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facebook messenger: creepy

Dan U said:
Facebook advertised a festival in my feed that I was talking about in a conversation on messenger.

Their bots definitely read what you say for advertising purposes
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Yeah, that stuff defo happens. Something similar with my youtube viewing and then the results google predicts as you type.

So say I had been watching a video about Stephen Farelly, and then go and google "stephen f", Mr Farelly, who ever he happens to be, will suddenly appear as the top suggestion above Stephen Fry. It's probably almost as if we agreed to let them do stuff like this when we ticked the "yes" to the 50 page Ts&Cs doc that none of us has ever read.
 
Dan U said:
Yeah am sure I agreed to it but still, found it a bit much.

Over to whatsapp...
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Different Ts&Cs (I think they've promised to remain ad free), but still FB owned. They'll find a way to monetise you. You don't pay £20billion odd for a messaging app (that has slightly less functionality than your own existing one) just to bring in the competition. The venture capitalists who funded it will have had an "exit strategy" (the switch after the bait to make the bucks) from day 1. It will become obvious some time soon.
 
We are in the worst period for messaging on the internet that I can remember. Dozens of different standards, none of them interoperable (okay, iPhone messages work with SMS too but that's a bit of an edge case). All proprietorial and run by companies who just want to keep you using their services. It is literally worse than AOL.
 
I don't understand the appeal tbh if you're using your phone.
If you need to have a deal with enough data so you can leave the data on in order to receive messages, you normally get plentymuchSMStexts thrown in, so why not use them, if you're just messaging.
 
Throbbing Angel said:
I don't understand the appeal tbh if you're using your phone.
If you need to have a deal with enough data so you can leave the data on in order to receive messages, you normally get plentymuchSMStexts thrown in, so why not use them, if you're just messaging.
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I have completely stopped using SMS in favour of Whatsapp and FB.
Scrolling back it seems the last one I sent was in March
 
Throbbing Angel said:
I don't understand the appeal tbh if you're using your phone.
If you need to have a deal with enough data so you can leave the data on in order to receive messages, you normally get plentymuchSMStexts thrown in, so why not use them, if you're just messaging.
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Because data based instant messaging works transparently over GSM, wifi and across (almost all) geopolitical boundaries (and consequently in the absence of GSM signal) without the potential for acquiring additional surprise costs? (Outside of your home country or those included for roaming within some sort of plan it's straightforward to confine communication to wifi only and control further incoming/outgoing comms charges which you can't do to the same degree with SMS - incoming/outgoing and SMS to MMS conversion charges). It also easily facilitates sharing of various multimedia/documents.

As regards the subject of the thread - FB trawl your data (which includes your communications) to monetise it. Not a surprise really. Don't use the dedicated FB messenger app (it'll help itself to a lot of your phone data anyway eg contacts in your addressbook, SMS log and contents, phone call log, location, other account details, media metadata, wifi network details, and access to your microphone, to name a few). Use a separate, end to end encrypted, messaging app. Access FB messages using a separate dedicated, web browser (one with incognito type features, limiting tracking and phone resource/data access, would be best).
 
Yeah re messaging abroad, my Mrs is in Australia for a month with our kids. I'd be bankrupt sending an receiving videos by text.
 
2hats said:
Don't use the dedicated FB messenger app (it'll help itself to a lot of your phone data anyway eg contacts in your addressbook, SMS log and contents, phone call log, location, other account details, media metadata, wifi network details, and access to your microphone, to name a few)
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I'm sure I should care about all that, but... Well, I don't really. As far as I can tell all they ultimately want that data for is to chuck ads my way.
 
FB have refused me access to my messages via my phone browser for a while now. It's a joke as the browser worked perfectly well - it just doesn't allow them all the juicy access to your phone. I did install it in the end as I missed a couple of messages. I let it have only restricted privileges (no camera, mic etc). I can see it's already taking up quarter of a gig of space on my phone though :mad: think it might go again

The other two work arounds I found were mbasic.facebook.com (a really simple version of the site made for shitty mobiles but actually works OK) or visiting www.messenger.com with 'request desktop mode' enabled.
 
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A friend of mine had this the other day, and I just thought he was being drunk and had pressed the wrong button, but the next day, when I was out and about and relying on a phone number someone had sent to me in a Facebook message, I also got an announcement telling me that all my messages had been transferred to Messenger and that I could only access them via that route.

Not only has it become a principle for me that I will not be forced to download an app I don't want, I needed that phone number and was not able to download an app at the time even if I had wanted to. I was so pissed off that I found a way round it, and it hasn't asked me again.

Fingers crossed.

Not sure exactly what I did, if I'm honest...
 
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editor said:
"We care about your memories"... so we're going to randomly dredge up an old post and slap it on your profile in an attempt to generate more page views and more money for us.
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I know, but I have fallen for those a few times, even though I know I shouldn't, and lots of other people have as well. :(

They're canny bastards, the folks at Facebook! :mad:
 
As someone who has struggled to make contacts in the "real" world social media has been a godsend to me. I've met many other aspies/ auties now only thanks to social media (including my boyfriend) and I'd say that without social media and the support I received through that I may never have transitioned. So, its not all bad.
 
AuntiStella said:
As someone who has struggled to make contacts in the "real" world social media has been a godsend to me. I've met many other aspies/ auties now only thanks to social media (including my boyfriend) and I'd say that without social media and the support I received through that I may never have transitioned. So, its not all bad.
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Of course not, but Facebook's endless mission to make as much money for themselves whilst overriding their users' needs sure fucking rankles. And it doesn't have to be that way - this site is effectively a social network but without all the data grabbing, privacy encroaching, cash in bollocks.
 
editor said:
Of course not, but Facebook's endless mission to make as much money for themselves whilst overriding their users' needs sure fucking rankles. And it doesn't have to be that way - this site is effectively a social network but without all the data grabbing, privacy encroaching, cash in bollocks.
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I'm not a big fan of Facebook. I pretty much only use it because the people I want to connect to it use it. If they were all on here Facebook wouldn't see the light of day in my life!

But as great as great as this site is, if I had been relying on it for support when I transitioned I would have been sorely disappointed. Twitter, however, met my needs then.

This site is great for some things and not so good for others which is why I'm on several different social networking sites I guess.

And I only said this originally because I saw a general rubbishing of social media taking hold in this thread.
 
Bumping because a friend of mine has told me not to use the new facebook messenger. She's sent on a link to a Fox news story about it. So I replied "fake news". She says it's not. They will go to jail, it's illegal.

I've asked here whether she means Fox or Facebook.
Anyway, I assume this is old news at this stage or is it bs? :confused:
 
krtek a houby said:
Bumping because a friend of mine has told me not to use the new facebook messenger. She's sent on a link to a Fox news story about it. So I replied "fake news". She says it's not. They will go to jail, it's illegal.

I've asked here whether she means Fox or Facebook.
Anyway, I assume this is old news at this stage or is it bs? :confused:
Click to expand...
What is illegal? :confused:
 
Sea Star said:
As someone who has struggled to make contacts in the "real" world social media has been a godsend to me. I've met many other aspies/ auties now only thanks to social media (including my boyfriend) and I'd say that without social media and the support I received through that I may never have transitioned. So, its not all bad.
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I have several friends who are on the autistic spectrum who only really communicate effectively online. People who can manage a lively and interesting discussion on messenger (and on many other social media channels), but are barely able to communicate at all face to face.
 
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