Facebook

Cons

Like most people on Facebook, I spend half my time complaining about it. Here are just a few of the irritating things I dislike about Facebook:

1. Friend requests. It just seems rude to turn down a request to be your friend, but ... Do you really want the weird guy from work knowing everything about you? Do you want your church friends to see photos of you out with your party friends? And who really wants to reconnect with every person you went to elementary school with?

2. Notifications. You make one comment on one photo/status/wall post and then you receive 27 notifications telling you that other people have also commented.

3. Games. I don't want to send you items, see your farm, vote for you in a fake pagent, or buy your fake baked goods. I don't care that you just won 1,000,000 points or have advanced another level.

4. Online. Each time you decide to check your profile, every one of your "friends" will know you are online and will decide that this means you are free to chat.

5. Performance. There are many times when the site lags or freezes due to a heavy load.

6. Changes. It seems that every month or two you have to learn a new way of doing something you've been doing with no issues for the last few years. It's annoying - I don't like change.

Oh there's more; privacy, political or religious postings, sharing my info., forwarding tons of things, etc. Nothing major, just your ordinary complaints.

Pros

Here are a few of the reasons I love Facebook.

1. When you are isolated by location, health, or circumstances, you have a way of interacting with others - even meeting new people. Any form of social interaction is better than none.

2. You are in control of your profile in as much as you select which photo represents you and what information is supplied. I'm amazed on how nice we all look, how successful we are, and what great families we have. Sometimes, I go out to my profile just to remind myself of how well I'm doing.

3. It is a quick way to update everyone in your family at once about any major, or non-major, issues. It's also a good way to share photos of growing children with everyone and not have to mail out photos every year. Also an easy way to keep up with what family members are doing.

4. There have been more than one time when playing the many games on Facebook kept me sane. I may not be thrilled to see game posts on my feed now, but I use to be one of those people making gaming posts/requests. I get it.

5. It makes me laugh. I have several funny friends and relatives who's posts crack me up. Not a day goes by that I don't at least smile, if not outright laugh, at something I've read on Facebook.

6. You can hook up with people from your past that mean the world to you, but managed to loose touch with through the years.

Tonight

Will was playing on the computer this evening. He is often on the computer and is proficient at searching for and playing many free games.

I came in about eight to check my email and was shocked to find four receipts in my inbox from Facebook totally over $96 - for games. Back when I use to play games on Facebook I had attached a credit card to my account for automatic purchasing, and I never removed it. Will had followed some links and hadn't realized he was making purchases.

I immediately followed a link on the first receipt to dispute the transaction. It took less than five minutes to find and dispute all claims from this evening. By the time I removed my financial permission and returned to my email, Facebook had refunded every penny.

Tonight, I'm loving them.