WTF has happened to Facebook?

My Facebook is the same as ever - I use it daily to run my business and keep in touch with friends and family.

I do get ads in my feed but they're mainly posts about cats, dogs, horses, photography and cruise ships!

Never seen anything about Russia or Putin, but then I never click on anything to do with that or read about it either. If your browsing habits show you're interested in that kind of thing then that's what Facebook will show you.

If you don't search for anything you will still get a stream of reels but it won't be influenced by things you actually like, and you are mpre likely to get negative things.

if you are not payimg you are not the customer

Facebook is free to use and you pay for it by having you attention drawn to "content" chosen by algorithm. You can't just "not have" that aspect - your attention is the product that they are selling. All you can do is influence the algorithm's choices.

23yo DD considers anyone age 40+ to be a boomer (nb: that includes many millenials who I believe actually coined the word boomer). Poetic justice imho.

Just now, 1st 10 posts in my feed are

1. 58yo cousin about politics
2. ad for product I just purchased from same seller
3. moan in hobby group
4. 54yo friend about life lessons (spiritual)

The political views I can tolerate or agree with.

But you didn't really think that Facebook wasn't a thing anymore because you and your friends don't use it did you?

Asking that on a thread where posters are describing their user experience comes across as a little sneery. Maybe you didn't mean it that way but you must be able to see it's a daft thing to ask

Do adblockers not work, sometimes you have to try a few different ones.

I don't use WhatsApp either as you have to agree to share with FB, I used to WhatsApp in the old days when it started

If you’re 55+, Reform-curious and enjoy memes about days gone by when ‘we was poor but happy,’ then it’s for you.

If not, and you like photos go with Instagram. If you prefer video and have a limited attention span, there’s TikTok.

And if you enjoy shouting into the void, X or Bluesky could be for you.

I did read that any interaction with stuff on there including to say you dislike it or want to see less of it, or any pausing to read something out of sheer shock/horror or whatever is taken as positive engagement and will end up showing you more of the same. So like a pp said just stop interacting altogether or even pausing to read the stuff you don’t want to see. And interact more with stuff you do want to see.

I honestly haven’t noticed any huge difference in Facebook recently? Except that I do think some things are more likely to be shown to me because a friend has interacted with it these days. So maybe get rid of any racist friends 🤣 I don’t see any of that stuff? If there is anything political on there it’s mildly left wing, and basically right in line with my general political leanings.

Currently my feed shows me mostly posts from close friends and family, Facebook groups I am in and interact with a lot, adverts for books or local events I might be interested in (often they are right!) and reels from comedians or about ballet/dance generally, gymnastics, singing/music, crafting, travel, dogs, little kids being cute, TV shows or actors/comedians I like and other random stuff I aimlessly click on out of vague interest on Facebook 🤣

I am more annoyed I don't see much of my friend's posts... it is seems to be mostly ads and sponsored stuff.

I also don't see what is "sick" about someone posting videos of their dog during their last day before being PTS. I think it is rather sweet.

Yep. I rarely go on it now. I want the old Facebook where all I saw was stuff from friends and family.

It’s fast becoming a cesspit. They should have an option to not see ads and things for people you don’t follow.

Similar - community info, things relating to hobbies or such that I've previously shown an interest in.

Nothing unpleasant.

don't even engage with the "see less of these" options. Literally just ignore them, don't click on anything within them, don't read any of the comments or click on any of the posters' names. Even just by trying to persistently get rid of them, you are still engaging with it.

Well this Gen X'er has a sick child and finds the relevant Facebook groups a source of great support in what is a truly dire situation. But yeah, go ahead and make sweeping statements based on fuck all.

Well, you won't find them funny to watch after a week or so, the novelty wears off and by then you'll just be pissed off and irritated by them. But by watching the first few you've invited more and more preposterous things to come to your account. With probably loads of rage bait comments with them, with plenty of fake posts expressing shock or surprise or delight and disbelief at the content, then another load of tiresome posts by gullible people wasting 20 minutes of their lives explaining that it's not real, it's just AI, blah blah. Not realising that by engaging with it AT ALL they're just going to get more of the same themselves.

Just look at your friends' photos of their nights out and you'll be reet.

I haven't had those but what I get every day now are sexist cartoons. I keep trying to get rid of them but they return from a supposedly "different" person. It's like msgs or emails from a creep who keeps changing his email addy to get round you blocking him.

Or literally just don't search for anything just for something to pass the time. Only search for stuff if you really need to find it.

I don't understand why some of you are getting that stuff. I don't click on ANYTHING that is a suggested post. I don't click on shared posts from FB friends that are not from a source I already know and/or follow myself. My mum is guilty of sharing absolute shit sometimes, you know - urban myth warning stuff, and when I asked her where she got it from she said that her friend Liz's daughter got sent it by someone who worked in a hospital "they were warned by their IT people so it MUST be a genuine virus warning". She doesn't get it, no matter how many times I've told her to be careful not to just press "share post" without thinking cos there's so much utterly wrong and idiotic stuff shared around.

I AM a member of a few groups like gardening groups or interior design. I take all their posts with a pinch of salt, stay out of any arguments,and don't join new groups based on the ones I've chosen to follow myself. My privacy is locked down. I don't follow any political stuff. All on purpose.

I regularly look on FB to see what's been happening in my friends' lives, I like seeing them posting pics of their kids growing up, or a few from their holidays. Just like FB was originally. It's easy to pick out the original stuff like that from the shared copy and pasted shit if you just think about the effect of each click you do.

I don't have this on FB at all. thank fuck

A couple of weeks ago, I flooded my feed with items about books, cats, other animals, owls, other birds, environment, cheese, other food, Jewish interests, other religious interests, music, cartoons, property, gardening, art, pretty teapots, cute babies, and anything else that's nice and interesting and will hold back the racists, the cynics, the trolls and anyone else who peddles conspiracy theories, misogyny and other forms of filthy politics. I top up regularly with anything else I see that looks good and I'll keep doing it for as long as it works.

Blue Sky is loads better from what someone told me. Not owned by powerful billionaires.

Ha ha! Twenty-odd years ago?

Mines full of gardening, nature, art and small AI generated houses that would never pass building regs but I dream of living in one all by myself anyway.

They've stopped moderating it as various powerful men are pushing a far right and "free speech" agenda. People are being indoctrinated.

My Twitter feed did the same. One day I saw loads of lovely posts on books, films and nice stationery and then it was flooded with far right propaganda and violence.