“Facebook is so annoying.” How many times
have you heard that sentiment this past year?
We bet a lot, because more and more people
seem to be getting tired of the social media
platform, especially young people.
We’ve noticed a nationwide annoyance with
Facebook over 2013. The company even
admitted in October that younger teens were
using the network less frequently on a daily
basis. Here are 11 reasons that might convince
you to let your Facebook account go in 2014.
1. Nobody actually wants to just read about
what you’re doing anymore.
Think about it: What sounds more appealing
(and believable)? Reading a status that says,
“I’m currently hanging out with Will Smith!”
or a picture of that person actually posing with
Smith? A photo is definitely more engaging.
Here’s the most-liked Instagram picture of
2013: Justin Bieber’s snap with Smith.
When TIME interviewed teenagers about their
social media use in March, 16-year-old Hamp
Briley explained that kids these days don’t have
time for Facebook: “Twitter’s all statuses,
Instagram’s all pictures. People like to do more
specific things like that instead of being on just
Facebook.”
2. Facebook makes it impossible for you to stay
“private.”
For many valid reasons (think stalker exes or
potential employers), some people don’t like
having their name come up when it’s typed into
the Facebook search bar. However, most users
this year found problems with changes to
privacy settings. For one, Facebook removed the
option to keep your name hidden when people
search you. They also forced people to control
their privacy settings on a cumbersome item-
by-item basis. Today, the only way to make
sure certain people can’t access your profile is
to block them. Or alter your name so it doesn’t
appear when people search your real one. Or,
of course, quit Facebook entirely.
3. Your parents (and even grandparents) are
now watching your every move.
This year seemed to be the year everyone’s
mom, dad, grandmother and great aunt got
hooked on Facebook. And that meant every time
you posted a status about something innocuous,
these Facebook novices started breathing down
your neck the minute you hit “post.” We get
enough scolding from our parents “IRL” — no
need to let it trickle onto a social media site
where our friends can laugh at our familial
bickering.
4. Or they’re posting photos of you that you
would never want anyone to see
What’s worse than getting no “likes” on an
Instagram photo you posted? Checking your
Facebook and realizing that a horribly
embarrassing photo of you that your mom
posted is getting over 50 “likes,” along with
some pretty serious mockery in the comments
section.
5. Facebook is even keeping track of what you
don’t say.
You may have been happy you didn’t post that
one over-share about your extended trip to the
bathroom the other day, but Facebook may
have a record of exactly what you typed and
what time you were about to publish it. This
month, Facebook released a study revealing that
they were undergoing a new type of data
collection in which they were tracking when
people typed content out and then removed it
without publishing. Their mission is to
understand why users “self-censor” themselves
in updates. According to Facebook data scientist
Sauvik Das, a “self-censored update” is “an
entry into either [a status update or comment
box] of more than five characters that was
typed out but not submitted for at least the next
10 minutes.”
6. Facebook makes you feel less positive about
your life.
Even though the purpose of Facebook is
effectively to reveal details about everything
and anything you do, access to this knowledge
could take a toll on your mental well-being. A
recent study done by the Department of
Behavioral Science at the Utah Valley
University discovered that heavy Facebook users
aren’t the happiest people out there. The
researchers found that just using Facebook
makes you view your life more negatively. Of
400 students questioned, “those who have used
Facebook longer agreed more that others were
happier, and agreed less that life is fair, and
those spending more time on Facebook each
week agreed more that others were happier and
had better lives.”
7. The “friend suggestions” tell you to befriend
people you don’t even know.
Facebook’s “friend suggestions” algorithm needs
some work, because these days we’re
discovering that your potential “friends” are
people we only know through someone else, or
someone we haven’t even met at all. If you
want people to stop using a platform that is
supposed to connect them and bring them
together with the people they care about, you
should definitely adopt Facebook’s strategy of
trying to get you to care about the lives of
complete strangers.
8. You realize you only know and care about
only 20 people out of your 1,000 friends.
It starts to get kind of weird when you check
the birthdays for the day and don’t remember
who any of the five people are. How do you
know them? Are they some random person you
met at a bar in college one night, and in a
drunken stupor decided to “add on Facebook”?
Probably. Do you need to know that this person
is moving to California this week? More
importantly, do you care? Nope. It could be
time to overhaul your friends list. Or maybe
it’s time to realize that your Facebook account
is being used pretty much entirely to keep tabs
on these kinds of strangers.
9. Your friends keep announcing their
engagements.
There’s nothing more obnoxious than being a
busy twentysomething and starting to see all of
your friends post statuses about getting engaged.
While you are happy for them and wish them
the best in their prospects for a lasting
marriage, the bombardment of status updates is
starting to make you feel like something is
wrong with your love life. Why aren’t you
getting married? What is wrong with you? Why
the hell do you need to be thinking about
marriage right now?! Once that anxiety
subsides, you realize you have to endure
continued updates on their wedding
preparation. You could unsubscribe to this
friend, but you know more are coming.
10. The excessive ads are about to ruin the
whole experience.
If the regular sponsored ads hadn’t already
destroyed Facebook for you — seriously, why
the hell do you think you’re obsessed with
guitars and horses — the upcoming launch of
video ads will definitely do the trick. Facebook
started testing these annoying ads out in
December. They’ll soon be coming to a newsfeed
near you, automatically playing a video as you
scroll through. However, the sound will only
play if you click or tap on it. The good news?
There is a way to block these ads from
automatically playing. You just have to use a
Flash blocker.
11. It makes getting over a breakup really hard.
Back in the days before social media, people
broke up and never called the person again. It
was relatively simple to move on (providing
you weren’t forced to physically see the person
on a day-to-day basis). But today, being able to
have constant access to your ex’s timeline can
easily cause serious obsessive tendencies and
behavior. Samuel Axon at Mashable accurately
summed up how Facebook makes breakups
harder, because the platform makes your
change in relationship status public and it
allows you to see all the action your ex is
getting.
have you heard that sentiment this past year?
We bet a lot, because more and more people
seem to be getting tired of the social media
platform, especially young people.
We’ve noticed a nationwide annoyance with
Facebook over 2013. The company even
admitted in October that younger teens were
using the network less frequently on a daily
basis. Here are 11 reasons that might convince
you to let your Facebook account go in 2014.
1. Nobody actually wants to just read about
what you’re doing anymore.
Think about it: What sounds more appealing
(and believable)? Reading a status that says,
“I’m currently hanging out with Will Smith!”
or a picture of that person actually posing with
Smith? A photo is definitely more engaging.
Here’s the most-liked Instagram picture of
2013: Justin Bieber’s snap with Smith.
When TIME interviewed teenagers about their
social media use in March, 16-year-old Hamp
Briley explained that kids these days don’t have
time for Facebook: “Twitter’s all statuses,
Instagram’s all pictures. People like to do more
specific things like that instead of being on just
Facebook.”
2. Facebook makes it impossible for you to stay
“private.”
For many valid reasons (think stalker exes or
potential employers), some people don’t like
having their name come up when it’s typed into
the Facebook search bar. However, most users
this year found problems with changes to
privacy settings. For one, Facebook removed the
option to keep your name hidden when people
search you. They also forced people to control
their privacy settings on a cumbersome item-
by-item basis. Today, the only way to make
sure certain people can’t access your profile is
to block them. Or alter your name so it doesn’t
appear when people search your real one. Or,
of course, quit Facebook entirely.
3. Your parents (and even grandparents) are
now watching your every move.
This year seemed to be the year everyone’s
mom, dad, grandmother and great aunt got
hooked on Facebook. And that meant every time
you posted a status about something innocuous,
these Facebook novices started breathing down
your neck the minute you hit “post.” We get
enough scolding from our parents “IRL” — no
need to let it trickle onto a social media site
where our friends can laugh at our familial
bickering.
4. Or they’re posting photos of you that you
would never want anyone to see
What’s worse than getting no “likes” on an
Instagram photo you posted? Checking your
Facebook and realizing that a horribly
embarrassing photo of you that your mom
posted is getting over 50 “likes,” along with
some pretty serious mockery in the comments
section.
5. Facebook is even keeping track of what you
don’t say.
You may have been happy you didn’t post that
one over-share about your extended trip to the
bathroom the other day, but Facebook may
have a record of exactly what you typed and
what time you were about to publish it. This
month, Facebook released a study revealing that
they were undergoing a new type of data
collection in which they were tracking when
people typed content out and then removed it
without publishing. Their mission is to
understand why users “self-censor” themselves
in updates. According to Facebook data scientist
Sauvik Das, a “self-censored update” is “an
entry into either [a status update or comment
box] of more than five characters that was
typed out but not submitted for at least the next
10 minutes.”
6. Facebook makes you feel less positive about
your life.
Even though the purpose of Facebook is
effectively to reveal details about everything
and anything you do, access to this knowledge
could take a toll on your mental well-being. A
recent study done by the Department of
Behavioral Science at the Utah Valley
University discovered that heavy Facebook users
aren’t the happiest people out there. The
researchers found that just using Facebook
makes you view your life more negatively. Of
400 students questioned, “those who have used
Facebook longer agreed more that others were
happier, and agreed less that life is fair, and
those spending more time on Facebook each
week agreed more that others were happier and
had better lives.”
7. The “friend suggestions” tell you to befriend
people you don’t even know.
Facebook’s “friend suggestions” algorithm needs
some work, because these days we’re
discovering that your potential “friends” are
people we only know through someone else, or
someone we haven’t even met at all. If you
want people to stop using a platform that is
supposed to connect them and bring them
together with the people they care about, you
should definitely adopt Facebook’s strategy of
trying to get you to care about the lives of
complete strangers.
8. You realize you only know and care about
only 20 people out of your 1,000 friends.
It starts to get kind of weird when you check
the birthdays for the day and don’t remember
who any of the five people are. How do you
know them? Are they some random person you
met at a bar in college one night, and in a
drunken stupor decided to “add on Facebook”?
Probably. Do you need to know that this person
is moving to California this week? More
importantly, do you care? Nope. It could be
time to overhaul your friends list. Or maybe
it’s time to realize that your Facebook account
is being used pretty much entirely to keep tabs
on these kinds of strangers.
9. Your friends keep announcing their
engagements.
There’s nothing more obnoxious than being a
busy twentysomething and starting to see all of
your friends post statuses about getting engaged.
While you are happy for them and wish them
the best in their prospects for a lasting
marriage, the bombardment of status updates is
starting to make you feel like something is
wrong with your love life. Why aren’t you
getting married? What is wrong with you? Why
the hell do you need to be thinking about
marriage right now?! Once that anxiety
subsides, you realize you have to endure
continued updates on their wedding
preparation. You could unsubscribe to this
friend, but you know more are coming.
10. The excessive ads are about to ruin the
whole experience.
If the regular sponsored ads hadn’t already
destroyed Facebook for you — seriously, why
the hell do you think you’re obsessed with
guitars and horses — the upcoming launch of
video ads will definitely do the trick. Facebook
started testing these annoying ads out in
December. They’ll soon be coming to a newsfeed
near you, automatically playing a video as you
scroll through. However, the sound will only
play if you click or tap on it. The good news?
There is a way to block these ads from
automatically playing. You just have to use a
Flash blocker.
11. It makes getting over a breakup really hard.
Back in the days before social media, people
broke up and never called the person again. It
was relatively simple to move on (providing
you weren’t forced to physically see the person
on a day-to-day basis). But today, being able to
have constant access to your ex’s timeline can
easily cause serious obsessive tendencies and
behavior. Samuel Axon at Mashable accurately
summed up how Facebook makes breakups
harder, because the platform makes your
change in relationship status public and it
allows you to see all the action your ex is
getting.
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