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[greatbritishhoney]

Perhaps you could explain why you think Facebook will sell people info to the highest bidder? If the answer is just because others have, then thatks no different to bocotting sainsburys because you don't like tesco!

 

[Brosville]

At some point they'll need to capitalise on their main asset - your information, and I have no doubt that at some point they will - if you squint carefully at the small print I expect you'll find they allow themselves that option ...
Other major internet companies have done so, so it's reasonable to suppose that they may well follow suit sooner or later.
Fine, if you choose to use it, that's your problem, but please don't try to force us non-users to join by putting information that should be available to all inside their "secret society".......

 

[greatbritishhoney]

, but please don't try to force us non-users to join by putting information that should be available to all inside their "secret society".......

Oh come on, I think you are over-dramatising!
No one is forcing you to do anything. You have a choice.
If the local pub puts on a pub quiz that costs 50p to enter, I don't complain that it's not being held in my front room free of charge.

If I want to phone you on the telephone I have to buy a phone and enter into some form of contract with a phone service provider. I'd have to give them just as much, if not more, info than I would give to facebook. That information is just at much at risk.
So, I'm guessing you don't have a phone so that you don't have to "force" your friends and family to join your "secret club" if they want to phone you?

 

[Brosville]

I think you're (deliberately) missing the point, of you want a more correct analogy, putting information on the Orange 'phone network that is only available if people sign up for "Orange" is far more accurate...
Can you not understand that a great many people resent being "forced" to join Facebook?

 

[greatbritishhoney]

I think you're (deliberately) missing the point, of you want a more correct analogy, putting information on the Orange 'phone network that is only available if people sign up for "Orange" is far more accurate...
Can you not understand that a great many people resent being "forced" to join Facebook?

Not missing the point at all - just trying to understand exactly why you dislike facebook over and above any other organisation that may use your data. By your own admission the "selling data" thing is not really much more than a hunch.
I can perfectly understand why people don't want to be part of facebook - there are a myriad of perfectly valid reasons. I have many friends who are not on facebook and I wouldn't seek to persuade them otherwise.
However, if I put a photo on facebook, I am in no way "forcing" anyone to join facebook to look at it. They have free will - they can choose not to join.
You may not like it that you can't access the photo without joining, but you are in no way being forced. That's the point I'm getting at.

 

[greatbritishhoney]

I personally think that most of the non-facebook users are put off by the many scare stories in the media.
This is a good example....

http://www.badscience.net/2009/02/the-evidence-aric-sigman-ignored/


People are often eager to propogate baseless theories about social networks that "scare" would-be users into avoiding them.

 

[Brosville]

I've voiced my worries about many internet organisations having "too much" information on all of us, IF Facebook allowed anyone on the net to view such things as company or club sites without "joining" then I'd have far less of a quibble with them, as it is people will use them for "club" and other sites and essentially preclude people like me from using them which shows that Facebook "have an agenda" (they want to force everyone to join, essentially to push the value of their company up)
I'm deeply suspicious at the potential of harm from the omnipotent Google, and dislike Yahoo (and Flickr) as intensely as Facebook, as they are just as intent on coercing our membership........
I'm passionate about the good that the internet can do, but feel that this coercion is totally against the spirit of the freedom of the net..... there ARE perfectly good other ways to disseminate information to all and sundry using the net....

 

[greatbritishhoney]

I've voiced my worries about many internet organisations having "too much" information on all of us, IF Facebook allowed anyone on the net to view such things as company or club sites without "joining" then I'd have far less of a quibble with them, as it is people will use them for "club" and other sites and essentially preclude people like me from using them which shows that Facebook "have an agenda" (they want to force everyone to join, essentially to push the value of their company up)
I'm deeply suspicious at the potential of harm from the omnipotent Google, and dislike Yahoo as intensely as Facebook (and Flickr), as they are just as intent on coercing our membership........
I'm passionate about the good that the internet can do, but feel that this coercion is totally against the spirit of the freedom of the net..... there ARE perfectly good other ways to disseminate information to all and sundry using the net....

But without the income generated through advertising to the 750 million Facebook users the company would not exist in any form meaningful enough to use as a tool to disseminate information.
I agree that the internet is missing its potenital as a tool for the greater good of humanity but think that a BKA having a Facebook page is possibly the wrong target for this wrath.

 

[VEG]

Brosville you are suspicious of anyone and everything lol

 

[Brosville]

..you don't have to be member of Youtube or Daily Motion to view the videos, or a member of the numerous blogging sites to read their member blogs, they do very nicely from their ad revenues without resorting to "coercion"...and reach everyone on the net

 

[greatbritishhoney]

..you don't have to be member of Youtube or Daily Motion to view the videos, or a member of the numerous blogging sites to read their member blogs, they do very nicely from their ad revenues without resorting to "coercion"...and reach everyone on the net

They are very different animals though aren't they?
If I wanted to share a photo of my daughter with, for example, my mum - I would want to do it through a medium that allowed me a degree of security rather than a completely open service like youtube.
And remember you DO need to register on youtube if you want to submit a video or comment on someone elses.

I just don't see the grand conspiracy here. If it's a "private club" then so what? I may want to be part of a private club, you may not. No one is forcing either of us. There's no significant moral argumant that says all information must be accessible to all.

 

[Brosville]

It's not a conspiracy, it's a rather odious way of forcing people to join their organisation for purely financial motives - I'll be using "Picasa" for the christening pics which allows everyone I want to view them to do so whilst leaving them complete freedom not to have to "join" anything - and before you say it, I know it's now part of the Google empire, and I am using Chrome as a browser.........
You can also mark things as "private" on Youtube

"No one is forcing either of us. There's no significant moral argumant that says all information must be accessible to all", no but if you are a club wanting to service everyone in your area, you are deliberately excluding many of them by using Facebook rather than "open" ways of doing it..................

 

[greatbritishhoney]

It's not a conspiracy, it's a rather odious way of forcing people to join their organisation for purely financial motives - I'll be using "Picasa" for the christening pics which allows everyone I want to view them to do so whilst leaving them complete freedom not to have to "join" anything - and before you say it, I know it's now part of the Google empire, and I am using Chrome as a browser.........
You can also mark things as "private" on Youtube

"No one is forcing either of us. There's no significant moral argumant that says all information must be accessible to all", no but if you are a club wanting to service everyone in your area, you are deliberately excluding many of them by using Facebook rather than "open" ways of doing it..................

But surely the point is that people CHOOSE to use Facebook. There is no odious coercion. Or were the 750 million users press-ganged through the use clever marketing and peer pressure?
Speaking for myself I joined because I found it a very useful tool to communicate with my friends and family - the fact that I had to join to do so does not bother me in the slightest.
So, perhaps the users of Facebook should be the ones who decide whether they are being exploited rather than non-facebook users telling them?

I would imagine that most clubs use Facebook as just one of their marketing tools, along with their website, leaflets, posters etc. It is not exclusive - it is just one way to access a group of people.

 

[region2]

I bought something on ebay a while ago - seller wanted a cheque. At this point he had my name, my address and my postcode.
I offered to pay by bank transfer. He refused to give me his account no and sort code so in the end I sent a cheque. He now had all the previously mentioned items plus MY sort code, MY account number and a perfect copy of my signature. I got my item and I still haven't been hacked...

Daily Mail Paranoia such as this is rife - someone contacted me the other day by email and even used an alias to talk to me about another hobby of mine. Turns out someone he met on Facebook had scammed him out of £100k which he eventually got back. Result? he was 'resigning' from Facebook. Why? What did facebook do to him? Nothing more than put him in touch with the scammer. I bet he isn't getting rid of 'phone or internet or Daily Mail subscription!

Get real people - Facebook will be around for a long time, it's successful, it's popular and it's safe as long as you use its safety features -a bit like putting on your seatbelt or buying insurance.

R2

 

[Brosville]

"But surely the point is that people CHOOSE to use Facebook" - therein lies the crux of my objections, I choose not to, so anyone using it as method of reaching all and sundry won't, and will by definition have to duplicate their efforts in other directions, which could be totally circumvented by using other more "inclusive" means in the first place -
I really worry when people say "oh it's fine, loads of people do it, you're mad if you don't" - loads of people eat junk food, watch soaps, read "sleb" magazines, and eat chinese honey - but I have no inclination to join them..........

 

[VEG]

errm you said you did join once and no one "made you"

 

[Brosville]

and I was soon out of there like a scalded cat.......... and resolved never to return!
In that case I genuinely "chose" to try it out, but if a local beekeeping association's only contact point on the net was Facebook, they'd miss out on my company (and many others' too) as I choose not to rejoin

 

[jakethedog]

a couple of good points from greatbritishhoney to which I'm going to be cheeky and add some thoughts.

I would imagine that most clubs use Facebook as just one of their marketing tools, along with their website, leaflets, posters etc.

Which is surely the whole point. it's value lies in being 'extra to' rather than 'instead of'. Like all extras it's pointless complaining that we can't take part because of our own self imposed choices. A little like complaining that it's not possible to attend an apiary meeting because it's too far away or coincides with our favourite tv programme. It's up to us to make the choice to get involved with the 'extras' or not.

It is not exclusive - it is just one way to access a group of people.

and for them to have an extra way of accessing group information, and also, if done well, being able to offer assistance (or put out their own SOS) to other local members - yeah, i know that this forum allows them to do the same over a much wider geographic area...but only if they join!

----------------------------------------------------​

to my mind the most concerning aspect of this thread was earlier references to the new generation bringing this paticular association up to date -I can't remember the exact wording as I write this but it read to myself like there's a mini coup going on, certainly a split between 'new' and 'old(established)' members. If this is the case then things certainly can't be very healthy.

 

[Poly Hive]

The issue here as I see it, and being a bit older and having been on line a long time, have seen things come and go, is just that, they come and go.

MSN chat deleted. Paltalk came into fashion and went, yahoo chat same, friends united.. same... and so on.

What is needed is a solid web site and no reliance on tweets or face book as trust me here they will die. Not next week but in five years?

Far far better to create a well built web site as the WWW is here for the long run.

Fads come and go, some fast and some slow but go they go.

PH

 

[Tom Bick]

Fads come and go, some fast and some slow but go they go.

PH

Not fast enough when it comes to twitter