Is life without Facebook possible? What for many people would seem unthinkable is the new normal for Leonie Reppich, 22, a German flight attendant. One day she just had enough of the social network, tiring of the insincere, trivial comments on her page.
She did what relatively few Facebook users do - she closed her account. But it wasn't easy - partly because Facebook doesn't make it as simple for users to say goodbye as to say hello. "Finally I searched on Google for how to do it," she says, and found out how to delete herself.
"That's symptomatic," says Sabine Petri, a lawyer with a consumer advice centre in Germany. The delete option is not where you expect in Facebook. Hint: It's a subpage of "Help": www.facebook.com/help/delete_account
But once it is found, a few clicks will do the job. But it doesn't become final for 14 days, in case a user has second thoughts about quitting.
There's also the option of deactivating an account if a user doesn't want to permanently delete it. In that case, the account is shut down but it can always be reactivated. But this function too is well hidden.
This is because Facebook is reluctant to let users go. If you take steps to close your account, the social network will warn you about the friends that you'll no longer be connected to.
"One is put under emotional pressure," contends Petri. But Facebook sees it differently: "We remind our users of the people they're connected to. There's no question of 'putting pressure' on people," retorts a Facebook spokesperson.
How can one remain strong when faced with pictures of the friends you'll no longer be connected to? Petri advises that if that' your decision, the head must rule the heart: "The interests of Facebook are less in maintaining friendships and more in keeping a business going."
Leonie Reppich did remain resolute.
"I thought at first Facebook would be a nice way to stay in touch. Instead I found people weren't having true conversations, but were practically 'stalking' one another with comments." On top of that she resented the advertising, as well as being exposed to the cross-conversations and endless invitations to events she wasn't interested in.
Media psychologist Christiane Eichenberg of Sigmund Freud University in Vienna, Austria knows this phenomenon. Many users quit the network because of annoyance over the abundant information it keeps on them.
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