Graphic from the Writtalin blog.

I’m leaving Facebook. There, I’ve said it. I’ve been thinking about it for some time, and after initially deciding to have a break, I’ve decided to make the break permanent. It’s not that I don’t love you all out there in the virtual world, it’s just that you take up far too much of my time. Well, it was that initially. Initially, I thought that cutting FB out would give me back time to do stuff, and more importantly, time to daydream – there’s simply not enough daydreaming going on in the Fletcher head-space. And then I read an article by Salim Virani that laid out all the shite that FB gets up to without our consent.

Salim, is a tech-savvy entrepreneur, educator and writer; he’s set up projects that focus on peer to peer learning, but the thing that caught my eye, thanks to a tweet from, Kit De Wal, was his post on leaving Facebook called, Get your loved ones off Face Book. The article was originally posted in 2015, but has since been updated, as have FB’s terms and conditions…

It seems that FB is taking personal info, creating profiles of you and your friends and then selling this info to the whoever wants it. Info is passed onto banks, insurers, potential employers. FB even has an algorithm that posts stuff on your behalf. If you’ve ever seen adverts for companies/services that are endorsed by your friends, the chances are that they did no such thing. FB posts stuff that you recommend to your friends. Well, when I say you endorse I mean it pretends that you endorse it. It accesses your phone including your camera, microphone and GPS info which, if you read Salim’s article, has led to some rather embarrassing and disturbing situations for people.

I suppose, what with the Snooper’s Charter now becoming law in the UK, I should just shut up and put up with this, but I don’t see why profiles and judgements should be made about me, my family and friends, and then sold on to whoever wants them without my consent.

Please read Salim’s article here. It only takes 15mins, and there are lots of references from reputable sources to back it up.

I’ll leave my profile up for a week and then I’ll take it down. I’m intending to start deleting photographs now. Sadly, I think I’ll still need a FB presence for my work as a writer, but if anyone knows of a suitable alternative, please let me know.

This post will appear on FB, but I won’t be replying to any comments that are posted on FB. If you want to leave a comment, please do so on my blog – it doesn’t take long to set that up. This also means I won’t be on Messenger anymore, but you can still contact me through phone, email, post, WhatsApp and, heaven forbid, face to face.

I know people that have left FB and have ended up coming back and that may well be the case with me. I’d just like to give cat-free-video-clip-living a try and to not have my info used for profit.