I knew the social networking giant had jumped the shark way back in 2008 when one of my mother’s friends wanted to know if I had a Facebook so she could “friend me”. Two years later when my beloved Daniel told me he was establishing a Facebook account I told him that I had lost respect for him. Despite that, when he joined I felt some desire to join as well, still I shied away from it.

And I’ve never been able to articulate precisely what it was that made me so uneasy about the concept of Facebook, other than a few (mostly) glib remarks about hating people and not voluntarily interacting with them any more than I already must.

This morning I was flipping through the current issue of Newsweek and I came across an editorial by David Lyons on the subject of Facebook and the privacy concerns surrounding it and he managed to put into words what I could not:

In the past five years Facebook has repeatedly changed its privacy policy, always in one direction, and every time this happens, the same movie plays out: people complain, Facebook stonewalls, then spins, then pretends to be contrite, then finally walks things back—a bit. Nobody seems to notice that, after the walk-back, Facebook is still grabbing more personal info than it was before …
The truth is, Zuckerberg needs your data. His business is built on it. You are not Facebook’s customer. You are its inventory—you are the product Facebook is selling.

The article goes more into much more detail about the nature of the changes, etc. It goes so far as to note that the current rendition of the privacy scuffle will in all likelihood play out without leaving so much as a dent in Facebook’s popularity. (100 millions new users in the last four months is an astounding figure.) I hold out hope that it will one day soon hit a saturation point and become just another fad that nobody wants to admit having once taken part in. (MySpace, anyone?)

Daniel does make a good point when he notes that I share far more information on my LibraryThing account than he does on his Facebook one. I’m comfortable with people knowing I own a lot of books; I’m even comfortable with the inferences that can be drawn from my collection such as the fact that many of the horizontal surfaces in my apartment have books stacked on them — twenty-six volumes deep in spots, if you must know. The difference is that LibraryThing has never made me feel like a commodity, which these days on the web is rare.

The price of a can of soda pop from the vending machine in the basement has gone up 10¢. The pricing of vending machine stuff interests me because one is expected to pay a premium for the convenience of it, but the operators of the vending machines are bound by the mechanics of payment (which is to say, because the machines do not accept pennies, the prices only increase by multiples of five). The result is that vending machine prices do not reflect inflation very well and so gaps in time are created during which one can buy things from a vending machine for less than one would buy the same item from say a convenience store.

A can of soda can be purchased as part of a case from a grocery store for less than what it would cost from either a vending machine or a convenience store, so it isn’t as if the operators of the vending machines are ever losing money on the deal, but the surcharge they are able to impose for the convenience of being able to buy a can of soda without going to a grocery store fluctuates wildly.

I am a bit curious to see how this phenomenon will be affected when using ones credit card to purchase food items from vending machines catches on in the States. The key will be, of course, whether the consumers will still want these things to be priced in the way they are now and how often the operators will be willing to adjust their prices. I envision a gas station like scenario with the price of a can of soda fluctuating a cent or two every couple of days.

Personally, I think this is a brilliant series of Play-Doh ads, but I am not likely Hasbro’s target audience.

Last night I was approached in a parking lot by a young and very pregnant woman driving an SUV. She began by tearfully telling me she had already called the police, and I immediately began trying to remember precisely what the EMD cards say about childbirth. So I was relieved when I realized she was telling me that the police had refused to give her any gas money and that she was low on fuel and needed to drive back home to Pennsylvania. Frankly at that moment I was happy to give her ten bucks.

Almost immediately I began to wonder if I had just enabled a pregnant woman to get high, but there remains an issue of weighing the possible scenarios against the one presented. I believe that in many situations one must give the person the benefit of the doubt just in case, even at the risk of my being an easy mark as a result.

There’s something a bit strange happening with the local “alternative rock” FM radio station. My current theory is that it was purchased by Mormons.

First there was the version of “You Oughta Know” that eliminated the phrase, “go down on you” in its entirety, while removing only the first consonant in the following use of the word “fuck”. This behavior can only really be explained by an editor thinking we won’t be able to guess what should have been there. (They clearly had no problem leaving the previously redacted lyric wholly mystifying to someone unfamiliar with the song: “What would she do in a theater? Watch a movie? Eat popcorn? What?!”)

Then this morning they played “Message in a Bottle” by the Police.

Case closed.

Addendum 24 July 2009:

This morning the Mormons subjected me to a particularly pathetic cover of “99 Luftballoons” by Goldfinger. Clearly, this is part of an insidious plot, but to what end?

I can’t say what the official policy on solicitation is in my apartment building, but during the day our doorman is quite gregarious and I rather doubt he keeps anyone out, even those bearing fliers. The result is that it is not an uncommon occurrence for me to find menus from Chinese restaurants, photocopies of scrawled adverts from dry cleaners and sundry other pieces of paper shoved under my door.

Today what I found was a business card from a cleaning service — a tri-color professional looking business card that gave me a woman’s name, notice that they use their own products and a phone number with the proviso that “Prices are discussed;” which makes me think that when one calls that number one will be forced to actively participate in a discussion of pricing whether one wants to or not. More baffling still was the line of text that appeared at the bottom of the card, “REMEMBER: cleaning makes you happy!” which isn’t really true and isn’t a very good motto for such a business in any event.

For those who are interested, this site has been set up so that U.S. citizens can wave good-bye to their money. Hooray for accountability!

My local NPR station is currently engaged in one of its bi-monthly membership drives. It occurred to me as I was listening that I would be far more likely to donate if the personalities interrupting the programming to ask for money would stop implying that I was stealing from them by being anything less than a current member. I made note of this to Daniel.

Tonight as I was listening to All Things Considered, Christine Dempsey, WHYY Program Director, came on the air and talked about how she was in the cafeteria earlier that day and she made sure to wait in line to pay for her lunch because it would never occur to her just walk out with the food and with that “analogy” the hitherto implied accusation became a direct one. Now I kind of wish I had never donated to the station.

I understand that NPR needs the funding. I am even the sort of person who is generally inclined toward giving money to make sure programs like American Routes or Fresh Air stay on the air, but it is entirely unacceptable to suggest that everyone listening to a freely available radio show without donating is a thief.

I noticed along the top edge of the remaining cover on a battered copy of Webster’s New World Dictionary (1995 edition) a line of text, “The #1 New York Times Bestseller”.

I have to wonder if that fact is particularly enticing to those in the market for a dictionary.

PETA in its ongoing protest against the existence of humans animal cruelty, has taken aim at fishing practices by way of taxonomy. Fish are slimy and delicious, but “sea kittens” are cute … and delicious. Speaking of which, I could really go for some grilled sea kitten right about now, or maybe a sea kitten salad sandwich. Mmmmmm … sea kittens.

Today I went into the Aveda store at a local mall. I would say they had me at, “Hello”, but it was more like they had me at, “Would you like a cup of tea while you browse?” (And what a tea — peppermint and licorice root, sweet enough it was hard to believe it didn’t have sugar in it.)

Then the genuinely nice salesperson asked if I had time for a “moment of wellness” and even though that phrase is just chock full of the New Age heebie jeebies, the “moment” itself was an all but blissful hand massage using several of their products. My hands still feel like silk. I guess I’m paying for all this feel good stuff, but if the products are all as good as I’ve read and what little I’ve experienced, I think it is probably worth it. I doubt this is enough to make me want to go to the mall more often, but if I do go I’ll be sure to stop in for another cup of tea.