Facebook

[Joseph41]

Inspired by this article, what are people's thoughts on Facebook?

If you are reading this, the chances are you also have a Facebook account.

Of the 20 million Australians who use the internet, the vast majority of us also use Facebook — with over 16 million Australian accounts.

Around the world, the social media platform has almost 2 billion users — more than a quarter of everybody on the planet, and that includes those either too young to go online, or too poor to have access.

At the same time, more and more of us are spending more and more time on Facebook — 1.7 hours a day, on average.

Facebook has turned that into a business earning more than $US16 for every user around the world.

That turned into a staggering profit of more than $US10 billion last year — 177 per cent more than 2015.

"They are arguably the most successful company in human history at just gathering people's time and turning that time into money," New York Times journalist John Herrman told Four Corners.

Do you use it? Do you love it? Have you ever deleted it?

[Joseph41]

Also, for those in Victoria (not sure about New South Wales), Four Corners is covering a story on Facebook this evening.

[Aaron]

When I was in school, it was a really big thing, so of course I enjoyed it. Now that i'm about to enter post-education life, I am starting to find that I don't need it as much as I once did. Face-to-face interaction is so important, especially for something like the education field.

I don't like the idea of sharing everything for everyone to see. I keep personal things to myself most of the time, and only share things when they really matter. I also (as a teacher) have to make sure that the privacy settings on my profile are very high (due to the nature of my work), whilst considering everything I put on there in case a parent or a community member happens to get a hold of it.

I primarily use Facebook for learning about things that are going on - e.g. news, pages of music/tv shows etc and friends, as opposed to sharing and posting things myself.

[Joseph41]

When I was in school, it was a really big thing, so of course I enjoyed it. Now that i'm about to enter post-education life, I am starting to find that I don't need it as much as I once did. Face-to-face interaction is so important, especially for something like the education field.

I don't like the idea of sharing everything for everyone to see. I keep personal things to myself most of the time, and only share things when they really matter. I also (as a teacher) have to make sure that the privacy settings on my profile are very high (due to the nature of my work), whilst considering everything I put on there in case a parent or a community member happens to get a hold of it.

I primarily use Facebook for learning about things that are going on - e.g. news, pages of music/tv shows etc and friends, as opposed to sharing and posting things myself.

Great post, Aaron. Do you think you'll ever get rid of it entirely?

From my experience, Facebook has definitely changed. So like, initially it was full of statuses like "just went for a walk lol" - almost like a journal. Now, I see very few statuses, and it's primarily shit memes and the like.

Do other people have similar experiences?

[Aaron]

Great post, Aaron. Do you think you'll ever get rid of it entirely?

I don't think I will get rid of it entirely, but at the moment I really only use it for page browsing and communicating on messenger (so you could argue I barely use it as is). A lot of schools are hopping on the tech bandwagon by creating social media accounts and posting things, so I think sites like Facebook still have some sort of a role to play.

I get that feeling as well. In some way, social media has replaced the role of text messaging/sms. Why would you spend money sending an SMS when you can instant message someone on Facebook for practically nothing? Other apps like WhatsApp are good too, but Facebook brings all the functionality together. Send a message -> get an instant notification. Much better than waiting to talk to someone face-to-face or sending an email and waiting potentially days. In that regard, Facebook is extremely useful.

[elysepopplewell]

It's been great for showing my life to people back home while I'm abroad, and I can't wait to use it as a tool to keep up with my friends from abroad when I get home!

I use it for my best-friend group chat/work group chats/family group chats anyway as everyone has it. In Europe, WhatsApp is the biggest deal and very few Italians use Facebook as a regular messaging service. Usually it's all on WhatsApp so it's direct or group conversation without the Newsfeed "public" sharing business. I'm trying to draw conclusions about why the society hasn't really taken to it, but I'm not sure yet.

[Joseph41]

It's been great for showing my life to people back home while I'm abroad, and I can't wait to use it as a tool to keep up with my friends from abroad when I get home!

I use it for my best-friend group chat/work group chats/family group chats anyway as everyone has it. In Europe, WhatsApp is the biggest deal and very few Italians use Facebook as a regular messaging service. Usually it's all on WhatsApp so it's direct or group conversation without the Newsfeed "public" sharing business. I'm trying to draw conclusions about why the society hasn't really taken to it, but I'm not sure yet.

Or perhaps, why Australia has? An interesting discussion!

[Alter]

It's been great for showing my life to people back home while I'm abroad, and I can't wait to use it as a tool to keep up with my friends from abroad when I get home!

I use it for my best-friend group chat/work group chats/family group chats anyway as everyone has it. In Europe, WhatsApp is the biggest deal and very few Italians use Facebook as a regular messaging service. Usually it's all on WhatsApp so it's direct or group conversation without the Newsfeed "public" sharing business. I'm trying to draw conclusions about why the society hasn't really taken to it, but I'm not sure yet.

This is really true in Germany as well. Nobody really uses Facebook messenger there, and it's less common for the youth to have a Facebook account altogether. They loved WhatsApp, however.

Interestingly, there are also many people in Germany that use pseudonyms for the Facebook accounts, which is a lot less common in Australia. Personally, I use (read: waste time on) Facebook a fair bit. I mostly read news, check pages for updates on my hobbies, or use Messenger. I've actually de-activated my account for brief periods (e.g. exam time) to stop myself from using it, because it's inconvenient for me to have to activate my account again and I just go back to doing work

[peterpiper]

I use it, and the only thing I use it for is accumulating memes and limiting my ever diminishing attention span

[heids]

I use Messenger, follow pages I think are valuable (mostly mental health or kindness-spreading organisations), don't follow friends, and stalk selected people in depth when I so desire.

I'm not a fan of anything much I've seen of social media tbh, because I think it tends to time-wasting, hive-mind-ish, shallow, popularity-contest-ing, quick-switching-between-things-without-truly-reading-or-appreciating-anything, dopamine-spiking, anxiety-provoking, and all that shit.   (Yeah I sound like a seventy-year-old )

[tashhhaaa]

I have a really dodgy facebook account, I only made it to use messenger. I've added < 10 people, some of which I'm close with and I do or used to talk to them on messenger. I don't use my full name on it and my DP is of a celebrity so it's a bit of a catfish account if you will 

I used to have a 'real' facebook account which I deactivated years ago -- wasn't into the popularity contest about it so I just got rid of it, besides I don't think I was one of the cool kids hehe 

the only thing that's probably wrong of me is I tell new people I meet that I don't have facebook, but tbh it's just because I'm not actually interested in the site and my account situation probably appears weird to people I don't know well hahaha

[Joseph41]

I have a really dodgy facebook account, I only made it to use messenger. I've added < 10 people, some of which I'm close with and I do or used to talk to them on messenger. I don't use my full name on it and my DP is of a celebrity so it's a bit of a catfish account if you will 

I used to have a 'real' facebook account which I deactivated years ago -- wasn't into the popularity contest about it so I just got rid of it, besides I don't think I was one of the cool kids hehe 

the only thing that's probably wrong of me is I tell new people I meet that I don't have facebook, but tbh it's just because I'm not actually interested in the site and my account situation probably appears weird to people I don't know well hahaha

It's really interesting to me that Messenger is sort of detached from Facebook in this way.

Out of necessity (lack of storage space), I deleted the Facebook app the other day. It's actually pretty swell without it. Would recommend.

[Aaron]

It's really interesting to me that Messenger is sort of detached from Facebook in this way.

Out of necessity (lack of storage space), I deleted the Facebook app the other day. It's actually pretty swell without it. Would recommend.

Both the FB and Messenger apps are resource hogs and eat your mobile battery. I replaced Messenger with the Lite version (basically a barebones version of Messenger without all that unnecessary crap - such as rooms etc). Very neat. Would recommend either using the Lite version or accessing FB via Browser (even if it is a pain to do every time). Preferably also with location services turned off.

For anyone interested: Go to the app store and search "messenger lite".

[Joseph41]

Both the FB and Messenger apps are resource hogs and eat your mobile battery. I replaced Messenger with the Lite version (basically a barebones version of Messenger without all that unnecessary crap - such as rooms etc). Very neat. Would recommend either using the Lite version of accessing FB via Browser (even if it is a pain to do every time).

I don't even know what a room is hahaha.

[Aaron]

I don't even know what a room is hahaha.

A fancy name for a public group chat/discussion section. They used to have a separate app for it, but then integrated into the main Messenger app.