I just received yet another email from a friend who says I should look at her Facebook profile, photos etc. I have to join first. I am really not happy with this:
"We may use information about you that we collect from other sources, including but not limited to newspapers and Internet sources such as blogs, instant messaging services, Facebook Platform developers and other users of Facebook, to supplement your profile."I will not be joining what looks like a really unsafe and obtrusive site. I really don't care if all sorts of rich and famous people have joined, I do not care to have my details available to all like that. Can anyone give me a reassurance on this?

What does that even mean, "supplement your profile"? Sounds to me like they want to learn more about you and fill out your profile for you if you don't? I've never seen that happen... I don't see why they would go about "collecting information" about millions and millions of users. Or am I totally misunderstanding that clause?

You may want to take a look at this clip. It doesn't tell the whole story, but it raises a couple of relevant points.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxF0z8nrNtY&feature=channel_page

This sort of thing is the reason for my query. Thanks.

That is exactly why I stay away from Facebook, ren, and so do all my friends and family who have sharing sites up. They all stick with MySpace and are able to keep the info as private as possible. Any use of these type of sites on the Internet leaves you open for a certain amount of privacy invasion, but Facebook is the worst in my opinion.

I'm not much a "social site" person, and I avoid Facebook like the plague, although my niece is active on it I don't see the fascination myself

It would seem to me, that a REAL friend can tell you what they want to about themselves, and send you pictures, without resorting to using a public forum.

Facebook is as private as you want it to be. If you wanted to join to talk with your friends over it, but didn't want other people to be able to access your profile, you have the option of doing so.

I use Facebook and keep my profile set so that only my friends can see it. I have never had issues with them supplementing my profile with information from other sites although, they do send you notices of people who you might know.

I was hesitant to join Facebook because I have major privacy issues but was convinced to do so by my teammates. I enjoy the applications and have even made some friends from there.

I agree Facebook isn't for everyone but if you are curious, you could always open up a profile and then close it if you don't like it. If you do decide to join, search funtrivia. There are a bunch of us over there.

I'm on facebook and have been a little more active lately but still I just don't "get it" and wonder how people can spend hours each day on it. I'll pop in every couple of days to see if anyone of my 'friends' has been up to anything I should know about . The most useful thing I've found about it is getting back in contact with old school friends.

I too am on Facebook, but very lightly. Just don't agree to 'drinks' or 'presents' - ever. Trust me on this.

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It would seem to me, that a REAL friend can tell you what they want to about themselves, and send you pictures, without resorting to using a public forum.

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Oh gosh, I so agree!
Thanks everyone, but I shan't be joining it. It is a bit too intrusive in many ways for me. I know I can keep it to friends, but all the same , it isnt for me.

I also don't agree to any of the drinks, gifts, games, etc.

What's wrong with the 'gifts'? When your friends choose to send them..? I hate all the invites to join 8 million different games and such, but a drink or gift picked out by a friend I accept.

To accept those gifts, you have to accept the application and that allows the application to pull all your information. I don't like that, but that's just me.

Facebook is great for connecting with friends. I've ran into a lot of old friends using that site too. Plus, most people, including myself, just don't check regular email that often.

You can keep things as private as you want. No one can view your profile if you don't want them to.

When it comes to the apps, I generally refrain from adding those. Just too much potential for viruses, spam, etc.

I joined facebook originally to keep contact with my niece when she moved to The Netherlands but since then I have found so many old school friends and long last relatives. So it's really quite cool. I have all the privacy settings and having a computer expert husband helps because I have all latest virus protections and so forth. It's been really great for me because some of my school friends have put up old school photos of us that I did not have and recently I found a second cousin who I had lost contact with when we left school. I play games against my family and friends, which is also a lot of fun.

As for the fact that they pull all your information for every aplication, well, they can only take what you put there and you don't have to put all your personal details up when you join. I don't even have my suburb where I live, just my province and Country and I don't put up phone numbers either. ALthough I have seen some people put home addresses and phone numbers and then they announce on their status that they are going away for the weekend

I just started on it.

I go on there each day but I've only got it set so friends can see it.

The main reason I go on there is to play Scrabble on it which you can play with friends or you can play a game with someone you don't know. You can say I want to play a game of a certain duration and it will put the request up and someone comes and plays with you.

For those of you who aren't familiar with/don't use Facebook, and are wondering what all the hoopla is about, here is a pretty good explaination of what Facebook is really used for.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFKHaFJzUb4

HAHA!!

The collection of friends. Hmmm. Sounds about right.
A teenage girl I know and am very close to has currently 495 'friends'. I doubt I even know that many people!

Oh gosh that's hilarious! Thanks.
Just what I meant with my original query I think

tim, That is hilarious and sadly enough, a lot of what 'he' says is true. I don't think anyone who has posted here falls into the category a lot of young girls and guys do who are on there. I disagree, loudly, with someone I know who allows her 11 year old daughter to have an account.
Lexie now has around 1,000 'friends'. (To me, that is dangerous and just plain wrong , but another topic all together.) Sound familiar, Copago?

jordandog, I agree with you. That is very dangerous. Besides you have to be 13 to have a Facebook account so she must have lied about her daughter's age to get one. One of my friend's lied for both her children and the youngest is 9 and she just invites anyone. I have read her 'wall' and I can tell she doesn't know the people because they ask her who she is.

Both my children have accounts but I have their passwords and my husband and I are on their friends lists so we monitor things very closely. They mainly have family and school friends on their lists. Most of the parents in our circle have their kids on ther lists and we have each others kids. It takes a village to raise a child, you know, lol. Anyway this is the 'in' thing for our children at the moment and at least this way we can keep an eye on our kids and each other's kids. My children aren't allowed to accept strangers at all and they get lots of request from strangers, for some reason. You really have to keep an eye on things. I'm a stay at home mom, so it's a bit easier for me. My children play games mostly and they don't go on if they have on if they have homework.

lynn-ann, My friend's lying for her daughter to get the account was what initiated the 'argument' we had to begin with. I tried to point out how dangerous this could be and got the pat answers back from my friend ie "It's just for fun, she will never meet these people, I check what she is doing [when I can]", on and on. Part of the problem to begin with is that while Lexie is a good kid, she is also precocious. This is one of those subjects that will be brought up again the next time her Mom and I talk too.
I realize that, just like on here and hundreds of other sites, parents allow their kids to 'pretend' to be older than they are, but that does not make it right - or safe. If I didn't care about the child, I wouldn't bother stating my concern.

Wow Jordandog, it's almost as if we are talking about the same person. The children of my friend put up their cell phone numbers, house phone numbers and street address and then they constantly load photos of themselves, some of them standing right in front of their house. It's crazy