Mr. Spadoni 

I got started early on Facebook, mainly to annoy my kids.
Since then my use I has steadily declined, mainly because I can find other ways to waste time. I kept a logon for two reasons. First, I was settling an estate, and some of the younger family members were unresponsive to other means of communication. Now that the estate is settled, the only reason I use it now is that there is some information on rides that seems hard to track down other ways.
But a few weeks ago, having not been on the site for months, I went to logon. No luck. Tried to restore password, and the current restore process requires that I send in documents with my birthday. BUT....when I first signed up, I used the wrong birth year to try to cut down on spam. Who’s going to sell time shares to someone born around turn of the last century?.And I don’t know what day or month I used. Hey, it’s been at least 15 years since I signed up. Plus, the friend restore points me to the last people who responded to my post, two of whom are in a country that has blocked Facebook.
So here’s the question: do I need FB to get bike info or can I just let it go?

cudak888 

You are home and in good hands.

Do not be assimilated by the Borg. Shields up.

Humor aside, the only thing on FB that could be of any interest is their Marketplace section. If you have a weakness for buying bicycles, it might be smarter just to stick to OfferUp and Craigslist and leave the temptation aside.

-Kurt

TenGrainBread 

I had an account for about 10 years but decided to delete the account about 7 or 8 months ago. The amount of bugs, advertisements, and idiocy makes it not only a time-suck but very unpleasant to use. Not to mention the political issues with how our data has been used and will be used, although that is a topic for another forum.

I would say my life is happier without it. I never really used it for bike stuff, mostly keeping track of local music shows.

repechage

And I thought this was about FB hubs.

that questionable website? Oh dear.

cudak888 

I went through that thought process three times between FB hubs and Facebook before clicking

-Kurt

SurferRosa

FB!

sloar 

I hate Facebook book, but I can keep in touch with my Marine Corps buddies through closed groups and the Marketplace is a wonderful place to find good deals.

canklecat

Fauxbroke is handy for keeping up with local meatspace friends, mostly for cycling events. I enjoy group rides so it's very handy for that. And I keep up with some artists, writers and other creative folks online. They seldom annoy me even when we don't agree on every issue.

It's possible to keep the noise down by prioritizing people and group pages that inform or entertain us, while muting the rest.

A few folks abuse it with relentless political posts or trite unfunny reposting. I don't mind one or two of those a day but some folks post, literally, dozens of times a day, crowding out everyone else. They have some irrepressible compulsion to share every fleeting thought or pet peeve that flits across their gnat-like attention span. When that happens I mute them for 30 days and see how they are later. Some folks are borderline bipolar and go through manic phases, then settle down for a few months. If they persist I'll unfollow them, but I seldom unfriend anyone. Most of us get along fine in person, but some folks just don't seem to get the hint about the difference between using and abusing an outlet.

And I've muted, unfollowed, blocked and in some extreme cases cut all ties with some family because of their outrageously hateful or overtly racist behavior online. It was a shock at first but in a way I'm grateful. I no longer feel any need to maintain contact with some folks even for the sake of appearances. And I don't attend large gatherings of distant family any more. Can't say I miss it.

I do occasionally wonder whether I might miss the news of an illness or death of a family member or friend, but I figure if their behavior was bad enough online for me to discontinue communication, I'm probably not going to visit them in the hospital or attend their funeral anyway.

rootboy 

"I know that you and Frank were planning to disconnect me...and I'm afraid that is something I cannot allow to happen."
HAL

PilotFishBob 

I left FB in July last year, I miss some of the bike groups I was following but other than those it was problematic. The increasingly negative 'Friends' chatter was bad but worse were the problems involving FB's misuse, selling and sloppy security involving user data, and weak non-apologies after every episode. Its gotten almost impossible to protect online privacy but I'm not going to be a willing participant.

On the plus side, my best bike acquisitions came after I left and BF is a better cycling info and sharing source. That, and it's a heck of a lot more pleasant too.

BF - the opposite of FB. Hmm...

unterhausen

I always use the same fake birthday so I can remember it.

If you could filter out politics (some of the worst of it is people I nominally agree with), then FB would be fine. Although they really want my phone number so they can sell it. If my FB gets hijacked because I won't give it to them, that's okay, I'll just let the spammers have it

seedsbelize 

Nothing more to say. I am also permanently deleted.

Mr. Spadoni 

Thanks for the feedback. Oh, the things I learn on this site.
I think I will use the time it would have taken to re start the FB account to look for some Fratelli Brivio hubs. That’s an FB I know I will enjoy. And I will be sure to pick an easy to remember fake birthday next time.

rumrunn6

FB has a lot of positive features & benefits despite the russian's political use of it. aside from updates about a cpl rail trails I like, I don't use it for bike related stuff. other than sharing bike rides w/ cousins who also ride. is it necessary for bike related stuff? absolutely not! this forum rocks!

noobinsf 

Yeah, I am following a couple of bike groups to get a fix of bike content and find out about group rides, but I never comment (like on the 650b group). I don't like the idea that thousands of people could then absently click through to my public profile, even though it is as private as I can make it. Creeps me out. Here, though, it's easy to meaningfully contribute and keep a comfortable distance, but still feel like this is a genuine community. I'd be more likely to grab a cup of coffee with most folks here than 90% of my FB "friends".

thinktubes 

Signed up a long time ago with a fake profile because I need awareness/access to social media for work.

only connected to one family member through it. Plenty of other ways to keep up with friends.

looking up old classmates and friends is a mixed bag of issues, politics, and extreme stances (both right and left).

TiHabanero

Originally set up an FB account to monitor my kids posts. Once off the college I kept it for a couple of years to keep in touch with some former shipmates and former race buddies, however 3 or 4 years ago I dumped the account. Found it was pretty much a waste of time, and figured that before FB we were able to find people from our past, so what is to keep us from doing the same without FB?

Happy to say I don't even think about that site at all anymore, and I do spend more time reading.

ThermionicScott 

I FB. Perhaps too much. It's a tool, what you get out of it depends on how you use it.

CliffordK

I had an account, but wasn't really active on it. Inactive now for several years.

I might reactivate if I choose to go to the next HS reunion.

I'm not happy with the Facebook improprieties that I've read about, and may not choose to support them in the future.

conspiratemus1

Vot iss dis ting you callem Fassbutch?
Goink back to em sleep now.
ZZZZZZ

xiaoman1 

Never been on FB and don't think that I ever will...I find that I can find information that I need with other sources, BF as one of them.
Best, Ben

gugie 

When I first started on FB I reconnected with lots of people I knew in high school, some from college, a few from old jobs. I don’t think I’m in contact with any of them. If they were worth keeping as friends, I would have stayed in touch without FB. The friends I have that go that far back I didn’t need FB to keep contact with.

Then there’s the issue of keeping my “worlds from colliding.”

Compare that to the many people I’ve met here. I’ll continue wasting my time on BF. At least I’ll learn something now and then, tell inside jokes, and share bike porn.

jetboy 

This forum is not for the FB enablers. I also have an account- and I visit it every 4-5 years. So do the math and I have been there like 3 times. so far I don't feel like I am missing much.

That said, FnTech (facebook production wing) just donated some stuff to my theater.. and my good friend works there. so .. it is what it is. semi-free country, so vote with your attention.

Murray Missile 

Truer words were never spoken but I've also sold more bikes on Marketplace in the past 6 weeks than I've sold on Craigslist in the past 4 years. At this rate my bicycle fleet will be down to merely "insane" numbers in no time at all.

canklecat

I know some folks like FB for the marketplace stuff, but I can't make heads or tails of FB for-sale ads. Searches don't work well to narrow down to specific items. Usually craigslist and similar sites are better for finding bikes that might interest me.

In general FB has done a poor job as a site for promoting businesses too. Several acquaintances who've used it say they get little or no traffic through Facebook. Same with artists and creative types -- little or no benefit from FB. And their targeted ads are nearly useless compared with Amazon and Google.

There's a reason why over the past decade Facebook degenerated from a social networking site to 4chan and 8chan for middle aged people. It's not good at anything else. So it became the internet hate machine* for older folks.

It's not bad if you don't get wrapped up in the drama and use the official and unofficial filters. As an above post mentioned, FB Purity is good for computer browser based access to FB, but isn't available for the mobile apps most folks use to access FB. I rarely use a browser on FB anymore unless I need to write a long post and attach multiple photos from devices other than my phone.

Use the mute and unfollow options generously to cut down on the noise. And to ensure you hear from folks and pages you're actually interested in, set them to the highest priority.

*(A meme that sprouted from a Faux Noise affiliate's description of 4chan about 1,000 years ago.)