Goodbye, Facebook

28 December 2016

I might elaborate on my reasons to delete (read: not disable) my Facebook account at some other time but for now it should suffice to say that I found no real utility to it apart from sharing my stand-up videos and short stories. The edgy memes are great but there’s always reddit for freshly baked goods. I hadn’t used it to “contact” anyone in months now, and interestingly enough, ever since I unfollowed all my friends and liked pages (which gave me a nice empty news feed) - I hadn’t even stalked anyone.

What really drove me crazy was Facebook’s consistent stalking. It keeps tracks of all my browser history and I suspect Whatsapp as well (regardless of what they say about end-to-end encryption), and I wouldn’t be surprised if its reach goes far beyond that (look at the reddit link below). Showing “suggested posts” about websites and services I have casually perused on my browser (both mobile and laptop) makes me unconformtable. I will never buy it as a feature no matter how hard anyone tries to sell it. I get that almost every other online service keeps a tab on user behaviour but I just really hate Facebook - let’s put it this way. I have had my on and off moments with it since the beginning (way back in January 2008) but I always lingered on for some or the other reason. Now, it’s time to pull the plug. I know I am not plugging out of the matrix or anything. But I would like to get rid of any social media service that tracks my behaviour without even telling me about it. I have dormant profiles on Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat which I will get rid of soon enough.

If you are interested in my life, you can follow this blog which I will try to update more regularly than before. Or you can send me an email. Or call/text me if you have my number.

Here’s a quick update anyway -

1. I will start working on my masters thesis in a few months. I will finish my masters six months after I start my thesis. I don’t know what I will do after that.
2. I am starting a podcast called Simplifyd in January - it’s about simplifying academic research and making it more accessible.
3. I will do stand-up comedy and write short stories in the coming months as well - all of which you’ll be able find on this blog.

Cheers.

Here’s some supplementary reading from TechCrunch: Facebook reading Android users texts? and reddit: I am becoming scared of Facebook.

(Yes, I understand the irony of the share buttons below)