Facebook Deactivations Gaining Attention
he phrase “how to quit Facebook” generated nearly 17 million results in a recent Google search, and prominent tech industry figures are ditching their accounts on the social networking site.
Whether they are driven by privacy concerns or fed-up with the amount of time they spend updating their accounts, apparently Facebook users are increasingly curious about the social networking site’s farewell policies.
The phrase “how to quit Facebook” generated 16.9 million results in a Google search Tuesday morning, while “how do I delete my Facebook account?” resulted in 15.9 million links.
Some well-known industry names have made much-publicized cuts to their Facebook ties. Google’s webspam chief Matt Cutts deactivated his Facebook ties on April 22, according to comments he made on Twitter. “I just deactivated my Facebook account using the guide [here]. Not hard to do & you can still revive it later,” he wrote. “It was really useful. I wasn’t expecting the FB guilt trip + dynamic “don’t go” box + password request + captcha though.”
Peter Rojas, Gizmodo and Engadget founder, and co-founder of technology blog gdgt tweeted about his decision to cut his Facebook ties. “I was spending more time managing my account than actually using my account,” he toldABCNews.com. “Having to constantly monitor the privacy settings was way too complicated. You can never be sure if you actually caught everything.”