Latest news: not only did Facebook erase my account, but those people who tried to publish a link to this post were “punished” with restrictions, and their posts were erased. Then, they blocked all posts in my groups. Didn’t I say that, in comparison, the old Soviet censors looked like gentle cherubs? Exactly that!
All of a sudden, out of the blue, there came the news that my FB account was permanently disabled. If the META people wanted to look at the same time nasty, idiotic, and incompetent, they couldn’t have done better than this. (image by ChatGPT)
Why the suspension? Not explained. Can I ask for a review? Yes, and I did. But nothing changed. Is there another way to appeal their decision? Yes, maybe. But it is a complicated story that would even cost some money.
I can’t imagine what I could have done wrong. I am sure I posted nothing politically incorrect or pornographic. Probably, it was a hacker attack (it already happened to my account in July). Or maybe a glitch, an error of META; perfectly possible given the poor overall quality of their software.
I haven’t lost much. Recently, I wasn’t using Facebook so much, apart from a way to distribute my comic strip Gastone il Naftone — But I can find other outlets. Certainly, some of my FB groups, such as “The Seneca Effect,” were still doing well and reasonably free from trolls. They are now “orphaned” groups, owned by no one. I am not sure of what will happen to them. But it is no great loss. Most of my activity today is on Substack.
Yet, I must confess that I am angry. Not for the loss of data that, as I said, is modest. But for having been treated like a Medieval peasant, who had no rights and no defense against landlords, bandits, tax collectors, plagues, locusts, and recruiters for the next crusade. But Meta is a private company; they have no obligations to be nice to you. Some time ago, there was a proposal to nationalize the social networks to guarantee at least some rights to the poor peasants…. er, users. It smacked of Communism, and it soon disappeared.
But it is not just me. Facebook is an awful piece of software, a toxic environment, infested with trolls and bots, subjected to a censorship that makes the old Soviet Union censors look like a bunch of cherubs. And it suffers from a general enshittification pattern. Correctly, the young abandoned it long ago.
I already predicted the demise of Facebook two years ago. It seems to be happening. Facebook is not collapsing yet, but they are not doing well. The users under 25 continue to leave the platform or never adopt it at all. I won’t shed tears if (when) Facebook suffers the same fate as its predecessor, Friendster. For Facebook, too, Seneca may lurk in the shadows. Call this the Seneca Revenge, if you like, but it is exactly what they deserve.