No, you can’t. Not unless you stop living in Europe or the US or any other place that has internet. I don’t have a Facebook account, but I’m certain Facebook knows all it needs to know from friends who shared pictures and tagged me, from people who uploaded their address book which included my phone number, from companies that uploaded my data as part of a targeted audience list. You cannot opt out of this part of the data collection. And all the policies that Facebook promotes, all the social dialogue it shapes, this affects me, too. I cannot possibly opt out of that either.

Facebook under GDPR isn’t allowed to create a shadow profile of EU citizens: all consent has to be opt-in. OK, so they could have some legitimate interest argument, but I find it hard to believe that’d fly in an EU court. They’re also not allowed to use the consent of your associates to process your personal information without your own opt-in consent. So it’s going to be interesting when the first court case with Facebook as a defendant against the GDPR happens.

Let’s see if that happens, but that’s tangential to the point. The GP was asserting that you can just ignore Facebook/Google and that act alone will remove all (ill) effect it might have on your life. I’m asserting this is false. If that effect is reduced by regulation, then this is the opposite of ignorance, it’s actively shaping what these actors can and cannot do.

As far as “social dialogue,” who cares? There is nothing on Facebook that is actually important unless you let it be. Not a single thing happening on Facebook makes one bit of difference to my daily life.

A huge chunk of people uses Facebook, like it or not. Facebook shapes what they see and how they see it, it at least partially shapes their perception of society. And even if you and me opt out of Facebook, the way Facebook shapes that dialogue for that huge chunk of people does affect your daily live.

> It only runs the show if you let them.

A few billion in fines for anti competitive behavior would disagree. Google does not want you to have a choice.

> You can still live outside of the Google/Facebook world happily.

Can you? Most restaurants in my area publish their hours and menus using Facebook, others integrate themselves with Google. And how could I fault them? It certainly is cheaper than what they did in the past, paying for a minimal website to do the same. Unless some government comes down on them hard they will continue to infect every aspect of modern live.

I may be an anomaly, but I live in Mountain View and never once looked up restaurant hours on Facebook. Yelp (which I despise,) Google, TripAdvisor and other sites generally have business hours. You could even call the restaurant to get hours! Old fashioned, I know. Maybe I am in a bubble in Silicon Valley but I never have to interact with Facebook to get things done. My kids school, frustratingly, has a What’s App group for parents, but I don’t even need to interact with that to know what’s going on.

All the people lamenting Facebook: simply stop using it.

> Can you?

Yes, you can. Nobody is holding a gun on your head to use Facebook and Google. You don't have to look up restaurants using these services, and if your restaurant is not listed there, you can go in person, or call you know? Or avoid such restaurants altogether. There is absolutely no obligation except habits that have formed over time. And habits can be broken.

See for yourself how many sites run Google AdSense and Analytics. It was eye opening for me. Google is the internet.