Once upon a time, I wore a tinfoil hat. Protect privacy, protect personal data, etc. Encrypted messaging, Facebook is evil…

At some point, I let go of that. I honestly don’t care about keeping most of my private life private anymore. Being “out” and disconnecting from my family has been a liberating experience in many ways. I’m increasingly coming to the conclusion I was right about that Facebook is evil part though.

The way that Facebook has become a de-facto “news” source for so many is terrifying. The ease with which that source can be manipulated for profit or political gain has started what I fear may be the fall of my country’s democracy.

The platform is USEFUL, which is why I’ve stayed so long and left my tinfoil hat to grow dull on the shelf. It’s a useful communication tool to keep in touch with people I don’t see in person on a regular basis. Like other “tools” of which my opinion of late has shifted, I think Facebook has reached a point where its danger is exceeding its utility.

Too many who use this tool do so without taking precautions against any of the ways that the ill-intentioned can misuse it. (To be clear, I don’t think that applies to possibly any of the people who can still read this message.) Worse, to the degree that those with misguided agendas are the owners of the platform itself, there’s likely nothing that can be done to protect against their seemingly sociopathic disregard for appropriate protections of the information and power entrusted to them.

For now, I’m deleting both the Facebook and Messenger apps from my devices. I expect I’ll continue to check them occasionally from a desktop browser, but I can see even that fading over time. I intend to configure notifications to ensure things like events will still reach me.

For those times I feel the need to share things about my life, I plan to expand use of the WordPress install I have at https://pendorbound.com/ It’s unfortunate that RSS/ATOM have essentially died as aggregation protocols, but if you happen to still use a news reader of any kind, you can subscribe using it. I also tend to quip on Twitter more than other platforms, so if you’re curious about things that might otherwise have ended up as a mini-rant on Facebook, that’s likely where you’ll find them going forward.

If you have a profile on another social site we could connect with, I’d appreciate anyone reaching out to me on other sites. Feel free to “friend” me, but I’d appreciate a message saying Hi if it’s likely I might not recognize your username or other info to know who you are.

If you’d like to contact me for any reason, please feel completely free to use any of the following mechanisms.

Text: If you have my cell phone number and use Apple devices, iMessage is my preferred means of contact.

If you use non-Apple devices, SMS is insecure. If you have my number, you can use SMS if it’s the only thing available, but I’d prefer you use Wire if you can.

Wire is an encrypted messaging platform. It’s my preferred means of contact if you can’t use iMessage. I’m @pendorbound on Wire.

I’m also @pendorbound on Twitter, Tumblr, FetLife, and numerous other platforms. If you find a pendorbound, it’s *probably* me.

If you feel the need to write a book, send me an attachment, or otherwise exceed 140/160/280, or whatever arbitrary length limits, you can email zac@thebedells.org.

And Zuckerberg: If your bots pick this up, pull your head out of your ass and prioritize your users over the dollars you can extract from anyone willing to pay a buck to exploit and manipulate people. History’s watching you. I honestly don’t think you care as long as you can increase shareholder value.