I am out of Facebook

The name Facebook comes from college yearbooks where photos of classmates are stuck and things are scribbled on. The scribblings are some(many?)times deeply regretted later in life. As most of you who read this may already know, Zuckerberg who started Facebook is young and reckless (not unusual in itself, but his success with Facebook is). His stand on privacy is that of someone who is out of his depth and not that of someone who is a revolutionary. You can read an interesting and critical analysis here. I quote:

Zuckerberg and gang may think that they know what's best for society, for individuals, but I violently disagree. I think that they know what's best for the privileged class. And I'm terrified of the consequences that these moves are having for those who don't live in a lap of luxury. I say this as someone who is privileged, someone who has profited at every turn by being visible. But also as someone who has seen the costs and pushed through the consequences with a lot of help and support. Being publicly visible isn't always easy, it's not always fun. And I don't think that anyone should go through what I've gone through without making a choice to do it. So I'm angry. Very angry. Angry that some people aren't being given that choice, angry that they don't know what's going on, angry that it's become OK in my industry to expose people. I think that it's high time that we take into consideration those whose lives aren't nearly as privileged as ours, those who aren't choosing to take the risks that we take, those who can't afford to. This isn't about liberals vs. libertarians; it's about monkeys vs. robots.

I am not keen to provide anything to Facebook--that includes my private data and my attention. I have completely and permanently deleted my data from Facebook using this. For those who used Facebook as a means to communicate with me, I apologize for the inconvenience and hope you would understand my position even if you don't agree with me.

As always, my email selvakumar @ gmail is always open for conversations.

Have a good weekend.