I’ve just been banned by Facebook. Yesterday someone asked why I shot raw instead of using camera JPG. I posted a number of images as comments to demonstrate the difference. You can only post one image per comment. After about half a dozen images, I was told I was temporarily not allowed to post more, because I might be spamming, I should try ‘later’. What later means (10 minutes or a day), was not said. I tried a few minutes later, and hour later, and then a day later. That last attempt resulted in an email saying my account has been blocked, because it does not meet ‘cyber-security requirements’, but I can make an appeal. I did. They asked for a phone number and a selfie, then said they’d evaluate the situation, and if they don’t like me, it’s game over.
Think of it as their loss.
Yet, they’re still going to train some form of AI on your images. Because of course.
Yes, I guess that would be one way to think about it. However, I’ve lost many contacts, some of them not just ‘Facebook friends’, but real ones (I don’t have email addresses and phone numbers for all of them). It’ll take time to gather all that info, and some of it I’m not sure I’ll be able to find at all.
I’m also unable to read the small things my family and friends post about their daily lives; the small things that helped me stay connected. I hate the dependence, and I hate the impersonal, soulless, machine-based evaluations, with no ways to argue my case, point at evidence, ‘fight back’ in any meaningful way.
The only way to fight back, is to slowly, oh so slowly, convince other people to not rely on it anymore. The only way to break these silos is by breaking the network effect. I’ve dumped Facebook years ago, and WhatsApp recently (and being in .nl, having WA was always assumed). Yes, I might miss out on some things, but if I care enough, I’ll just call those people every now and then, and if they need me, they know how to find me, too.
Having that rug pulled without you having that contact list makes this harder, of course… It’s a shitty situation, yes.
Well, I’m in Switzerland. WhatsApp cannot be avoided altogether: when your kids’ school uses it for official communication, you install it, end of story. Also, my photo club. They won’t bother to send me separate emails. Sure, I can look for another photo club, but…
I can live without Facebook, especially because my wife has it, and family members and closest friends can be reached / can reach me through her. But it’s still sad, when ‘social’ media behave in such an antisocial way.
Typical Facebook: wholesomeness punished, terribleness rewarded. I do have an account for practical access only. WhatsApp has been unavoidable. Everyone I know uses it casually or exclusively, including volunteer or nonprofit groups.
I went off of Facebook in 2012. I have never had WhatsApp, Instagram, or Pinterest.
They allowed me back.
I have Facebook since 2016, but I haven’t used it past a few months (logged out) to break free from doom scrolling short videos. I have Instagram, but I only used it to send photos of birds I took to falconers that we visited with my family and also to get access to some fan pages.
If Messenger wasn’t critical for me, I would likely have deleted my account for good…
As the new owner of an OM System camera, this is concerning. One of the reasons I decided to give them a try is their supposed ruggedness and because I was disappointed with my Fuji’s durability and high cost of repair. Of all the manufacturers, I thought OM products were supposed to be built like tanks.
Hopefully they agree and offer to replace yours free of charge or something similar.
I quit Facebook many years ago. Too many of those “social” interactions where empty, useless. Good riddance. It was a surprisingly difficult and lengthy process to get my account removed. No doubt my “content” is still out there.
Fun aside, I had to have a few harsh words with my in-laws about sharing photos of us. I want NO pictures of my children or family on the open internet. It took some convincing (threat of no longer sharing our pictures) that that includes Facebook.
Last year, however, I joined a local photo-walk club where we share our work on Facebook, so I opened a new, pseudonymous account. I use it exclusively for the photo club. No app, no friends, no news, no feed beyond that one group. This is tolerable.
Did you have to provide your ID to create that pseudonymous account?
Nope. I just used a name that is plausible, but not mine.
I would not worry too much about this. Before my entry into micro 4/3, I checked the service experience. While the reputation of Panasonic is mixed, the OM dealers I have checked have a stellar reputation for repairs.
This is the one in Budapest, you can read the reviews (I think Google translates them to English), many of them talk about repairs, their rating is 4.9. The only complaint I have seen is that if you need a part for a camera that is really old (think 2 decades), they may not have it in stock.
Find your local dealer and check out their reviews. Also note that many third-party repair shops handle micro 4/3, and if it is out of warranty you may get better prices. I could list the options in Budapest but probably you are somewhere else 
In the spirit of “random”:
Yesterday we spent a solid 5 minutes discussing with out 5 year old why the pot with the béchamel sauce needs to be soaked (because daddy didn’t stir enough…). And why it was burned. And why the pot specifically wasn’t actually burned but the content. And how to get the pot un-soaked. And if we need to get a new one now. He was pretty preoccupied trying to wrap his head around it. We managed to satisfy his demand for explanations eventually and at the end, he asked if we invented the soaking process. Sometimes kids are just great.
TIL about Rhein II, a photograph that underwent some editing and framing, and eventually sold for millions. That’s… quite the price.
Glad to hear that. I’ve never had an issue posting multiple photos, so it sounds like another case of AI gone wild.
I know FB is a double edged sword, but I’ve found it useful to connect with old friends in a way that wouldn’t be possible otherwise, and I have several local photography groups who use it to keep in touch and share information. I avoid politics and controversy on FB and my posts are mostly photos.
So I understand why people have quit it, but it works for me… for now.
So a bit of coincidence…
I happened to be talking with a member of a photo club I just joined. He considers himself a “street photographer”. He was talking about how he was trying to convice his granddaughters to not post pictures to social media. He was frustrated because he was not successful.
I asked him if any of the photos on his website included his family. He said “of course NOT!”.
I asked him why it was ok to post pictures of other people’s family on the internet, without their consent or knowledge, but it was so bad for his family to voluntarily do the same?
Before he could answer, several other stepped in with various legal or “artistic” reasons. I dropped the subject, but it was clear my comment was not appreciated.
It’s an interesting problem and I think I would find myself being hypocritical if I really tried to define what those boundaries are for myself and others. I’m a very private, introverted person and I tend not to photograph a lot of people anyways so it’s kind of a non-issue for me personally.
I do a lot of volunteer mutual aid work around homelessness in our city, and I have a friend from that space who has an ongoing project documenting homelessness. He never takes photos of people without asking, and usually tries to get to know them a bit first. Often his “portraits” don’t even include faces. Last week someone saw his camera and immediately got defensive, demanding that he not take photos of people, but luckily with how he approaches his project, it was easy to diffuse.
A lot of street photographers have no problem photographing the unsheltered, and it’s very easy to justify by saying “I’m shining a light on a societal problem!” but to me it still often comes off as “Look, a poor person!” because there’s no real context beyond the photo.