Why I Never Use Facebook, MySpace or Twitter ....Never Have ....Never Will...Ever !

#34 haha!  That's what I was thinking, I could barely tell what David's opinion was! -Kasey

I can't believe this post is getting all this attention...yet I saw it, I get now.....David isn't into FB, so what. 

David - I love the post.  People do not realize that by joining FB and the others they are literally giving away a coujple of hundred dollars to the site owner, who is a weasel (in my opinion) who appears to have been given this programming assigment by two other slick Harvard guys.  He said he was doing it, then he said he didn't have the time, then he launched his own site.  That's my understanding.  However, if they say the site is worth $100b, and it has 800m members, each one is worth about $125.  That's just the tip of the iceberg.  The also provide the IRS/Federal Gov't/private investigators/FBI/CIA/the world, complete insight into your life. 

There is an expression that say you be defined by who you keep as friends.  In this case, it is so true.  In 10 minutes, any investigator can find your friends, even if you don't ever post.  Thereafter, they can basically find out everything about you either by combining your posts and theirs, or by intervewing friends.  It's sick.  However, Americans have always been willing to give up their rights to privacy for nothing.

Beyond that, Facebook is simply AOL rehashed for those who forgot about it or were to young to remember the first popular IM device or 'You've Got Mail'.  It's crap.  To look on there and see people I thought were intelligent involved in games of 'mafia wars'', 'farmville' or other garbage - it's ridiculous.

Any business that can be had on Facebook should be able to be had elsewhere.  My children have been forbidden from having accounts (and I'm pretty lenient as a dad), but they have thanked me for it.  They say that, even by middle school, so many problems have come from it that it is ridiculous.  Why has bullying become popular?  Because people are faceless and easy prey online.  It's easy to destroy someone when you can type anonymously or even just forward rumors.  It's sad.

It will be the downfall of thousands of people's careers, schooling, life, etc.  As a mom in my town once said, could you imagine every girl you grew up with being defined by the worst night they had in their youth?  So true.

The government would probably be involved and against its abuses, but the government is able to use and abuse it for their own benefit as well.  Stay away!

If you need 'friends' on the computer, it's rough.  And, for everyone who says it 'allows them to keep in touch with people they haven't seen in forever,' well, send them and e-mail, or, huh, an actual letter and enclose photos!  Geez, that's a crazy thought.

For business, one has to realize that the average user on FB has an IQ far to the left of the center of the bell curve.

Great post.

By the way, while AR has so many teriffic features, it also has section that mimic FB.  I know it's great for everyone to share, and I don't have to read or see these poses, but enough already with photos of people's dogs, cats, flowers, etc.  I don't care and they have nothing to do with real estate.  I'd love to see the point system tweaked here to makes sure that people post about relevant topics.  I'm not looking for a Stasi overlord to review every post, but I know that most people are allowed to blog ad infinitum about nonsense or, more recently, I saw someone post over 300 Blogs in under 48 hours.  They were simply adding their entire local MLS to AR by some robot or other. 

Don't get me wrong - I'd love to replace my local MLS with Active Rain as then I could return to having control over my listings!.  But, that's not the case just yet.  In the mean time, it would be nice to have two columns of blogs - one for real estate discussions, another for people mass blogging listings or other advertisements, and maybe, actually, a third for people to self-assess what they are writing and post to the third column called "fairly useless crap which some people might find entertaining." 

Or, the third column could be - "Look here if you simply want to make inane comments on inane posts to get your 25 points."

I think you and I are called 'haters', but I don't think that's the case.  I think it is that we can see a little farher down the line to the deleterious effects that FB is having on our society.  And, Tweets, give me a break.  I don't care what 99.9999% of humanity ever has to say.  I surely don't need to be tweeted by anyone other than my radiologist in the case of a bad x-ray.  Otherwise, get some degree of self esteem (or, actually, get rid of your sense of self-importance, and skip the tweet that your cat just had babies or your just abouto to board a plane. 

The economy is in the crapper.  Everyone says it's e-commerce that will help pull us out of it.  Does anyone stop to think it may be things like FB and the other 'social media' that caused our economy to crash.  Everyone has their heads so far up their - facebook accounts - that they don't do anything while our politicians run rampat over our rights and our finances.

OK - I'm done.  You hit a nerve in me!

David, this is some of the best writing on this topic I've read. Boingboing.net has a great article called "Facebook of the Dead." I quit "F" book 2-1/2 years ago after a very short time spent on it. I received a computer virus from an incoming message, and the Farmville requests were obnoxious. I find it hard to believe that anyone actually generates real estate business from FB--but what do I know? I agree that FB is dangerous, especially for teens. It's vapid and hideous. After reading this I'm thinking of closing my twitter account and google+. I've not generated business from either of those social media sites. I don't tweet what I've had for breakfast, just blog posts on real estate and my listings. You've shed some more light on the monstrosity called social media. 

David,

I am not very techy but in the last month there has been a story stating that even when you log out of FB their site tracks your internet activity.  So they have a good pattern of your habits to sell.   Frightening.  Not sure how accurate the infor is but it was enough to stop me from going to FB on any type of regular basis.  I do like to connect with old friends though and it is an easy platform to do so.

David,

Unfortunately I use Facebook, but I despise it. It is a waste of time, but I can't deny the link love it can provide, so I will use it.... for now.

That's the average annual income of the average FB user you're showing right there.  I don't think they can afford to spend all that. 

You've got the post that will never die - and I noticed up top that 'points have been removed' from it.  What's up with that - they don't like the photos?