> The article claims that life without Facebook is impossible

Does it? This is the closest I can get:

> Facebook has been giving many people many reasons not to sign up over the years. But we’ve had to: everyone we knew was on Facebook. And eventually, this trickled up and our parents were on Facebook. Now the trickle down effects of this are the opposite: kids don’t want to be on Facebook because it’s what their parents are using.

That's not really the same as "impossible".

> Is this article more a reflection of the author's poor self control than of reality?

Is poor self control the only reason one would be on Facebook?

>But we’ve had to: everyone we knew was on Facebook.

But the fact that everyone they know is on Facebook doesn't mean I have to be in Facebook. I never made an account for it.

> Is poor self control the only reason one would be on Facebook?

Poor self control is what turns "many reasons to sign up" into "had to".

My best friend is a promoter who throws underground electronic music parties. Do you know where he promotes his events? Fb. There are websites like resident advisor, but they link back to Fb.

FB is how the event is marketed. Fb is how i find about different underground shows. And my use of Fb is limited for events, but for my friend, life without Fb is very much impossible.

Events is probably the only feature of fb that provides me with any value.

Yeah, I also haven't had a facebook account for years, and I seem to be muddling along fine.

It turns out that all those people I had shallow social connections to from some time in our past? I don't miss 'em.

I never got into FB and have not used it in probably 7+ years, and as unbelievable as it sounds, I still have a robust social life and am not missing out on anything. The necessity of Facebook is entirely in people’s minds.

You with your hobbies and your existing social life are not missing out.

I with my hobbies (Swing dancing) would dearly miss out. That's why I'm still evaluating whether it's feasible to delete my account, by getting other sources for events. So far, only very limited success.

> The necessity of Facebook is entirely in people’s minds.

All of human social relationships is "in people's minds", no?

The one problem I have with FB is that quite a lot of companies directed their customer-contact to facebook and it's virtually impossible to get in touch with them without having account - for example the other day I wanted to contact KLM and their Contact tab (https://www.klm.com/home/us/en#/tab=hpTbContact) lists: * Send KLM 24/7 a text message via WhatsApp to +31206490787 > * F Ask KLM a question 24/7 via Facebook > * M Ask KLM a question 24/7 via Messenger > * T Ask KLM a question 24/7 via Twitter > * (phone-icon) View the contact information for all KLM departments

So no e-mail, no contact form and 3/4 of those services belong to FB :/

The email addresses are under "view contact information for all KLM departments" and then under each department. It's not very clear, probably the work of some UX desperate to reduce the number of options to avoid confusing people.

I found it later on, but it still requires digging deeper, and then we and up in a viscous circle pushing us more and more to use FB…

I've never had a facebook account. I always found it daft that people posted their private information for everyone to see. I'm not really a people person though, so I guess I just can't relate to the value that others get from it.

Same here; I don't think I've ever even read a Facebook post in my life[0], and I see less and less reason why I would ever want to.

0: Admittedly, NoScript helps a lot with this.

> The article claims that life without Facebook is impossible. I haven't had an account for years and although I don't know what I'm missing, that statement seems exaggerated. Is this article more a reflection of the author's poor self control than of reality?

Not necessarily. Lots of social circles use Facebook Events to organize get togethers, and not having an active Facebook account leads to you being left out. The people leaving you out may only be acquaintances, but that doesn't mean it's ok.

This is the reason why I still have a Facebook account. It's obviously and explicitly inactive, and I only log in when I get an event invite.

This is the one problem I have with not having a Facebook account. There are one or two groups that I would like to be a member of but their online forum is only available through their Facebook group. Not ever having an account with Fb prevents me from signing up.

I have many reasons to dislike Fb but at the top of that is how gated it makes communities.

On the other hand, do you want to get involved with people who are okay with such gated communities? It sounds to me like there would be a difference in values.

Interacting with people of different values is mostly a good thing. And it is certainly no bad thing when the differences are over something as trivial as which online platforms you want to use.

I think the reason why Facebook is used is due to the ease of setup and management of the group. Rather than installing forum software, paying for hosting, etc., it's just easier to use Facebook Groups. And, as adrianratnapala wrote, I think it's good to interact with those that have different values.

It's not a difference in values, just a difference in priorities. You make it sounds like they explicitly set out to build a gated community, when they actually want to build a community and just choose the path of least resistance.

>Lots of social circles use Facebook Events to organize get togethers, and not having an active Facebook account leads to you being left out. The people leaving you out may only be acquaintances, but that doesn't mean it's ok.

If Facebook is such a problem then people could just stop being part of these social circles. It really isn't that difficult.

Your arrogance is breath-taking.

Will you only decide which hobbies I may have, or do I have to submit planned meals and TV watching for your approval, as well?

"Just stop being part", my ass...

I'm not telling you to stop doing things you want to do. I'm telling you that it's possible to go without being part of a group if you don't like some things about the group.

That's bullshit. You simply don't know what I'm talking about and your better-than-thou attitude is insulting.

"Just cut yourself off from social interaction" is not really helpful advice.

> If Facebook is such a problem then people could just stop being part of these social circles. It really isn't that difficult.

No, it actually is that difficult, or more precisely that undesirable. Very few people are such anti-Facebook activists that they're going to dump valued friends and acquaintances in order to dump Facebook. That's why Facebook is going to hold on to a lot of users, and why it'll end in a whimper and not a bang.

The only case where it "really isn't that difficult" is if you have no valued relationships that have a Facebook component.

I deactivated my FB account 2 months ago. No issues. No missing out. Lots of recovered time. And I go pee when I have to without having to browse FB for half an hour.