Messian Dread is NOT on Facebook (Column)

MESSIAN DREAD IS NOT ON FACEBOOK
MESSIAN DREAD COLUMN SEPTEMBER 20 2014

WWW, September 20 2014 - When you Google "Messian Dread facebook", you'll see a link to a Facebook page which says: "Messian Dread Is On Facebook". Well, Messian Dread is NOT On Facebook, and I'm often asked why. Good idea to put that answer in a column. Hopefully one of these days that column will be among the search results so that the right information will come at the right place at Google. 

Yes, there's some profile on Facebook with my name, but it's not my photo. I don't know who that person is on the photo, all I know it's not me. Maybe some funny guy put it there. 

With that out of the way, let me share with you why I am not on Facebook and in fact even would call for en exodus out of that voluntary ghetto inna Cyberspace, as the website should be called in my not so humble opinion. Facebook is everything that the Internet is, and because of that it has become completely unnecessary because it is not everything that the Internet is. Confused? You don't have to be.

I do not know how many times I'm asked why I don't open a Facebook account, if only because "all" websites and "all" contacts have one and even check their accounts daily. Or they are like most people, they just stay logged in and let Facebook record their each and every move on the Internet. Where I live, I see people glued to their mobile Facebook devices as they bump into each other because they're not looking where they walk. Or worse, drive.

In fact, that argument was the only valid one for me.

I imagined myself opening a Facebook account. What would my  account status be? I couild only come up with one. "What Are You Doing Here?" would truly be the only thing I could say and the obvious answer would be "Well, What Are YOU Doing Here?". Indeed. People join facebook because people joined facebook. Like Myspace. People joined Myspace because people joined Myspace.

Facebook is a website on the world wide web, a part of the Internet where there are websites. People can make an account on that website and start to have contact with other people, share messages and all other things publishers do. But wait. You can do that on the Internet anyway. Facebook is just a website. There are millions and millions and millions of websites. Sure, they all have their... Facebook page. Why? Because there are many people on Facebook who are so cyber-illiterate that they do not even know that Facebook is just a website and that there's a bigger Internet out there.

Facebook has gone to the Stock Exchange. It's a company and it's sold to stock holders for billions of dollars. It's a company, so it has a product. That product is (the privacy of) it's users. People who join Facebook sell their privacy for the ability to communicate, where Facebook made billions selling that very same privacy to the ones whose only drive is the Roots Of All Evil: the love for money. 

That's why Messian Dread is NOT on Facebook. Whatever Facebook tells you.

One Love,
Messian Dread