[soulboy77]

Originally Posted by sweh

No way man, those Facebook event invitations are just spam as far as I'm concerned.

I cannot staaaand promoters on Facebook. They're so annoying cluttering up my wall and inbox with all their garbage.

Agree with the above. Unless the invite is from a friend organising a private party then it is just promotional spam in my book.

[Chasing Shadows]

Originally Posted by Ænima

Why would you ignore a text?

Because unless you are on a contract texts cost money to send. While browsing the internet from a broadband connection - and clicking on buttons on a website - doesn't.

[Ænima]

Originally Posted by sweh

No way man, those Facebook event invitations are just spam as far as I'm concerned.

I cannot staaaand promoters on Facebook. They're so annoying cluttering up my wall and inbox with all their garbage.

See, this is what I don't understand about facebook... You have your ten real friends on there and then feel obligated to add like a bazzillion other people you half know like the person you once bumped into in the street, the woman who works in the corner shop, neighbours dog etc... If you don't add these none people, you are constantly reminded, taunted about how you 'might know them' because your 2nd cousin, twice removed has them as a half friend on their account. You feel guilt, if you shun them, next time you see them in the street, will you get evil eye rather than a friendly smile?

Reluctantly, you add them and all their extended friends that you now 'might know' too. Said people then clutter up your page with constant updates about unamusing things they find amusing, the status of their cats and love life which nobody cares about but them, and borderline creepy and excessive photography of their demon spawn children, full of obligitory comments from girls, along the lines of 'aww cuteness xxxxx', irrespective of whether or not said child, who by all accounts, probably has webbed feet, is actually cute or not.

You sit there and consider talking to your actual friends who you could just as easily text in full privacy, but instead you submit to facebook and write your message for all to see. Now the whole world knows about that itchy lump you were afraid to see your doctor about, but it's alright because 99% of your friends list consisting of neighbours dogs and shop assistants will just ignore it anyway, too obsessed with their own constant updates sent out to people they don't really know who will also ignore them.

[davidmcn]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

If you're that strict with your Facebook settings then why does it matter what you post as only your friends will be able to see it?

But we're talking about other people's events - you can't control the visibility of those, and you might not want every friend of friends of friends etc to know where you're going to be.

[Throgmorton1]

No - it's not. Events invitations are sent out to a lot of people and advertise whatever event the sender is pushing. A text message is personal.

It's also the case that many people don't check Facebook, email or even mobile phones regularly.

[bookaddict]

I never respond to Facebook events. If it's an event that a friend of mine is inviting me to, then they would invite me by other means as well, not just through Facebook.

[Jambo_c]

Originally Posted by davidmcn

But we're talking about other people's events - you can't control the visibility of those, and you might not want every friend of friends of friends etc to know where you're going to be.

What have all you people got to hide?

I can just see you sat at work, a colleague looks over and asks "Are you doing anything this weekend?" They recoil in horror as you scream back "**** off, it's none of your business, I don't have to tell you anything!" You then proceed to cover your head in tin foil to prevent the magic detection rays in the office penetrating your brain and finding out your plans for the weekend.

I really don't understand why it matters if some random friend of a friend of a friend knows that you're off to a party at the weekend, unless of course, you've got something to hide.

[davidmcn]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

I really don't understand why it matters if some random friend of a friend of a friend knows that you're off to a party at the weekend, unless of course, you've got something to hide.

Well, if you're planning a big gay night out on Friday, you might not want your homophobic workmates to know about it.

Or you might have a stalkery ex who's still vaguely acquainted with your FB friends (bearing in mind that friends-of-friends are often not your friends for a reason).

Or you might be a teacher, who doesn't want your pupils knowing anything about what you get up to in your spare time.

Things like that.

[Jambo_c]

Originally Posted by davidmcn

Well, if you're planning a big gay night out on Friday, you might not want your homophobic workmates to know about it.

Or you might have a stalkery ex who's still vaguely acquainted with your FB friends (bearing in mind that friends-of-friends are often not your friends for a reason).

Things like that.

Personally I wouldn't let anything like that affect how I behave and I wouldn't become all secretive because someone else has a problem. In those examples it's the other person that has the problem so screw the other person, I wouldn't change anything I do because of their prejudices or mentalism.

[droogiefret]

Oh bugger - I upset a friend recently by not replying to a text that had multiple recipients. Facebook events? How many more friends am I insulting? I'd better go and have a look.
Anything else while we're about it?

[davidmcn]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

Personally I wouldn't let anything like that affect how I behave and I wouldn't become all secretive because someone else has a problem. In those examples it's the other person that has the problem so screw the other person, I wouldn't change anything I do because of their prejudices or mentalism.

Well, that's fine for you. But I'm not sure why you're astonished that other people take a different approach - that is, after all, why FB and other sites allow you to adjust your privacy settings.

[Jambo_c]

Originally Posted by davidmcn

Well, that's fine for you. But I'm not sure why you're astonished that other people take a different approach - that is, after all, why FB and other sites allow you to adjust your privacy settings.

For me the privacy settings are for things such as: Teachers and people who work in a school not wanting pupils to see status updates, drunk photos etc. Young relatives or in-laws etc who you don't want seeing certain status updates or posts. That kind of thing.

It never entered my head that someone would ignore a party invite because they didn't want someone knowing they were going to a party.

[bookaddict]

Originally Posted by Ænima

See, this is what I don't understand about facebook... You have your ten real friends on there and then feel obligated to add like a bazzillion other people you half know like the person you once bumped into in the street, the woman who works in the corner shop, neighbours dog etc... If you don't add these none people, you are constantly reminded, taunted about how you 'might know them' because your 2nd cousin, twice removed has them as a half friend on their account. You feel guilt, if you shun them, next time you see them in the street, will you get evil eye rather than a friendly smile?

Reluctantly, you add them and all their extended friends that you now 'might know' too. Said people then clutter up your page with constant updates about unamusing things they find amusing, the status of their cats and love life which nobody cares about but them, and borderline creepy and excessive photography of their demon spawn children, full of obligitory comments from girls, along the lines of 'aww cuteness xxxxx', irrespective of whether or not said child, who by all accounts, probably has webbed feet, is actually cute or not.

You sit there and consider talking to your actual friends who you could just as easily text in full privacy, but instead you submit to facebook and write your message for all to see. Now the whole world knows about that itchy lump you were afraid to see your doctor about, but it's alright because 99% of your friends list consisting of neighbours dogs and shop assistants will just ignore it anyway, too obsessed with their own constant updates sent out to people they don't really know who will also ignore them.

There's no doubt that some people do use Facebook that way, but I have always made sure that I only add people who I am close to in real life. You could ask why I need to connect with them on Facebook, if we have a real-life friendship, but for example, my brother lives a long way away from me, and while we talk on the phone a lot, FB is a quick way to share photographs etc. Also, we have good friends who live in America, and again FB is a good way of keeping in touch with them.

[bookaddict]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

Personally I wouldn't let anything like that affect how I behave and I wouldn't become all secretive because someone else has a problem. In those examples it's the other person that has the problem so screw the other person, I wouldn't change anything I do because of their prejudices or mentalism.

Well, yeah that's great, but in the real world, people do have to consider whether what they are writing is something that they would really want everyone to see.

It would be terrific if we could all just think, well screw that person, they're the one with the problem. But things aren't that clear cut and simple.

For example, a friend of mine is a teacher. She doesn't get up to anything particularly controversial or anything like that in her spare time, but that doesn't mean that she wants all the teenage children she teaches, to know where she's going or who she's with.

[davidmcn]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

Young relatives or in-laws etc who you don't want seeing certain status updates or posts. That kind of thing.

It never entered my head that someone would ignore a party invite because they didn't want someone knowing they were going to a party.

You might not want your relatives knowing about the types of party you go to

[Jambo_c]

Originally Posted by bookaddict

Well, yeah that's great, but in the real world, people do have to consider whether what they are writing is something that they would really want everyone to see.

It would be terrific if we could all just think, well screw that person, they're the one with the problem. But things aren't that clear cut and simple.

For example, a friend of mine is a teacher. She doesn't get up to anything particularly controversial or anything like that in her spare time, but that doesn't mean that she wants all the teenage children she teaches, to know where she's going or who she's with.

I'm definitely in the real world thanks. I mentioned the teacher/school job thing before. I work in a school myself so I have my profile private so students can't see anything. One thing being that I wouldn't want them seeing my pictures or reading my statuses. However, the main reason is from a safeguarding perspective in that online contact with students would be unprofessional.

In my experience there's no way that a student would get to see any events I'm going to. That'd generally mean that the student was friends with someone I was friends with who'd also been invited to the event, extremely unlikely to happen. However, to be honest, it wouldn't actually bother me if a student knew I was going to a party on Saturday.

[bookaddict]

Originally Posted by Jambo_c

I'm definitely in the real world thanks. I mentioned the teacher/school job thing before. I work in a school myself so I have my profile private so students can't see anything. One thing being that I wouldn't want them seeing my pictures or reading my statuses. However, the main reason is from a safeguarding perspective in that online contact with students would be unprofessional.

In my experience there's no way that a student would get to see any events I'm going to. That'd generally mean that the student was friends with someone I was friends with who'd also been invited to the event, extremely unlikely to happen. However, to be honest, it wouldn't actually bother me if a student knew I was going to a party on Saturday.

Sorry, I realise my previous post came over a bit snarky; that was unintentional and I didn't mean to suggest that you didn't live in the real world. But the fact that you yourself have privacy settings kind of underlines the point about not wanting people to see what you post (for whatever reason that may be). I personally don't refrain from posting what I want on Facebook, as I know that only certain people (i.e., the people I am friends with on there) will see it. But I definitely would't want just anyone to see it. (Possibly I misunderstood what you were saying - I thought you meant that there was no reason to hide anything you write on Facebook from anyone, whether they were a friend of yours or not.)

I also realise that I'm probably not interesting enough for people to actively seek out my profile, or take much notice of what I'm doing on there. But online privacy is something I've always been pretty careful about. However, I don't ignore invitations due to any worries about privacy; it's just that if it's a party (for example) thrown by someone I know, they would invite me anyway, Facebook or not. So I just don't bother even looking at the facebook invites.

EDIT: This will teach me not to read a thread properly!! Yes, I agree with you - providing your privacy settings are in place, then there's no real need to worry about you're writing. Sorry for the misunderstanding (my fault)

[coachtrip_fan99]

I simply do not want people to know what I'm up to every minute of every day...... even my closes friends...

If they ask me what I've been upto, I'll tell them...... but I don't want it all documented for them to browse at their leisure.

I cannot stand it when a friend puts a status like "Is at the Dog & Trumped with [my name]. which then tags me in that post... and so publishes it to my profile.

I have now altered my privacy settings... any photos I am tagged in, statuses mentioning my name, etc, result in an email sent to me, and I then log into facebook and have to give my approval before it gets posted.

Thats just my personal preference though... its my choice not to have my entire life documented on facebook...... Im sure there are lots of people who don't mind.

It also means that when you meet up with old friends, you have less to talk about... because you already know what each other have been upto anyway!