What Are Your Thoughts on Facebook?

I use facebook mostly for fluffy stuff, seldom for real life stuff.

It is, however, how I met my husband.

I scroll through it.

It's not really how my friends and I keep in touch. It's just for fun.

Like on here, if it's not something I'm interested in, I flip past it.

To me canceling it would mean missing out on a super easy way to keep up with long distance friendships, news, family/friend photos, all kinds of stuff that makes me happy.
My FB is like my real life though, I don't do negativity and drama.
I find that most people who have "issues" with FB are people attracted to exactly that, negativity and drama, so of course their FB is a source of frustration and overall unhappiness.
Associate with positive people, and you will have a positive experience, on FB and in life!
ETA: of course some people, even positive ones, can get kind of addicted to social media, so I totally get maybe needing to take a break, or set daily limits, just to keep your life in balance.

I have family and friends all over the place. I like Facebook because I can see pictures of what they and their kids are doing.
I do get sick of all the political posts, I usually just scroll past them.

I think it's a reflection of life: there's a bunch of really good stuff said by really smart people, and there's a bunch of garbage spouted by morons who don't even bother to proofread, let alone fact-check. Some people think that, if there's a Facebook meme on something, it just MUST be true.

I think it's important to assign your "friends" to different categories so you can decide who sees what. Most people don't do that, and the whole world can see everything. If you leave everything unrestricted and then make a huge mistake and put out something you shouldn't, then yes, everyone sees it including employers. On the other hand, it's just a modern version of the old soap box in the town square. So there's nothing inherently wrong with it.

If people are afraid of those they disagree with, then Facebook is a nightmare. If people like to see what others are thinking as well as see photos, it's a great thing.

One anecdote: at the time of the Boston Marathon bombing, before anyone knew what was going on, it was a way to communicate. In addition to the 2 explosions, there was a fire at the Kennedy Library - it later turned out to be minor and unrelated, but the point is, at first we didn't know how extensive things were. My son was 1.5 blocks from the first explosion. I texted right away to find out if he was safe, but after that, we lost cell phone service. Believe it or not, we were able to communicate via Facebook which, for some reason, wasn't affected by any shutdowns or overloads of the communications network. I don't know why and at this point it doesn't matter. But my son had ZERO info on what was going on, which way was safe to go. With what we got from the news organizations including aerial shots, I was able to tell him which way to walk, which trolley line to head to, and how to get out of the city and get back to his apartment. Say what you will about the downside of FB, on that day in history, it was a lifesaver and a real comfort to this worried mom.

My daughter closes her account from time to time, it doesn't actually delete it. She started doing this in college when she had exams or big project Just works for her.

Today was a hard day for FB mostly because I can't stand stupid political statements. By stupid political statements I mean oh look, someone who thinks like me posted this I will repost it without thinking about what it said.

So I just don't look at my feed on days like this, easy as pie. If I don't want to miss something a friend or family member is doing I look at their wall. Seems to me there is no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

I barely use it, when I do it's only to lurk and I never enter anything and have only a handful of friends.
I much rather use email than Facebook to communicate and I don't trust their privacy settings.
I just heard a statistic the other day where it's estimated that soon the number of dead Facebook user will out number the living.

http://www.theloop.ca/dead-facebook-users-will-soon-outnu...

I don't like facebook - alot of it seems like voyeurism - people looking into and checking into other peoples lives. My goal is to get off devices and a lot of this type of thing is wasting time when you could be doing something more productive.

My parents were much older when they had me. I am the youngest in my generation

My oldest uncle, on my dad's side, was born in 1898...and I'm only in my mid 50's. He had 14 siblings. They all had numerous children. I would estimate that I have well over 500 relatives alive today, just from his side of the family.

My mom's side has about a third of that.

I am able to "know" my relatives through facebook. I have relationships with them, their kid, grandkids, and even great grandkids. I love knowing about them.

I also manage FB Like pages for several businesses in my town. I love having Facebook.

If you are tired of seeing political junk, arguments, and all the stuff that can end up on your timeline then perhaps you need to unfollow some people.

I have given some thought to FB, but I like looking through it to see what everyone is up to, even if it is only 70% true.

I remember when everyone was loading up on the friend requests to see who had the most friends. I even noticed many of my friends ended up on someone else's friends list. I had an instructor who had to tell his students his account was full so follow him on twitter.

With that, I have noticed some people mix their personal and business life on FB. One very popular girl had a lot of followers from her business account, but soon we all learned that she and her popular husband got a divorce, then she remarried, and now has a baby. I have met this girl in a business setting, but probably don't need to know all of that.

So, I just don't post much any more.

I feel there's enough distractions these days. We are raising 3 children who need us to be present. I've seen fb and other social media outlets take over and I've seen parents on these outlets while their child is craving their attention. Me and dh do not have fb and we really don't feel like we're missing much. We're very private people and we text, email, or call our close friends and family. I also like not having a huge "digital footprint" and ditto for my children. This next generation will have a digital footprint from conception.. Someone mentioned it's easier to have fb when children are in school.. My dd is in K and we had no issues not having fb. I also wanted to add I think these social media outlets can blur peoples sense of reality at times and make people very egocentric and impersonal. I'm not saying these things are true for every user, just my personal views and observations. It is good for people who have family in other countries, far away etc. so I can see some utility in it.

I find facebook to be a very useful tool. I have been using it to organize a reunion, I use it to keep in touch with friends and relatives who live far away, I use it to manage several groups (work, school, church, kids programs), send out announcements, share photos and videos and even to stay on top of local and world news. I have friends from childhood, friends from work (past and present jobs), friends from the neighbourhood, the parents of my kids friends, parents from school, friends and committee members from church, people I do business with, friends from the gym, friends from the library, friends from the grocery store, massage therapist, hair stylist, esthetician, kids coaches, kids directors, kids teachers, our contractor, close personal friends, family...pretty much anyone I need to contact is there on facebook.

i only have family and a few friends on fb. i check out wahts on the newseed daily, and use the messaging feature to keep in contact with many people. (i still have a pay per minute phone so fb is the only way i can hold a conversation thats longer than a minute, and not pay out the booty for the minutes) and many of my family are living farther than a 5 hr drive from me, so its the easy to keep in contact with them. i rarely ever post a status update. i just do a bit of looking.

I made a Facebook account about 3 yrs. ago. The first week I was on and off everyday. Then people from my past was getting a hold of me to keep in touch. I didn't like it at all. I am a very private person. I don't like putting myself out there. I go on about once every 2 months now because when I finish college my future employer will look at my fb (teacher told me)and I want them to see a very little bit about my semi-personal life. Hopefully I can use fb to an advantage. When I get a career I will be happy to get rid of it all together.

I love FB. I love being able to see what friends are up to, especially those who I can't see in person often.

I do make use of FBs lists though. I only post pics with kids to close relatives and friends. I limit 99% of my posts about the baseball team to the other parents on the team because I know others aren't interested in the minutiae we discuss. Etc.

Also, if I get a friend request from someone I'm not really friends with, I politely accept it, and put them on FBs default "Restricted" list. This means I can message with them, but they can only see my public profile and they don't show up on my news feed.

I rarely use FB. I have it just because. I email or text personal news.

When I first opened by Facebook account in 2007, I was on it every chance I got. At home, at school (even during class), on my phone, etc. It took over my life. So I decided I'm not going to use it. I did it cold turkey and it's made me a more productive person. I don't use it, but haven't canceled it yet.

But I'm contemplating whether I should start using it again. Now that I have a daughter in school, I'm afraid that my daughter will miss out on things because she doesn't have a mom that uses Facebook -- parents, especially moms, keep in touch through Facebook even if they may not on the phone or in person. They set up playdates, etc. through Facebook although they might not have in person. I'm afraid I'm putting my daughter at a social disadvantage.