Like many people, I have a facebook account. I thought it would be a good thread to open up discussion about the pros and cons of social networking sites - but also to let people know if you find a good application.

I use it primarily to keep on contact with family and friends and have networked with old school friends that I haven't communicated with for years. With my sister down in Oz - we often swap photo's and chat with the instant messaging system.

With regards to applications, I have recently become addicted to a stupid, blasted game called 'Bejewelled Blitz'. If you haven't played it already - then please proceed with caution. "One more minute" quickly turns into "OMG... Two HOURS!!!!"

Geo Challenge is another one of my favourites and I always play the silly slot machines and scratch cards with my cup of morning coffee (don't know why... just habit now! lol)

So then... what about you? :biggrin:

Pros: I cba
Cons: I still cba :p

I have an account, I barely use it. Well ok, more like never use it. I prefer Twitter. Keep it short and tweet <3 ahahahaa. *slaps self*
Whenever I go on Facebook it always seems to have had a face lift of some sort. I spent about 10 minutes trying to find my wall the other day :rolleyes:

I do have all my friends on there but it's too much hassle to communicate that way. Half my friends don't use msn and the other half use txt ch@ n i cnt stnd it. So I refuse to text them. I find picking up the phone more fun!
I do wish my friends would twitter though. It's so much more easier to navigate and everything's in one place. You can even share pictures with ease.

Hmm, I seemed to have steered away from Fb. Oops? XD

lol - no problems AJ - it opens up the discussion :razz:

I do have a twitter account, but I rarely use it - simply because Facebook is a bit more interactive and, I dunno - interesting? lol

Oh.. I forgot to say - I also have a blueberry thingymajig - and I use this to update my status and check for messages. I know you can do this with Twitter too - but not sure how easy it is?

I have a facebook account - started mainly because I have a 10 yr old daughter, and I felt I needed to know how it all worked etc as she is only a few years away from being able to have her own.

I don't really like the instant chat part of it, although use it sometimes - I find that MSN is easier. Sometimes if you both are typing at the same time, or if you are flipping between applications, some of your words disappear. Also, in some applications (like Bejeweled Blitz) you can't actually use it as the app takes up too much of the screen or something. Well, it does for me anyway - the chat window is half 'behind' the app.

My favourite games are Lexulous (used to be Scrabulous), finally got Scrabble working again, (but I still prefer Lexulous), Word Twist, Word Challenge (*couldn't stop playing that one until I beat Ches' measly 20K ^^*), and, yes, Bejeweled Bltiz is a huge time-waster, can spend an hour on there easily (/flirt 125K jewel symbol)

Someone has just made me sign up to 'Mob Wars' and so far I have mugged someone, bought myself a Colt, and successfully attacked three other players, taking their weapons and all their money. I should sign in to that and see if I have enough money to take out a contract on someone yet..........

i have a facebook, seems like everyone does these days.

i was actually one of the first few thousand users, when it was restricted to college kids only, and have to say that i liked the old style better. but, i do still use it to keep in contact with old friends, friends from mexico, and current friends. nice for planning activities.

as for apps, i played mafia wars, but it gets boring once you get farther on, havent done any other ones since..

Along with most people so far, I have a Facebook account, but I don't have a Twitter account. I rarely use it mainly because there are way too applications ranging from hugging people and "How fast is your car?" to joining completely random social groups with names like "I once flipped three heads in a row using a coin".

The best thing about Facebook in my opinion is the ability of collecting people to organise events and birthday reminders. I haven't tried Twitter but it seems very celebrity based.

I love facebook. I love it soooo much <3 I am an addict. Well not as bad. But I have my favourite past-time. Facebook perving. It's seriously so much fun. But obviously I have no life. :P But yes.

I love facebook. I just think it's a great tool to stay in touch with people. And keep photos and tagging and have everyone looking at my amazing pictures :D It's just a good thing :) mmm... :) I enjoy it. :) I don't like how like yeah that sometimes privacy is a bit hard on it.. -_- So like yeah, it's a bit of a pain sometimes but yeah.. Other than that I love it :)

Oh yes. And facebook events are the loveliest thing eveeer. I love just inviting all my friendies to my parties easily :) I think with my age if you don't have facebook you miss out on stuff. -shrugs-

Facebook is old news, twitter is what it's all about now. Get with the times people!

I have a love/hate relationship with my facebook. I used to use it to keep informed about friends beach escapades and the ex-girlefriends mood swings. I still use it, for the most part, to do that. But it's becoming so pointless. And with quizzes popping up on my home feed without me being able to do much about it other than hide them, it's pretty aggravating.

Still, since most of my far far away friends use facebook, i still check it regularly to see what they're up to. But it pisses me off regularly.

I don't have any apps on facebook, and I only add people from my uni now, or people I run into while I'm studying there. And it's for the sole reason that I know we'll soon be (or already are) 5 billion miles away from each other within a year, and I don't want to forget about them entirely, because it's always been useful and fun if you're going to travel around, which is my favourite activity.

Run on sentence run on sentence run on sentence run on, run, run!

I only visit when I want to send a message, or when I've received one.

I also have a Twitter, but I don't know anyone who has added me. I use it for brief nonsensical/funny(?) statements about things I've encountered during the day.

I have a FB account, and a myspace one...
FB is ok I guess, I play Scrabble and have a restaurant in Restaurant City..plus I like using the grafitti application to send pics to fellow isketchers :) oh yeah, my friend list on there is mainly made up of isketchers, a few friends and some relatives...is nice to be able to talk to people who aren't on my msn using the im feature...but I don't know how people can spend an entire evening on there...that's what ISketch is for :twisted:

I have a facebook account and I use it to:
a) share pics I think my friends would like to see
b) talk to friends who I don't talk to on IM services
c) do random quizzes that psychanalyse me in 10 questions "It's SCARILY ACCURATE!"
d) spy on check out what people are up to

Fb is really my way of keeping in touch with my friends, because most of them have it. If it weren't for fb, I'd have to write e-mails, and somehow they always seem more 'planned' and I feel like I have to write long ones, compared to quick, spontaneous messages on fb.

My friends on fb are usually only people I've met. If I haven't met someone but they're my friend on it, they usually have restricted access, as do cousins.

I have a bunch of other social networking accounts which I don't check regularly or check at all. I think the last time I checked bebo was last year. I don't mind adding people I haven't met to other social networking accounts, but usually I just MSN them or something.

Ahh Facebook. What would we do without you? I have Facebook phases so I'll go on it loads for a week or so and then leave it for a month. I generally use it for catching up with friends and organising events/parties and looking at random photos of randomer people (lol Facebook perving). I play the odd quiz if I see it on my feed but I don't use any of the regular game apps although I tried out their inferior attempt at iSketch and it was shocking! Very easy to win though using my iSketch-induced speed guessing XD.

There's also the privacy thing and I was reading in an article that even if you delete a picture from an album on networking sites such as Facebook, the URL of the photo itself often stays on for longer.

Oh, privacy... I read an article on MSN News the other day, that terrorists were using it to lure people. They added random people as friends and got them to meet up, and then they captured them and forced them to become terrorists or held them for ransom.

I get a few random people wanting to add me as friend and I'm like, eh??? Get off my profile, you stranger. :eek:

I read that too Sparrow. And lol. What. Ahaha. Why would you like to meet random people and urgh. Lol That sounds like the people who went to the cannibal. -_- Lol. I wouldn't add people I don't know, and so I know all the people on my friends list. :) And lol yeah, when you get the random odd people adding you it's odd...

But I love the term facebook perving. xD And glad to see I'm not the only one ;) ahahah xD

I think to be fair, if I didn't have facebook I probably wouldn't have stayed in touch with half the people that I have done. But they're not really close friends, but yeah sometimes. You have a really good friend who you don't see that often, so it's just easier to just keep in touch with them via facebook. :) Mmm.. :)

I do have other networking site accounts, but I don't use them as often as I use facebook at all. Bebo I never use, I had this thing called tagged I think, which I never use, Myspace I go on sometimes (rarely though). I haven't touched twitter but I'm sure I'll be tempted to in the summer if it's still good. -shrugs- Facebook is enough for me at the moment :)

... I had this thing called tagged I think, which I never use ...

Dude, tagged. I keep getting e-mails about how some Carol Baxter has tagged me. That's funny, coz I don't know any Carol Baxters :rolleyes:

Lol. Yes. It's the most effing irritating one for emails. I kept getting them before, so I signed up. Then I kept spamming people of no reason of my own. As in, I didn't even yeah. Hmm So I deleted the account. It basically jax your msn contact list and then spams everyone on it till they get it xD ahaha. Well that's if you chose to invite all your hotmail list or whatever. But yeah. -shrugs- So not worth it. -_- It was a piece of poop anyways xD

I left all my email updates on so that if I'm on MSN it tells me when something happens on my Facebook :) but I set up a little Facebook folder on Hotmail which seperates them out from the ressst.

I love Facebook it's fun :)

I love FaceBook, I have two accounts. One that is all about my sketcher friends. Another is the real me, and only has friends from real life, family and classmates. I have tried some of the games like Pet Society, (I got bored)and currently am playing Restaurant City, and have a mafia character, but have not actually done anything with it. I don't like the ads, and hate when it links you that stupid quiz that is trying to get you to buy ring tones. I have a myspace account, that is all sketchers too, and have a Twitter account, that I have done nothing with. I prefer having a real life social life, and prefer meeting people in person. All this cyber stuff is risky, so be careful about what type of info that you are giving out. There are a lot of good people out there, but there are also those that are trying to get your personal information.

I prefer having a real life social life

Looool over rated ;) ahah xD

Oh.. I forgot to say - I also have a blueberry thingymajig - and I use this to update my status and check for messages. I know you can do this with Twitter too - but not sure how easy it is?

Blueberry?

Is that the Blackberry or something different?

I am in love with facebook. I check mine at least 4 times a day, lol. I love playing Geo Challenge, Bubble Spinner (SO addictive..), looking at photos, catching up with friends, etc. I really love how you can send a message to a certain group of people or plan an event with a specified guess list. Not to mention the convenient little side pane with the birthdays listed, haha.

Overall, I think facebook is a great way to connect with people, and also a great way to entertain yourself with their millions of applications. :P

*ahem*..not to mention facebook allows me to stalk--I MEAN--become more aware of what people are doing... ;)

I also have a facebook. I like to play on Pet Society, and Vampire Wars, and Farmtown. But mostly I use it to keep up with family and friends! =)

As for other social networking sites, I have a Bebo and a myspace account. I very rarely use them any more because I get too many adds from strange people. I swear I logged onto one of the two the other day and I had something odd like 30+ adds. Not one of them did I know :rolleyes:

Sorry. I thought you might accept me if I disguised myself. :'(

Lol, so Peaches Blossom-Jones was you? :razz:

Yes.

You have a problem with my nickname? :D

Me have a facebook. Yup.

No twitter or myspace or what-not.

Facebook was good for getting in contact with some old friends, and then I had a dry spell where I didn't use it for ages. Currently I'm using it again, mainly to insult friends and family. :)

I just got two e-mails from facebook apps. My Aquarium and Characteristics will now become...

SpeedDate :eek:

I think I'll opt out of this, thanks.

I guess fish aren't cool anymore :(

I have FB ...love it, love being nosy for peoples statuses, love Srabble app. I used to hate the pokes but now have a longstanding "poke" with one special lady (Cunnyfunt).

Dont understand Twitter and dont have any other things.

I LOVE facebook, I spend hours on it. I have two accounts, one which is under my real name, and I have my family and real life friends there. I found out that my niece's water broke and she was on her way to the hospital to have her baby one morning on facebook. My other account is reserved for my Isketch friends. I'm especially addicted to Farm Town, and I WILL buy a mansion, I WILL, I WILL, I WILL! I just learned how to make waterfalls, so that will be my next project. I also enjoy Pet Society, Country Story, and Farmville. Oh yes, and I keep trying Bejeweled Blitz, but never get any better at it. I need a life.....

Lol, I was addicted to a bunch of the facebook games. I still have a couple that I get on regularly but am bored with a lot of them.

I think that there are too many apps on Facebook. A few apps are useful but a lot of them are just meh in my opinion.

bebo is the best!

if I ever wanted to be hit with a cucumber I would go to the streets of soho

I agree with db....the apps are irritating.

BUT....

What is even more irritating is that stupid new News Feed set up that they have!!! I keep getting yesterday's status messages from people, and I don't know what the heck the difference is between the news feed and the live feed. :mad:

I agree with db....the apps are irritating.

BUT....

What is even more irritating is that stupid new News Feed set up that they have!!! I keep getting yesterday's status messages from people, and I don't know what the heck the difference is between the news feed and the live feed. :mad:
There are some addictive games on there though, like Bejeweled, Tetris and Scrabble :D. As for the News Feed and Live Feed, the Live one seems to show more recent events than the News one, but the content seems to be the same...

I find the news feed tends to show more recent posts n such from the friends I interact with most, but maybe that's just me or coincidental or something... And the live feed is like up to date posts from everyone. Meh. There is a lot of crossover. I think it's pretty funny that whenever fb makes any changes about a gazillion groups are made to oppose it and everyone's all anti it, yet in a few weeks you won't even notice it anymore :P

As for the apps.. I haven't really gotten into them apart from the odd quiz here and there to fill time, but then they end up sending me all these spam notifications and it's like blegh. Oh and I have farmville, yet I haven't used it in a few weeks - I think all my crops are dead!!

Two teenage girls got caught in a storm drain in Australia recently, and got saved because they used their mobile phones to update their facebook status to alert people to their predicament.

No idea why they didn't just use their phone to ring someone.....

Two teenage girls got caught in a storm drain in Australia recently, and got saved because they used their mobile phones to update their facebook status to alert people to their predicament.

No idea why they didn't just use their phone to ring someone.....
Maybe the teenage girls were actually Mark Zuckerburg...

FB has started to make suggestions of "reconnecting with friends" and "suggesting friends for friends who don't have enough friends" like some sort of wise aunt!

I agree with db....the apps are irritating.

BUT....

What is even more irritating is that stupid new News Feed set up that they have!!! I keep getting yesterday's status messages from people, and I don't know what the heck the difference is between the news feed and the live feed. :mad:

Try facebookLite. I don't think apps can be accessed from it. If you want apps you can switch back to facebook regular (2 sugars and milk).

Thanks for that info stormy, I didn't realise that this was available.

I think it's a good idea for what can be a somewhat crowded Facebook page.

I like Facebook, agreed apps and a gazillion requests a day is annoying but it doesnt take that long to just click ignore all. And with email settings sorted its not too bad.

I try to use mine differently, I mean who really cares what colour socks im wearing or what im eating for dinner? I try to start debates or just make people smile with status updates like

Louise is so stupid that she stared at the orange juice carton because it said "concentrate" or

Louise only needs two tools in life: WD-40 to make things go, and duct tape to make them stop.

Hate Twitter! that is so dull. MySpace is ok to find new music, thats about it.

I think I'm going to look into the facebookLite....for some reason, if I leave my Facebook inactive for more than about five minutes, it takes me to a "LiveChinaTV" porn-type website, or up pops some other crazy warning from my anti-spyware software. Lovely.

I haven't had any of those ridiculous hackers into my status messages though.....you know the ones that go around....(example) "---- has made $168 today working at home! go to SelfWorkHome.com to see how you can start! pkb" or "I'm 8 1/2 pounds lighter thanks to the FREE trial pack of this new colon cleanser that I got! visit ColonCleanerXL.com to get yours! iwu"

LOL at least I only get redirected to a porno site without my friends ever knowing!!

LOL at least I only get redirected to a porno site without my friends ever knowing!!

Yes, but now we all know :P

But anyway, Facebook gives you an option to default to Facebook Lite, but you could always change it at a later date.

facebook = spamfest

Also, serious problems over deleting accounts, which thanks to Canadian govt. facebook will be introducing changes to the permanent deletion of accounts next year and much, much more useless stuff will always remain and become added on there

nothing better than facebook bashing :twisted:

The "privacy" update 3 weeks a go or so was nothing to do with inproving privacy.

Everyone's settings was made public for purposes of google and bing indexing. Facebook struggles to generate profit, this year being their first after investment from microsoft and a Russian group of $200m.

Apart from advertising, their main source of income comes from data sharing. So anything you post from name, age, netowrk, email etc is avaiable to any third party apps on site or search engines.

If you try deactivating your account with your settings all set to private, but then reactivate, then you notice something magical. Your settings are set back to default and I thought they would keep thigns as they were before :p

Also, the reason why you cannot delete your account (permanently) is because the more data they have of users, the more revenue it brings from data sharing. This is changing next year however, because Canadian privacy groups brought facebook to court, only to settle it before it went before a judge, and they also released this information on a Friday . . best time to bury bad news.

Also, as a result of facebook's actions, they're now being taken to court by 12 or so privacy courts in the U.S.

meh, just dont put anything on the internet that you wouldnt mind other people knowing. As for me, i like facebook, helps me to keep in touch with people from across the country and other nations, much better than email.
so if they share my birthdate, well really there are a ton of other places on the internet where you put that in so im not too worried, i just dont put my phone number, street address, or any financial info up. And really, almost all social networking sites share info as well so facebook isnt that different.

Anyways, i loooooove my facebook and would hate for anyone to take it away from me :D

desperate measures for a desperate site

http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/01/23/facebook-vanity-url-harman/

then came the "oops, bad publicity here and we've been caught out"

http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/01/23/facebook-gives-harman-his-name-back-apologizes/

"..To be clear, the move was not driven by monetary reasons, rather trademark protection..."

so they didn't deny receiving payment :p

Check out this article: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/04/21/facebook.changes.users/index.html?ref=search&sid=100000184301834.594225018..1

I'm really not sure exactly how I feel about this....and kind of like keeping my extra-Facebook online networking private from what is visible to my Facebook friends.

I guess that means I just won't press "Like" on any random websites, but I also don't really care which one of my random friends has also viewed the webpage that I'm looking at. I don't know...it makes me feel really uneasy. How do you guys feel about this?

Urgh. I can just see that pissing me off. I like facebook staying to facebook and will probably end up making me steer further away from it. I wont want random faces popping up all over the net, especially since I have quite a few random friends on my facebook anyways.

Meh. It seems like it'll be annoying but until I see it working, I suppose we'll have to wait and see.

Yeah I think more people will be annoyed by this development than "Like" it :p. It's easy if you don't want your own face popping up everywhere: don't "Like" anything outside Facebook. But I wonder if you "Like" a link (e.g. news story) that someone has displayed in Facebook, whether your face will then appear on that external site? I won't "Like" that!

Doesn't seem that new to me.

There were already plenty of sites that had button saying things like "share this on facebook" or "...on myspace" etc

As far as I can tell (without having a facebook of my own) your face isn't displayed on the website. Checking imdb, I just see "x people like this" on a film's page, and it doesn't seem to be clickable or anything. On the CNN page it just says "X people recommend this", with no faces. Might change between websites though, and may even change if someone who has facebook looks...

And from what I can tell, facebook already gave you all so many annoying messages about what your contacts are up to that this will probably be negligable and could probably be turned off anyway :p

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Check out this article: http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/04/21/facebook.changes.users/index.html?ref=search&sid=100000184301834.594225018..1

I'm really not sure exactly how I feel about this....and kind of like keeping my extra-Facebook online networking private from what is visible to my Facebook friends.

I guess that means I just won't press "Like" on any random websites, but I also don't really care which one of my random friends has also viewed the webpage that I'm looking at. I don't know...it makes me feel really uneasy. How do you guys feel about this?

It's very easy to set your details on private.

Follow these simple guidelines from here (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/05/11/businessinsider-how-to-lock-down-your-facebook-profile-2010-5.DTL)