Here's something you might be interested in.
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a part of the computer generation. I am not a geek and I easily get my feelings hurt. My kids blow off the high-tech insults but I take them personally. In my day, people deserved good treatment and good customer service for giving their business to a company.
Two days ago, I received a nasty message from Facebook. Apparently, the social media website had received multiple complaints that I had sent friend requests to people I didn't know and were suspending my "friend request" ability for a week.
Huh?
In the middle of the night, I snapped awake with the mystery solved. A couple of days earlier, I had created an author page and Facebook had asked if I wanted to notify my friends. Thinking they would notify my Facebook friends, I clicked on "okay" and then saw many long-forgotten computer contacts flash before my eyes. There are plenty of contacts that I wouldn't want to have as friends; we were mere business acquaintances at best. Now, even my landlord thinks I want him to promote my book. Such is not the case!
In the unemotional, detached world we live in, there is, of course, no place to click to complain. I can't demand a retraction sent to say, "readers stories" or anything else that might save my sanity. I thought about cancelling my account as Alec Baldwin did when he got mad at Twitter, but who was I kidding? I think Mark Zuckerberg would do just fine without me.
The problem with Facebook and many other conglomerates is that they are simply too big to care. They can walk all over the little guy without recourse and I blame that fact on society. If people would walk away and not put up with the maltreatment, the nerds at Facebook would have to change their ways.
Case in point--a mother recently spoke out in the media because her son posted a picture on Facebook with the barrel of a pistol in his mouth. Friends were horrified and had no way to warn his family or anyone on the website. The young man, who was twenty-two, shot himself a few minutes later and I don't expect Facebook to care. Why take responsibility for someone else when you already make millions of dollars without doing it?
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a part of the computer generation. I am not a geek and I easily get my feelings hurt. My kids blow off the high-tech insults but I take them personally. In my day, people deserved good treatment and good customer service for giving their business to a company.
Two days ago, I received a nasty message from Facebook. Apparently, the social media website had received multiple complaints that I had sent friend requests to people I didn't know and were suspending my "friend request" ability for a week.
Huh?
In the middle of the night, I snapped awake with the mystery solved. A couple of days earlier, I had created an author page and Facebook had asked if I wanted to notify my friends. Thinking they would notify my Facebook friends, I clicked on "okay" and then saw many long-forgotten computer contacts flash before my eyes. There are plenty of contacts that I wouldn't want to have as friends; we were mere business acquaintances at best. Now, even my landlord thinks I want him to promote my book. Such is not the case!
In the unemotional, detached world we live in, there is, of course, no place to click to complain. I can't demand a retraction sent to say, "readers stories" or anything else that might save my sanity. I thought about cancelling my account as Alec Baldwin did when he got mad at Twitter, but who was I kidding? I think Mark Zuckerberg would do just fine without me.
The problem with Facebook and many other conglomerates is that they are simply too big to care. They can walk all over the little guy without recourse and I blame that fact on society. If people would walk away and not put up with the maltreatment, the nerds at Facebook would have to change their ways.
Case in point--a mother recently spoke out in the media because her son posted a picture on Facebook with the barrel of a pistol in his mouth. Friends were horrified and had no way to warn his family or anyone on the website. The young man, who was twenty-two, shot himself a few minutes later and I don't expect Facebook to care. Why take responsibility for someone else when you already make millions of dollars without doing it?