If you, like me, live in the EU, Facebook is now entirely clamping down and forcing free users to make their personal data available for monetization.
Attempting to access any Facebook domain and perhaps also other meta products will redirect you to the following prompt with a choice between either accepting the monetization of your user data, or coughing up a region-dependent monthly subscription fee: base (for me ~10€) + an additional fee (~7€) for each additional facebook or instagram account you have.
Now, the hidden third option. At an initial glance, it seems like there is no other option but to click one of the buttons - however, certain links still work, and grant access to important pieces of functionality through your web browser.
If anyone has information to add regarding Facebook or Instagram, please do share it. I’ve only (begrudgingly) used the former up until now, but I know many others use Instagram and don’t feel like giving a single cent (nor their personal info) to Meta.
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https://www.facebook.com/dyi - perhaps most important of all, now is a good time to make a request to download your Facebook data. Don’t forget to switch to data for “all time” and “high quality” if you intend to permanently delete your account.
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https://www.facebook.com/your_information - here you can find and manage your information, but crucially also access Facebook messenger.
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The messenger app: Still hasn’t prompted me with anything, though I expect that will change in the not too far future.
Currently my plan is to use messenger to inform any important friends that I intend to leave FB, and where they’ll be able to reach me in the future.
You need to make a choice to continue using Facebook
This reminds me of the movie War Games, when WOPR says, “The only winning strategy is not to play.” The only correct choice to make here is to delete your Facebook account.
Indeed, I’d like to, and hopefully will be able to. Unfortunately it is basically the universal method of communication at my campus - unless you use instagram… or snapchat… :(
Hopefully it’ll be possible to get others to make the move, but I’m not really that important in social contexts, nor are most privacy-focused folks.
The evil of the lizard is too great to resist. The only way to win is to deny it battle.
How anyone still has a FB account I’ll never understand—or, I should say, anyone who doesn’t subscribe to the insane, “well I have nothing to hide!”/“anyone reading my information will be SO BOOORED LOLOLOL!” mindset and that actually gives 1/10000th of a shit about privacy.
Most of my sports and social activities are organized through various Facebook groups, and I’d lead a rather boring life without it.
That’s why.
For me it is still holding on, barely, as a messaging app. I have a few friends and groups that just refuse to message on other things and that’s keeping me around. I’m tired of evangelizing better options.
Or stop caring about data being used for ads. Most people don’t 🤷♂️
Third choice: Delete your account and never look back.
Imagine how many artificially inflated egos would be deflated all at once if facebook/social media went away.
probably be one the greatest things to happen to humanity.
Isn’t that incredible? Turns out that connecting people to one another in this way fosters some healthy interaction for those who choose it but also amplifies loads of unhealthy bs. I’m one of those idiots who 15 years ago thought the internet and social media would bring about something of a second enlightenment, a golden area of progressivism, being well-informed, connected to one another in new and beautiful ways.
25ish years ago we all thought the internet would be a wonderful marketplace of ideas where people wouldn’t be judged by their age, gender, race or whatever, but on the merit of their ideas.
And it did feel that way for a while back when it took a bit of intelligence to get online. However, now that anyone can get online with just a few clicks the morons have learned how to amplify their moronity.
Its both a marketplace of ideas and the cesspool of moronity.
100% because of social media. see my reply to schnapsman
It would have been that. Or at least a lot more like that…
If social media hadnt been invented, and if social media hadn’t gamified human interaction with upvotes/likes/etc, which ended up doing nothing but creating a dopamine feedback loop that is directly responsible for the extremity of online discourse today.
Social media is also responsible for using its algorithms to link isolated village idiots and conspiracy nuts, and giving them secure echochambers with which to bounce off of eachother free of outside criticism or view, until they ended up completely disconnected from any hint of reality.
I mean, it sort of did, it’s just not quite that simple. A lot of amazing things have come about because of social media. So many artists able to reach people directly without needing gatekeepers like publishers. Movements able to be organized where previously those people would have never interacted.
Commenting this on a post about one of the new gatekeepers is quite ironic.
The route to getting something posted on Facebook or other social media involves 1 gatekeeper who barely involves itself. The route to getting a book or news article published involves more, and they micromanage the content much much more. Just compare what percentage of people have posted something on Facebook vs have had an article published by a newspaper or magazine.
You can post all you want, if you actually want to reach an audience you must comply with silly rules (try putting an innocent non sexualized nipple on an albumcover and posting it to facebook) and you have to pay for visibility because algorithm heavily favours money. On top it’s vendor locked-in, there are only very few networks with a very large userbase, and even fewer corporations behind them.
None of that affects people’s ability to disseminate information anywhere close to the constraints put on people by traditional publishing. Again, how many people have ever posted to social media vs how many people have ever published a book?
When the “Subscribe” button is gray and the “Use for free” button is blue, you know something’s up 🤔
It’s because they make more money from your user data, but it also doesn’t cost you money
The text is also incredible misleading. The data will still be harvested and monetized, just not for ads.
Even that claim I find dubious. Yes, your data won’t inform targeted ads on Facebook, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be used for targeted ads elsewhere on the internet.
Delete that garbage.
I swore off all Meta products before they were called Meta. One of the better decisions I’ve ever made.
lol, saying “before they were called meta” as if that was a long time ago. That was 2 years ago.
Pepperidge farms remembers
How much you wanna bet your info will still be used for ads even if you subscribe?
They’re actually holding your friends and family hostage, make plans to get them to safety.
That’s, uh, a little bit hyperbolic.
Not really, like, you can’t communicate with your family. In my case, i live in Germany, but my family lives in Brazil. It’s the only thing keeping me on Facebook, until now.
Thank God my family switched to WhatsApp for all family stuff. Since there are also family members in Colombia & USA, we have to keep a fixed online place, so we can communicate quickly.
WhatsApp is owned, by meta, just like Instagram. So it is rather when and not if we’ll start seeing ads everywhere.
Yes, really. Your family can find any number of other ways to communicate. Facebook does not have a monopoly on international communication.
I know, but the problem is to convince everyone to use something different. 70, 60, 50 ,40, 30 year olds ( i think anyone up to 30 is much more open and used to deal with software ) a plenty, living in different countries.
I really tried.
That’s not Facebook’s fault. You can’t say that a service is holding people hostage when the actual situation is that those people aren’t interested in trying other services.
It may not be fb’s fault directly, but they hold the keys to an enormous resource which should be properly regulated. Telling op to just make the choice ignores the structural issue at hand. It’s a bit like saying if you don’t like all the problems of your country, just emigrate. That’s everyone’s choice, but it isn’t practical as a general solution. Emigrating in a digital sense is far easier, but do we wait for these common goods to be enshittificated and reinvented or can we skip some suffering and seize control already.
Lol my guy, I have actually completed an emigration process. Comparing it to finding a different free communication service is fucking bonkers. Facebook doesn’t hold the keys to anything. If the users leave, they have nothing. Finding a replacement is practical and its not anything like emigrating to another country, holy shit.
Is it? You have to pay or give up all of your rights to stay in contact with your friends and family. What would you call it? Glad to see pro-facebook people here on lemmy, there’s dozens of you.
Lol for the record pal, Facebook can get fucked. I haven’t used it in years. Maybe don’t assume someone’s stance just because they said you were being hyperbolic - which you’re still being.
“It’s free and always will be”
It is free. You are not paying. You couldnt even get money for your information so its not like youre selling it
deleted by creator
Where can i sell my data? I want money.
https://surveys.gobranded.com/
There are tons of sites for this, it was a lot more popular a decade ago before sites realize they could just steal it
Go fill some surveys for Google Play Store credits or something.
There are services out there that will pay you (either real cash or with points) to fill out surveys all day. They’ll pay you less than they’d pay someone like Facebook though, since people are more truthful on these platforms than when filling out these surveys.
They dont want my data, they want to ask me dumb questions. And they dont pay
deleted by creator
You couldnt even get money for your information
Well, you could. Taking part in surveys in exchange of monetary compensation is a side hustle for many.
And on the other side is sourcing data a huge expense for many research endeavours.
That’s why everybody is buying from Google & Facebook. Because they offer it for relative low cost.
Only if you think your time and personal information are free.
You might want to work on your self-worth and business sense if you think that.
Dark pattern of the week: button colors.
Can you guess which button Meta really wants you to press?
Recently uninstalled:
- Twitter/X
I feel free. My phone feels lighter, almost. My brain feels lighter.
Same! I am enjoying the fediverse as a largely nontoxic replacement.
Agreed. It’s not too mainstream (yet) so not too much drivel has started seeping through lol. Here’s hoping it’ll stay this way. Feels very wholesome so far! Feeling at home already.
don’t forget to delete the accounts too! I’ve seen people just deleting the app and thinking their account is gone too.
Very good tip! To be honest, I’m not ready to delete the accounts yet. I’ll just run the services on my computer in containers (Firefox) and with μBlock Origin, so there’s minimal impact of this change for me.
But it does feel very nice not to be able to do much when I pull out my phone as a reflex. I feel limited in a positive way. Much rather be talking to you fine folk than the drivel I was often interacting with on Reddit. 😁
The real question, in EU, is not Facebook (or even Instagram). It’s WhatsApp. Business talk with WhatsApp, family talk with WhatsApp, meet a person in a bar? Yep WhatsApp or you are the weirdo
As soon I got the banners, I uninstalled the app and switched to friendly. Not sure if I have such luxury with WhatsApp…. Maybe time to explore matrix? 🤷
I would love to ditch WhatsApp, but then I wouldn’t be in touch with my family half as much, and it would be a lot more difficult to get anything done.
I am in Spain where people simply assume you have WA, and the majority of small business use it extensively.Remind those businesses that if they don’t have explicit consent from the people saved in their contacts, they are violating article 44 of the GDPR.
Same if their websites use Google Analytics without asking for consent first.
What can facebook really gather from whatsapp? Asfaik messages are encrypted, and other than that I’m not really giving info to whatsapp, like my estado and date of birth but that’s pretty much it.
Like I get it from facebook, you are constantly looking things up that can tell what u like, hobbies, or political affiliation, but whatsapp?
WA is also owned by Meta, and was only being used by my privacy-oriented friends. We swapped it for Signal pretty much instantly when the news came, but getting others to move over has been a slow fight.
Yeah… the result is that now I have WhatsApp, signal, telegram. 99% of my contacts are on WhatsApp, maybe 20% are on telegram (and a number of group chat are there) and 1% take it or leave it has signal (and no group chat).
In practice the only one I can get rid of is signal (that is also the one I would like better 🙄🙄)
Matrix is pretty good! I use Element. It’s pretty much as usable as anything else I’ve used for similar purposes: Discord, Slack, Messenger, etc.
Hard part is obviously getting people to switch over. But it’s ready for normies!
The ElementX developemnt is looking really really good!
I was more thinking about using the matrix <> WhatsApp bridge for avoiding the pop up. It’s impossible to migrate people (especially strangers)
Laws are changing in your region, so we’re introducinga new choice about how we use your info for ads.
Which law?
You know, the law. That one. That law that changed. The law that changed in your region. That law. That recently changed.
I always choose ‘fuck whoever is giving me an ultimatum’. That’s the control freak. That’s the source of problems.
lol, that’s just not true. If I give my alcoholic friend the ultimatum of “you need to get sober or we can’t be friends” I am not a control freak or the source of problems. Also, every online service gives you an ultimatum. It’s called the Terms of Service. Either you agree, or you don’t use it. Yes, even here. Guess you can’t use anything, or go anywhere. Don’t get me wrong, Meta is the scum of the earth that we as people desperately need to get rid of, but you’re really picking the wrong fight with the “ultimatum”.
Easy fix. Stop using crap like meta, or Reddit, or TikTok, or Twitter or another degenerated social media platform…
Sounds like a lot of hassle, when the real answer is to just get rid of Facebook
