and famous. As he dropped names, I tuned him out. He was a small town hick with big city dreams like writing a string of best sellers from a cabin in Tahoe. I doubt if the wheelers and dealers in Hollywood paid attention to him.
So far, I had Facebook and a blog. And I had a phone that costs $40 a month that didn’t Tweet. I have no interest in the language of Tweeting. I feel like everyone in social networking has this one, big common problem:
“Pay attention to me! Pay attention to me! Look at me! This is what I’ve done lately, so pay attention to me!”
Facebook Tends to Cover up Real Problems and Emotions. We are all living in an ideal online world. So now, without Facebook, I go at my own speed, stay home and write. And in order to write, I have to shut down the extra noise. I am tired of the noise, and all the names and faces have changed when it comes to activities posted here. I am not interested in:
1) Your endless vacation photographs. Unless I happened to be there. And if you vacation as a couple, do you realize that most photographs don’t have the both of you in them unless you ask a stranger to take the photograph?
2) Pictures of the kids and you baby talking to them about their newest school achievement. Face it. I am Auntie Arlene for life because I made the choice not to have children. I look at photographs of children and see dollar signs over their cute little faces. They will need braces and college educations and everything in between. I am grateful that you are the Mommy or Daddy and foot the bills instead of me. All I have to do is slip a $20 bill for them on birthdays and on Christmas. I’ll buy some Girl Scout cookies.
3) The latest toy or the latest boy or girl toy. What’s going to last longer? The cute Mercedes sports car with license plates fully exposed? Or the new boyfriend or girlfriend? With some people who don’t have staying power, t-shirts or socks last longer.
4) See what I’m doing to my house and garden. I don’t want to know because my house and garden are enough for me. If someone wanted to break into my house, they would look at my lack of housekeep skills and say, “Aw, no! This place is already been broken into! Let’s go somewhere else.”
5) This is what I’m doing now, this hour, today, and tomorrow. Oh, get a life, why don’t you? When you have to document each move you make on Facebook and Twitter, I say something is truly wrong with you. You need to get dressed and leave the house at times.
6) The daily rant. There are a lot of angry people in the world, and they don’t think about how they look to others when they constantly rant online. A rant is a rant, and it doesn’t belong anywhere.
7) The Facebook business account. People will set up their business account on Facebook. But if they aren’t pushing their business, they are revealing a lot of personal stuff.
Now, is this what I want an acquaintance to see? Would this Facebook page represent me as a writer if you dropped by and took a look at my site? No, it wouldn’t. Instead, they would see examples 1-7.
“But you can control Facebook,” argued one of my Facebook friends. He was one to do a lot of posting about his trips and vacations. But once he started posting the photographs, he didn’t know when to stop. Each week revealed a different location. I travel, too. But I found out a long time ago that people aren’t interested in your vacation unless they want to pump you for information concerning their own trip to the same location. Otherwise, eyes glaze over after the fourth or fifth photograph of the vacation. This also happens when someone shows photographs of the kids and the grandkids.
I tried to. I punched buttons and “hid” a lot of friends. But what I ended up with was the national business chains and authors pushing their books. I didn’t want that, either.
After Facebook, life goes on. So I permanently deleted my Facebook account and haven’t looked back. Although people swear by Facebook, I am happy with my decision. The problem with Facebook and following anyone online is that you can lose interest. You can hide the person, unfriend them or don’t check in. But if you hang onto a Facebook account that you haven’t used in a long time, it’s just like hanging onto a gym membership and not setting foot in the gym. It is my belief that you if you establish a Facebook account, you will use it and make it work. Sometimes, it doesn’t work that way.
Otherwise, as I’ve found, without Facebook, you make an effort to call and email friends, then meet with them. And I’m talking about spending time with them as living, breathing individuals instead of settling for blurbs and blips on a computer screen. You personally meet with them because you want to be there.
Works for me.
The Question that Started It All
- Can You Live Without Facebook?
Social networking giant, Facebook, will go public next year with its IPO. Would you invest in Facebook? Can you live without it?
The Decision to Break Up with Facebook did not come Overnight
- How to Break up with Facebook Forever
We tend to sign up with Facebook and leave it to clutter our computers when we don't use it. Breaking up with Facebook is certainly not hard to do.
Bye, Bye, My Facebook Account
Good point, Flora! Facebook was entertainment for me, but only for a brief time. I remember wanting to copy recipes, and here were pages and pages of comments from people that I didn't know. What did their opinions mean to me? Nothing! There were times when getting on Facebook meant watching pissing contests on who had the most toys, vacations or the smartest, cutest children. Common sense told me to turn off the noise.
Fantastic!
Thank you, taemc2! Should I celebrate my Facebook breakup and get out the Mountain Dew? Uh, there was an article that came out recently about Mountain Dew, and it was not good. I will need to think about something else. What would those people with 500+ Facebook friends do? That's a huge break up! Someone emailed me and said a lot of her 500+ Facebook friends were insulted when she announced that she was permanently deleting her account. Ewwwwwww!
I have mixed feelings about FB myself. On the one had, it IS useful for sharing photos with family you are UNABLE to see in person very often. Because my son-in-law had posted photos of their new baby throughout his first year, I was able to download those photos, print them out myself, and send them to the baby's great-grandmother, who does not have internet service. Otherwise, she would have missed out on seeing the newest family member. The baby's parents are barely making it, and don't have money to print out all the photos with copies enough to mail to the family, so FB fills that gap nicely.
The games--ah--the games! They ARE a big time suck, and I did stop playing them for a long while. That is, until my daughter-in-law sucked my husband in because she needed a "neighbor" in CastleVille. Then, of course, hubby needed a neighbor, so I got sucked back in. BAH!
I do actually have better things to do with my time. And, I don't give a rat's patoot if so-and-so is going out to the mall with friends, or is having a cup of joe...that's the kind of crap that gets posted on Twitter.
But, I initially signed up for networking purposes--it gives me a place to share my latest writings and generate traffic, and yes, I have over 200 "friends" that I actually don't know from Adam....or in person in any way...they are part of my network concerning issues in which I am interested, such as animal welfare...like-minded people.
So, as irritated as I sometimes get with the stupid games, the endless ads, and stupid posts, I probably won't delete my account because for me, the couple of things I do find useful outweigh the negatives.
I'm glad you made Facebook work for you, MsLizzy. I latched onto the Facebook pages of the charities and organizations I had supported, but their pages didn't do the charities or groups justice. Nothing was updated, or only a handful of people ran the site and communicated within these groups. Since my retirement, I have learned to be more selective. I have become very selfish with my time, so quality time with my friends and family is very important to me. Relationships are everything, and I won't settle for online relationships when my friends and family are within reach. Most of them are. I can either pick up the phone for a brief conversation and meet them somewhere to catch up.
I think Facebook is a waste of time for all the reasons who have written, I am "breaking" up with this odd creation for it holds no use to me, I though it may help with traffic then again I would rather take the chance of a more organic approach.
Well done, voted up of course.
You are soooooo right! When those writers in the group kept pushing Facebook, Tweet, blogs, and websites to establish their writer's platforms, what does it come down to? Even if they had all of these ways to "establish" their careers, they are still stuck with books they self-published. It was such a big thing for some of these writers to self-publish, but they found out that this writer's platform was not even enough to sell their books.
Your drawing cracks me up. I respect your wish to terminate fb. For me, it's just an account, quite idle but it does help me to keep up with friends. But I agree, nothing like a personal talk or time spent together to show love and care.
Thanks, angin! I was going as far as picturing me at a sheep shearing, but it got too busy. Too many sheepies. Since ending my Facebook account, I've found that I'm spending much more time with my friends and family. I enjoy them, and some of us are already planning Thanksgiving and Christmas. I realize now that Facebook doesn't work for me, but others have made it work for them.
I am not going to lie: I like facebook. I have been known to completely delete by page for years at a time and to start all over as my life shifts and changes. But when I moved abroad, I really saw the real value of facebook. It was a great way to stay in touch with people around the world and it even played a role in the organizing of many people for the Egyptian protests in Cairo. I think it has potential for good but it depends on how people choose to use it.Voting up! I love your writing and you inspire me!
Love the drawing and caption! I don't mind Facebook. I've used it to reconnect with people I've lost touch with over the years, and it's an easy way to stay connected with friends and relatives who live far away. Those are the benefits for me. It also drives a good amount of traffic to my hubs. I agree there are many annoying aspects of it, but at this point for me the good outweighs the bad. So I'm not ready to break up with it, but I'm glad you're happy with your decision.
Thank you, Krystal! That's a very high compliment from you since you've arrived at HubPages and are the newest shining star. The thing about me is that I'm retired, and I have the time to look up friends and family. I do have time to sit down for a quick cup of coffee or a meal that drags on and on. All I have to do is find a waitress that is patient enough to have us linger at the restaurant. A big tip helps, too. I think if I was working and did nothing but work all week, Facebook would work for me. But being retired, I'm always doing something. But at the same time, I'm available to meet in person and put time into my relationships.
Deborah, you are lucky that Facebook works for you and also drives people to your Hubs. Most of my former Facebook friends live within reach--either in Sacramento or two hours by car. So you might say I have friends and family from Sacramento to the San Francisco Bay Area. And I found out it's just as easy to jump into my truck and drive over to a local location or around San Francisco or the city slickers coming to Sacramento for a visit. It all works out. My brothers never bought into Facebook, so I have always made an effort to keep in touch with them through emails and family gatherings. The charity and Guild people are the ones I always see in person because there are regular meetings and activities held each month.
I, too am on Facebook, but I am not enthralled with this social network. It does make it easy to reach friends, but I think it is unnecessary. It has cheapened friendship as far as I am concerned and has made it trivial.
Thank you for your comments and insights, suzette! Facebook has its juvenile moments. I always hated that "Like" button. And my answers are long, so my comments would get cut off. I've learned how to pick up the phone or get out for a visit. I was never meant for Facebook.
Facebook causes jealousy issues, too.
I don't want to get too much into that. lol
I enjoyed this hub & think that you did the right thing! =]
Voted up, useful, & awesome.
Veronica, thank you for the vote up, comments and insights. Facebook DOES make some people jealous. Who doesn't know a few Keep-Up-with-the-Jones people or the One-Uppers on Facebook? Those people represent insecurity at its finest hour! Then what about the cyber bullying? Facebook tends to cover its problems, but whatever changes it makes to its program, its followers have to follow. Nothing like being at the mercy of Facebook.
Facebook is a mystery to me. I love my friends but my friends are close. One of the best things in life is catching up with one of my close friends on the phone - imagine this - a real conversation - where one talks the other listens and then responds. Love communication. I appreciate your take on Facebook.
I try to visit Facebook to catch up but alas my life does not revolve around Facebook.
I appreciate your insight in the fact that Facebook friends see photos only not reading. Maybe thats my other problem, I really do enjoy reading.
For me, I am addicted, forever to HubPages.
Hi, GmaGoldie. Thank you for your comments and your insights about Facebook and HubPages. With Facebook gone from my life, I noticed I am treating HubPages like my former Facebook account. There are people on HubPages that I won't read, so I will hide them. Which helps a lot when I'm going through the feed. I am retired, so I don't need all the noise. I do like peace and quiet, and I am one of those people who do well without carloads and carloads of friends and family. But if Facebook works for anyone, that's okay, too. It just didn't work for me. I gave it my best shot, then broke up with Facebook. It was painless! No regrets!
I started using FB to get in touch with my friends and family members who were not close to me, and I did it after years of everyone telling me that I simply had to do it... I used it for a few months, played some games, looked at some photos, and stopped using it. I haven't broken up with it, as you say, only because I still need it to get in touch with some people who never bother to open their emails... If this were any different, I would probably too brake up with FB :)
A great hub, Arlene, with a lot of good points!
nemanja, since breaking up with Facebook, I do make more of an effort to get in touch with my family and friends. But all of the people I want to get in touch with are a maximum 2 hours driving for me. Which is no big deal. Facebook works for some people. I can't see the point of Facebook mixing business and pleasure. Oh, no! Not with my family and friends. I can "hide" them all I want, but they're still there.
I have been one of those on again of again Facebook followers. It works for some of my friends and colleagues as a viable social network but for me not so much. With all of the changes currently taking place within the Facebook platform I look forward to my clean break as well.
Well written and thought provoking hub. Thank you Arlene.
Thank you, BeYOUtifulLife. Just my luck. My article comes out right before the Facebook IPO. Compared to the Facebook game company Zynga, which IPO came out last year, I'm curious to see how Facebook does. Other than that, I am very happy with my decision to permanently delete Facebook from my life. I am back to meeting with my family and friends the way it's supposed to be: in person!
FloraBreenRobison 4 months ago
The only vital service that facebook provides is being able to get photos of missing people /criminals out faster so that they can be located faster. The rest is just entertainment value purpose.