As an IT professional and a daily Facebook user I naturally have an opinion that I plan to share with everyone here about this. If you don't Facebook awesome for you, but was there really a need for 12 pages worth of self-serving 'me too' nonsense on the topic? Sure there are downsides to the site, sure but thats pretty much the norm with anything. People do get caught up in it for a myriad of reasons, maybe they are depressed, lonely, bored, whatever. Anything to excess is bad including ATS (and lot of folks here openly admit to being 'addicted').

On the topic of data mining and government snoops I think a lot of people are way over thinking things, if I was calling the shots at the NSA or CIA and wanted information about somebody on Facebook I wont waste time trying to get an operative to friend people; ill just obtain access to the database and call it a day at noon. Not a single person who is not on my friends list can access any information about me besides perhaps my name, but given that my profile is configured to not display a picture to those not already on my friend list they have no real way of knowing if its really me or one of the few million other people with the same name.

Furthermore I don't actually spend every waking moment staring at the Facebook main screen waiting for another status update from a friend; like a growing number of users I get updates on my cell phone so I don't have to burn my retinas out staring at the screen, just a periodic buzz on my desk if something new goes up. What it boils down to is people, they do stupid things all the time and generally show they don't have a clue how to be responsible and reasonable people leading to huge wastes of threads like this one.

Yea I never understood the obsession either. I mean its great for attention freaks but then again go and get them all on there so I wont have to deal with them in real life. The downside to leaving FB, you start spending all your time on some other site with a bunch of wierdos who share your all your same interests

I happen to use Facebook as a means of communicating with those close to me and in my past. I've reconciled with old friends, met new family members (or regained contact) who live across the globe just by having the account. This isn't to me like a kid and MySpace where it's a popularity contest to have the most friends, comments, etc.

It's fun that you can track your attention to specific topics as I am generally seeking actual discussion from Facebook as I do from members of ATS. I am part of a "secret group" or basically just a private one where I can freely discuss many topics similar to ATS posts with close friends and keep prying eyes out as it's an invite only type of deal that I communicate with in a small group. It's actually quite productive and interesting as the majority of them are skeptics - more fun for me as a believer in many things!

I can't remember the last time I looked at my profile or saw how many friends I have. I setup a few things when I first got the account, but mainly all I do is talk to people, post interesting articles (hard to do in person over the phone) for discussion and comment, track events and I'll post a little bit of poetry every now and again for some thought or criticism.

I don't use it as a popularity contest, I don't add people I don't know (although I'll have people from Middle / Elementary school add me, not say anything so deleted and away they go!), and I get actual discussion, thoughts, and sharing accomplished through a digital commonplace. Nobody on my news feed posts what they are doing at the moment, that's for Twitter. And that's what twitter was designed for and why I do not have an account. Facebook is a digital commonplace where information, discussion, and contacts are stored for retrieval.

I have fun, I learn, I reconcile, I discuss, and I act as a human being on a large scale with many people whom I see on a regular basis in real life. Anti-social behavior, huh?

It's all about context and how a particular person uses it. Don't bash Facebook for being Facebook. I think the advertisement schemes they use are highly inventive, non-obtrusive, and effective. Local businesses have definitely gotten my business solely because of information I got from a Facebook page or ad.

Oh I'll also add that I have my locals news stations added on there, for example of another use of Facebook. I can get streaming updates throughout the day on what is actually going on or what news there is on a local scene rather than waiting for evening news which is filled with in your face advertisement, and misinfo than just reading a particular article and also not wading through their website through all the other 'national pop' news of Sheen, Lohan, etc.

Plus on an interesting article I can pop in, leave a comment, discuss and maybe open people's minds to a different way of thinking just because I read an article I would have anyways.

Originally posted by jude11
"Jude11 is sitting on the toilet eating pork chops."

According to Face Book, this is interesting stuff.

Well aren't you the definition of efficiency?
LOL

I'd also like to point out that I've been having an on-going debate on my sports radio's facebook page for the last half hour and have learned a few things myself during this debate. So go ahead and keep calling it useless, worthless and mindless while I get a good baseball debate in with some fellow fans. You know, because if we just emailed each other back and forth this would go as smoothly....

I don't think we can even comprehend what it's doing to our youth psychologically. Me and my wife have ranted about it for hours on end.. Ever seen SouthPark's episode about facebook? It's seriously pretty genius. And the more time goes on, the more genius I think it is.

An old friend of my wife's once put it best without even realizing it.. She asked him "so do you keep in touch with anybody else from work?" (they used to work together) and he said "Not really, but you know, I'm friends with most of them on facebook so I know what they're up to". That says it all. Nobody knows anybody anymore, they know they're PROFILE, they know that person's digital personality. It's insane

Originally posted by bacci0909
I don't think we can even comprehend what it's doing to our youth psychologically. Me and my wife have ranted about it for hours on end.. Ever seen SouthPark's episode about facebook? It's seriously pretty genius. And the more time goes on, the more genius I think it is.

An old friend of my wife's once put it best without even realizing it.. She asked him "so do you keep in touch with anybody else from work?" (they used to work together) and he said "Not really, but you know, I'm friends with most of them on facebook so I know what they're up to". That says it all. Nobody knows anybody anymore, they know they're PROFILE, they know that person's digital personality. It's insane

If you can't keep your kid from becoming a mindless zombie, it's your fault. If you can't keep them from playing video games all day, it's your fault. If you can't keep them from using profanity, it is your fault. If you can't keep your kid from becoming a Facebook monster, chances are Facebook just happened to be the most effective distractor at the time, and it's your fault.

Don't make Facebook out to be some giant, evil, ominous being that wants all your attentions all day. They want traffic, just as ATS does, for ad revenue. They happen to provide a service many like myself find useful at the same time as benefiting their own needs of revenue. While they revamp and change how advertisements work in a digital commonplace, while still providing a means for me to stay socially active on and offline.

You guys crack me up. ATS is pretty much a FaceBook for alternative news seekers. We all have profiles and the ability to post on each other's profile pages. We all have avatars and it's open to any and all. It is all very similar.

People dislike Facebook, fair enough, but enough people dislike being outside, reading, watching TV, playing on the next games-console.

I find FB a lot easier to get in contact with friends or to arrange an event seeing as I don't use the home phone and I hardly ring anyone on my mobile.

Everything has a downside, it just depends how much of a downer you are yourself to notice said things.

Oh and one last thing...if you think that the gov't isn't looking more diligently on sites like ATS for possible suspicious people rather than facebook, you are absolutely off your rocker...thank you...now I must get back to work...

i use facebook, i feel it's an excellent tool to share truth or what i think is truth with a large amount of people...


i am thankful for the internet and for all of the information that is shared...


tptw (THE POWERS THAT WERE) will do anything and everything to stop the rise of consciousness and that includes disinfo and even agents to spread stuff on the internet and websites like this...


you think this website is free from agents of non-light? lol

i know the threads they create because i can tell what they are trying to do....i just know


anyways all is well, because consciousness will rise anyways

thank you God..

thank You

Another thing I noticed:

Is it just me, or do the FB members ignore posts that are more than 10 words long?

Thats why my old posts never got read by them. They actually contained more than 10 words and had substance.

And is it true (as I've read on here) that some people get banned from FB because they put 'intelligent, smart-people info' on there?

Wow!