news: arrested by facebook

Arrested by Facebook Have you heard of the term “Facebook fatigue”? If not, then you are probably a smart cookie for not being too intimately involved with Facebook. We have not only heard of this term, but are currently experiencing it. We have Facebook fatigue. We just got arrested by Facebook, and are contained for Seven days. Facebook for most bloggers and online businesses is a must. It is, in our opinion, a necessary evil. Don’t get us wrong, we love the idea of social networking. Staying connected with friends and family is difficult when you live hundreds or thousands of miles away from them so we are very much aware of the benefits of social networking. But, it is difficult to keep up with the amount of changes taking place on Facebook. Unless you live and breathe Facebook, which some people do and we call them addicts, then it is quite difficult to keep up to date with this social network that changes its rules as fast as we can point and click. We could talk about the plethora of changes, the privacy issues and all the general annoyances of Facebook, but those issues in and of themselves could serve as a month’s worth of articles. What has us particularly peeved at this time is that we were blocked from adding friends for seven days. We were put in jail for seven days for allegedly sending out too many friend requests. We understand Facebook’s policy which reads:
“Sending repeated friend requests to people you don’t know personally is considered harassment, and it is against Facebook’s Community Standards.
Facebook also has limits in place to prevent behavior that others may find annoying or abusive. These limits restrict the rate at which you can use certain features on the site. If you received a warning for going too fast when adding friends, you will need to temporarily stop this activity to avoid hitting a block on your account.”
Let us repeat this one sentence again:
“sending repeated friend requests to people you don’t know personally is considered harassment…”
We are currently trying to combine our personal Facebook pages into one page so that we can eliminate our personal pages. We feel that on the personal level Facebook is not for us, but for myFudo it is a necessity. We have been inviting our friends to join us on our new Facebook page. Naturally, knowing that we cannot flood the system, we have been doing this in small increments. However, Facebook sent us a message: "We received feedback that you were sending friend requests to people you didn’t know.” But we do know of them, they are in our industry, we have from 30-100 mutual friends suggested to us by Facebook. We have been using a feature that our social networking guru, Mark Zuckerberg, has implemented, a side bar suggesting mutual friends. We thought Facebook was a social networking site. The fact that we were banned for seven days completely defeats the purpose of social networking. We are conscientious and respect others. Within the framework of a social network we would not call 20 open friend requests high activity. Facebook has a system in place that is, perhaps, flawed. All our friend requests were accepted. However, when the person accepts a friend request they must also answer the question: “Do you actually know this person?” If, despite accepting the request, the response is “no”, we believe a red flag goes up. Then, (we must say this again, despite the person having accepted our request) we get a message stating that “someone complained”. Perhaps someone answered incorrectly by accident. There is no way to retract the answer. If a person accepted our request logic would dictate that, even if they didn’t know us, which they do, they are able to make their own decisions. We are not spamming people. We are moving our friends and mutual friends to our new page and we are using the Facebook tool to find other mutual friends. In essence, we are networking in a very professional and controlled manner. And, yet, we were barred from adding friends for seven days. Zuckerberg has manipulated the site in a way that has users scrambling to keep up with numerous changes. Facebook, more importantly, has collected an unprecedented amount of data to include an unrivaled photo identification network. How is it, then, that Zuckerberg’s policies restrict us from doing exactly what Facebook is designed? We are not thrilled with Facebook which is why we are trying to shut down our personal pages and simply use it for business. Apparently, we aren’t the only ones who find Facebook a bit trying. Reports went out in June 2011 that Facebook lost over 6 million users. An article dated June 20, 2011 on CNN Tech states: “there are also some recent signs of "Facebook fatigue." There is only so much you can do to socialize online, especially after you've exhausted your friend list. Some people also complain they're spending so much time on Facebook that they're short-changing the rest of their lives. Evidence suggests a small but increasing number of users -- at least in North America, where Facebook use is especially saturated -- may be shunning the site. The site lost more than 7 million active users in the United States and Canada last month, according to data from the blog Inside Facebook, although Facebook disputes those figures.” Facebook may have lost users this past summer, but overall, the company actually saw a net gain in users due to countries like Brazil, Mexico, India and Argentina. Facebook’s statistics are still impressive:
More than 800 million active users More than 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day Average user has 130 friends Average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events On average, more than 250 million photos are uploaded per day On average, people on Facebook install apps more than 20 million times every day More than 350 million active users currently access Facebook through their mobile devices
Why then, with these statistics, were we denied the ability to network by a social networking website? We are frustrated, yet, here we are in the same predicament as many running online businesses. We are slaves to social networking which means we need Facebook. We will have to serve out our seven day sentence with no possibility for time off for good behavior. Then, we are back to networking. And, when we send a friend request to our husbands we can only hope that Facebook does not send us a message that says, “You are sending friend requests to people you do not know.” Please join us Facebook jailbirds for a delicious meal of Salisbury steak, served with a little more panache than what we would find on the average prison tray. We’ve included a delicious macaroni and cheese recipe instead of the average mash potatoes.
Salisbury Steak with Mushroom Sauce (Michael Chiarello) Ingredients 4 boneless steaks (about 4 ounces each) Salt and freshly ground black pepper Flour, for dredging 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil 4 cups beef stock 8 ounces white button mushrooms, quartered 8 ounces shiitake mushrooms, stemmed, caps quartered 1 tablespoon unsalted butter 1 onion, minced 1 carrot, diced 4 sprigs fresh thyme 3 cloves garlic, minced 1 cup balsamic vinegar Directions Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Use a jaccard steak tenderizing tool, or tenderize the steak yourself with a fork. Lay the meat out in front of you, pushing it flat with your hands or a meat mallet, and pull it gently apart with tines of the fork until the meat is slightly pulled apart and tender. Season with salt and pepper and dredge in flour. In a large oven-safe skillet over medium-high heat, add olive oil and brown steaks, in batches if necessary, on both sides, about 2 minutes per side. Set aside, keep warm. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, reduce stock by half. Season mushrooms with salt and pepper, to taste. Sauté quartered mushrooms in the same pan as the meat, in the leftover olive oil, until very brown, about 5 minutes. Add butter, minced onion, carrot, thyme, and garlic. Cook until vegetables are caramelized, about 5 minutes, add balsamic vinegar and reduce for 1 to 2 minutes. Add broth, slide meat back into sauce, cover and bake until tender, about 1 hour. Click here for our kick-ass Macaroni and Cheese recipe.
  • rss
  • flickr
  • twitter
  • facebook

25 comments

  • February 2, 2012 at 11:31 am //

    I can’t believe I’m involved with criminals. As in: I like you more now.

    • February 3, 2012 at 8:05 am //

      We got street cred now!

    • February 3, 2012 at 8:06 am //

      Ins’t it Skye? They are absurd, and contradictory.

  • February 2, 2012 at 11:33 pm //

    We’ve all known Facebook to be nuts, but like you said, it is a necessary evil to keep in touch with friends and family afar and also for businesses. I hope Facebook jail is treating you well though!

    • February 3, 2012 at 8:07 am //

      Hi Amrita, we have street cred now! lol It’s truly is annoying, I imagine others find it just as so, freak’n necessary evil for the time being.

  • February 3, 2012 at 8:27 am //

    I’ve heard of such happenings…crazy!

    • February 3, 2012 at 9:41 am //

      Isn’t is absurd? Thanks for commenting Liz.

  • February 3, 2012 at 8:39 am //

    Facebook jail?? Ridiculous, but let me know if you need help fastening a shank or a cake with a file baked in. ;)

    • February 3, 2012 at 8:49 am //

      I love it Heidi! Love your comment! I know, isn’t it utterly ridiculous? We are nearby contained for seven days, we can not send friend requests for seven WHOLE days, it’s a necessary evil for the time being, but soon, I think they will fade out and another network will appeal to not only on a personal but also business level, combining both, a linked in, and a social network.

  • February 3, 2012 at 9:59 am //

    Haha, that sounds ridiculous. I try not to get too involved with it, but yeah.. it’s tough avoiding as a blogger.

    • February 3, 2012 at 3:42 pm //

      It is Kiri, it’s so stupid, and so contradictory which I think many will find frustrating.

  • February 3, 2012 at 5:35 pm //

    I guess I feel that way about twitter too. I stayed away for a long time because I didn’t like the idea, but for blogging, you almost have to. This is why though I have chosen not to do FB with my blog. I like to feel that I have some part of life that’s only for people I actually know. And even then, some things just don’t belong on the internet. I know how you feel though about using social media for business purposes. I think FB, Twitter, etc… ought to seperate personal pages from business ones. Afterall, I see the same ad’s on the side of the page, but that’s not harrassment, even though I prefer not to see them. But you are right, FB is kind of a neccessary evil…can’t live with it, can’t live without it!

  • February 3, 2012 at 9:49 pm //

    How interesting your experience with Facebook has been. I’ve never heard of this happening before but it doesn’t surprise me in the least. We’re not huge Facebook fans over here. We are all a bit introverted in our family so we don’t really have the constant need to share or read details about others. I put up my blog articles but always feel less than excited putting them up on Facebook. I am pretty private and the thought of family always reading my very personal thoughts leaves me feeling awkward. Doesn’t make sense since I’m publishing on the WWW to strangers but isn’t that the mystery of it all!

    • February 4, 2012 at 9:00 am //

      It sure is. It actually happens a lot, we tried to add our “mutual friends” suggested to us on the right hand side-bar, we have, for example about 30-100 suggested mutual friends, we clicked over 10 in a one day period and were blocked from sending friend requests.

      On a personal level, we really don’t use it, used it once or twice but felt it was too invasive and a time sucker, and years went by before even logging in, on a personal level, we really don’t like it either, I prefer my family or friends-quote-un-quote not be updated at every moment the status is updated, I’m a very, very private person, so this doesn’t work for me. BUT, BUT on a business, industry, networking professional-level, it’s such a necessary evil, although we’ve made wonderful connections, on a personal and business level, it just doesn’t fit.

      Then it contradicts its very purpose, so very utterly frustrating.

  • February 3, 2012 at 10:56 pm //

    There are many rulings in there that we are unaware about. Two days back I was made aware of yet another one of them which I am not thrilled about. I am not surprised that over 6 million people left. I know of a few. It is scary just how much information they have in their database and the new Timeline exposes one even more.

    Actually, I do wonder if it is necessary to have a fan page as only a very minute percentage of fans click through to the blog. Maintaining the fan page is like maintaining another blog as you have to keep feeding the page with info and links.

    Your Salisbury steak looks great! You have a well balanced meal on the tray.

    • February 4, 2012 at 9:03 am //

      We should talk about that Biren! I have my theories. It’s wonderful to make networking connections but it’s such a huge time sucker! The fan page is wonderful, but unless your URL is plastered on the front of the FBML landing page, I wonder how many click-throughs actually happen?

      Do you use GA as well?

      • February 5, 2012 at 1:39 am //

        You are so right about it being a huge time sucker. Now that they have the number “of people talking about this” stats, it makes page owners scramble to add links and update the page frequently in order for that number to increase. If you notice, some pages have so call high traffic on Facebook because they post links every hour or so but hardly any activity on the actual blog itself, or so it appears. Here I am talking about comments on the blog but then again, comments do not equate traffic.

        You mean Google Analytics? Yes, I do.

  • February 4, 2012 at 3:41 am //

    I’ve always wanted to make a mushroom sauce…sounds so savoury and fantastic.

    • February 4, 2012 at 9:05 am //

      Thank you Charissa.

  • February 5, 2012 at 4:02 am //

    I find this both funny and sad. I had no idea they did that. Good luck getting back in the swing of things.

    • February 6, 2012 at 4:56 pm //

      It truly is Emily. Thank you for commenting.

  • February 6, 2012 at 9:01 pm //

    I really don’t enjoy social networking all that much. Especially Twitter. I like you find that face book is a necessary evil with blogging. I too joined at first to reconnect with cousins I hadn’t seen in years.

    Young people, especially, are good at promoting themselves using social networking. This can be good or bad. There is real money to be made out there for the agressive promoter — yet much of it is “flash in the pan” money. It’s fleeting fame which doesn’t last past the next U tube sensation.

    My fears are this:

    We don’t talk to each other anymore.

    Many people get a false sense of how many “friends” they have — those “friends” on the wall are what we commonly used to call “pen pals” in the days when people actually wrote letters.

    Too many people spend way too much time social networking and not enough time working. As a result (I know what I speak of here as I work as an HR trainer by day) – many organizations are losing productivity. At a time when companies need to hire workers to help the economy, how can they justify it when many who do work for them aren’t — again, there is money to be made in other ways, so people justify tweeting instead of doing thier work.

    You get fat if you sit on your butt too much and social networking promotes this.

    I think people will wake up. Hopefully sooner than later. I love that commerical where the young woman is sitting on fb and her parents are going to rock concerts and biking with friends. Life is worth LIVING, not tweeting. Social networking is and will be an important part of our world from now on. I think like good food, it has to be taken in moderation.

    Great post. Now I have to get to my real job. Must walk the talk. ;.)

    • February 7, 2012 at 12:57 pm //

      My sentiments exactly, between life, real life, work, and daily life who really has the time, and how DO they have time. In business it’s a necessary evil, high time we hire our assistants to help us here, but on a personal level, we set an allocated amount of time aside, and that’s it.

      Maybe companies should block access to certain sites that would get productivity going again. I think building up good, quality followers is important rather than a million spurts of a whole bunco of blanket statements on a status, I’m still very curious to see where Google plus goes.

      FB just doesn’t know which way to go, Linked In, isn’t enough, and FB is too Vas, we need a special niche for us Foodies, something that doesn’t suck time either.

      It’s hard enough when you have a sedentary job in the corporate field, (office job) thank god for Gym’s and home gym equipment where you have to force a good workout to stay healthy, but some people don’t understand this, and let their ass grow to epic proportions. I think my life would be turned upside down if I couldn’t do my 45 min workout.

  • August 28, 2012 at 11:17 am //

    Thanks for shraing. What a pleasure to read!