This one’s for you Mr. Zuckerberg.
I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that the public’s opinion about Facebook is slowly shifting. It went from being the next best thing humanity has to offer to an absolute nuisance. Being on Facebook is a constant fight with an algorithm whose sole purpose is to sell you something. And that something is a product you would never buy unless you’re drunk or 14 years old and just stole your mum’s credit card.
LOSING CONTROL
Every second you spend on Facebook is data to be gathered in order to manipulate you to be persuaded into doing something. I used to feel completely in control of what appears on my screen when I’m on Facebook. Now it feels like a hodgepodge of ads, videos with ads in the middle, fake news and maybe, just maybe, some posts of friends.
JUST PAY SHIPPING!
Do you like comic books or tv shows? Well good luck, because your feed will now be bombarded by cheaply made “official” merchandise of your favourite show or character with the words ‘FREE!!! JUST PAY SHIPPING’ plastered all over. Or how about those photoshopped pictures of your favourite stars holding up badly photoshopped t-shirts saying how special people born on a certain month are. Is that the point of Facebook nowadays?
WHY AM I SEEING THIS?
Recently I’ve been getting the most bizarre notifications. Some friend liked some post of someone I didn’t know at all. They weren’t in any list of mine, I wasn’t following them or had any contact with them. Did I ever activate this feature? No. Was I ever asked if I wanted to see every random detail or event that Facebook considers valuable information I should absolutely have? Hell no. Of course, you could dig in the settings and find the dozens of things that constantly change in order to take back control of your notifications, but good luck with doing that. Facebook’s rules are ever-changing.
THE TRUE FACE
Pardon my French, but Facebook has become a shitshow. Scandal after scandal after scandal, Zuckerberg’s empire is slowly crumbling. Facebook has lost its most valuable asset; the people’s trust. Every user in the back of their minds knows that Facebook treats them as data first and human beings second. They’ve been caught with their pants down abusing that data many times. Not only that, but the amount of micromanagement needed to get that “old” Facebook experience has increased tenfold.
NECESSARY, BUT NOT FOR LONG.
Whether it’s because of university pages, work groups or keeping in touch with grandma, we still keep Facebook installed on our phones or visit the website from our computers. We still have Messenger. We still make posts there. But we are slowly starting to hate every moment of it. And the moment you swipe that Facebook window off of your recent apps becomes a liberating event. So turn off notifications, take back control and remember, Mark Zuckerberg is a lizard with plans to sell you cheap merch with quotes of Tyrion Lannister from Game of Thrones.