It seems to me that reaction to this has been tame so far. I believe EFF and phone calls alone aren't going to do anything. You basically need awareness on the level of blackouts.
Are you confident about the current donation model? (I understand/appreciate that it's not a business)
I just want to make sure sites can stay up before I start recommending this to friends' kids.
> I have to admit I've been playing NES and SNES with roms on the computer since early 2000s. My parents wouldn't buy me any game consoles or handheld devices so the computer was the only way to go.
Hmm. Isn't this also an argument to support Nintendo now? When I was young I would buy CDs even though I had the mp3s already.
I've certainly struggled with the layout of exact stuff in Markdown ... but there's something about this name, the writing on the index.html, and the constant use of the unofficial file icon (which i'm really not a fan) that kind of irks me. Maybe it's the spirit of the naming? Maybe it's because of the effort to _brand_ this? And perhaps the developer-centric tone of the writing versus the writer-centric tone of the
original spec? I'm not sure.
I do not agree that having to hide friends so you get a curated News Feed really works. For me, this is a lot of work just to get Facebook back as a fun product again - and FB doesn't really provide great, painless tools for curating your feed. (I'd love a dashboard and power-user shortcuts)
But even if your News Feed looks great, the other side of controlling your FB experience is How You Share. Sure, we can all create lists for our families and faraway friends and acquaintances — but trust and relationships evolve, and pretty soon you're fiddling with "+Family -AuntJenny +HighSchool -Amanda" just for one little post about your relationship status.
You can deal with this by unfriending or self-censoring yourself, but it's really not fun to hold your tongue, and there's a social cost to unfriending.
The author is probably right that "Facebook is fine", if you put enough work into it. But depending on your comfort level, this can mean a lot of work. So the questions are 1) is this really a user error, or a problem with the product? and 2) how can Facebook improve this area? and 3) is it even in Facebook's interest to go down this path?
"I'll wake up in the morning and go on Facebook just ... because," Casey says. "It's not like I want to or I don't. I just go on it. I'm, like, forced to. I don't know why. I need to. Facebook takes up my whole life."
http://kottke.org/13/05/wanting-to-be-liked
I agree that his piece isn't well-researched, and the title is sensationalist, but I share most of his experiences and sentiments. I hope a more quantitative research around this area does emerge though.
I prefer Siracusa's original article. It's wider-spanning, less dismissive, and a perspective that is informed by tech, hardcore gaming, and gamers' Nintendo sentimentality.
Many of these examples tend to be online communities that share the same interest as you. Sure, you can probably configure your own Google Group (i guess?) but who's going to do that?
Facebook is mostly used by people to keep in touch with their offline community - their real-life friends.
Agreed. The social ads, creepy frictionless sharing, the history of privacy issues, the "hidden options" UX, the lack of anonymity, and the lack of support for multiple facets to our identities -- these issues all combined together made me deactivate my account.
I'm still trying it out to see if I can live without it for a year. But I'm hoping to delete it altogether.
It also looks like there are functions, but they're considerably shaved down compared to JavaScript/etc.
I wonder if this will get more adoption in the TW community and by various static site generators.