Facebook has faced a barrage of negative publicity over the past 24 hours via a whistleblower who appeared on 60 Minutes last night to speak of the company's dubious practices along with today's inexplicable six hour outage which also affected Instagram, WhatsApp and other applications.
For many years, I refused to join Facebook and even wrote an American Spectator article on it which I can no longer find. But after I lost my Twitter account, I reluctantly joined Facebook in September 2019. While Facebook has certainly its flaws when it comes to disseminating misinformation, my experience has been mostly positive. I have been able to reconnect with some people whom I haven't crossed path with in years. It's presented an opportunity to discuss some of my interests such as baseball (I've become Facebook friends with several former MLB players), bowling, Columbo and the 70's all-female rock group Fanny. With the latter, not only am I Facebook friends with former Fanny members June Millington and Alice de Buhr but I have become acquainted with many other fans both new and old.
The vast majority of my interactions on Facebook have been friendly and positive. I cannot say the same for Twitter (which I am now back on) which I consider a far rougher neighborhood.
For better or for worse, Facebook isn't going anywhere so long as people don't leave it en masse. It isn't so much a question of what use it is but how you use it.
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