I’ve been a member of Facebook for many years, joining since before it became the advertising behemoth it is today. Back then I did make fairly regular use of it to interact with friends and colleagues as well as groups. But my use of it dwindled to reading group posts and posting ‘happy birthday’ messages. But I kept it.
As hobbies changed with time and retirement I joined several new groups. Again, really all I did was read posts.
At some stage during this time I also began to use Messenger. I now find that I rarely get any use out of Facebook and only have two contacts in Messenger that I do not have elsewhere. So I thought it time to get rid of Facebook. That did not go as planned!
First, the Messenger app on the Mac decided it would log me out and I cannot log back in. I get as far as the 2FA challenge where it allegedly sends me a text which never arrives. Three goes at that and I just deleted the app, life is too short.
Then I went into Facebook and after being bounced around between Facebook and the overarching Meta sites I was a given a choice of disabling my Facebook account and keeping Messenger, or deleting my Facebook account – which was my aim – but losing Messenger as well.
Choices, choices… so I’ve disabled it pending contacting my only two Messenger contacts and asking them if they have WhatsApp, Telegram or Signal. Hopefully they do, and Facebook can be assigned to (my) history.
Update: 11/1/24 YES! Both contacts use WhatsApp, so… Facebook deleted. Or it will be after 30 days apparently, in case I change my mind (fair enough, nice to have a cooling off period)