Facebook gags verbal dissent group

Facebook has silenced a 20,000-strong campaign group dedicated to the seemingly innocuous goal of stopping the site from forcing people to use the verb "to be" in their status updates. The group, entitled "Campaign to lose the mandatory 'is' from facebook updates!", disappeared overnight on Wednesday without any warning to its …

[Nick Shaw]

Group details

It seems the group has been restored, no doubt due the registers enquiries. Those interested in joining or forwarding general abuse (you'd be surprised) can find us here:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=3985404323

:)

[min]

So that's...

where my "All ipod users are fekkin' panzies" group went.

bless you, facebook. wo said freedom is dead?

[Tim Lake]

Fuss over nothing?

I suspect this is a fault rather than a deliberate attempt to 'quash the uprising'. There are plenty of far more contraversial groups on Facebook and I can't see any good reason why they'd ban this one without warning.

I am/was a member of that group which seems formed out of a good idea. I hope they haven't just dropped a bollock and wiped the group by accident but suspect that if they have, it may be rather less embarassing to hide behind their terms of use.

[Anonymous Coward]

Silly anti-grammarians

I for one am glad their campaign looks like it will fail. I could not bear the thought of seeing what all those idiots will be writing when it just reads their name and whatever inane comment they choose to follow. At least the present system requires some small modicum of thought and can provide somewhat entertaining grammatical somersaults as people try to work out how to say what they are doing!

[Anonymous Coward]

Alas,

they ironically were not to be.

[Adrian Jones]

It appears to be back

Clearly the power of El Reg at work! (Or rather, slacking off work and playing with Facebook. :)

[Nick Shaw]

Group details

It seems the group has been restored, no doubt due the registers enquiries. Those interested in joining or forwarding general abuse (you'd be surprised) can find us here:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=3985404323

:)

[Ian Ferguson]

Hmm, consistent...

So this group is deleted while "Fuck Islam" is allowed?

[Chris Williams]

@Tim Lake

Hi Tim,

I'd have thought the same, except for that I asked the company what had happened to it, and they responded by telling me about how they can remove anything they please for whatever reason they please, not that it could be a fault.

Glad to see it back though.

Chris Williams

El Reg

[Inachu]

Facebook admins acting like POF admins

Seems like the admins at FACEBOOK are the same ones at Plenty Of Fish dating site.

POF mods and admins do not like it if lets say for example:

A black girl only hunts for white dates

or

A black man only hunts and chats only for asian women

Or

A white man that only hunts and chats with asian women.

The examples above and you will get an email from POF admin

that you must give other races a chance to date you......

EXUSE ME??? are you my mother or father?

I think not!

[Chris]

I r facebook

Facebook should take a page out of the "I r Weasel" cartoon and change the "is" to "are"...

But otherwise the chris agrees with 'Silly anti-grammarians' post above. Trying to manipulate the english language and being able to express onesself in the third person is something the chris enjoys doing. it makes chris feel like a professional athlete. the chris likes that.

[Duncan Hothersall]

It's alright

Even if this group should disappear again, you can still join the "Jim Davidson is a cunt" group, which is a far more important statement in my view.

[Rich]

Eh?

I fully accept that I may be being thick, but bearing in mind I've never used Facebook, what the dickens are you all talking about?

Posters to Facebook have to use the word "is". Eh? I don't understand!!!

[Matt MArtin]

All your groups

are belong to facebook

[myxiplx]

doesn't surprise me in the slightest

I took one look at facebooks terms & conditions and said no thanks.

If people are dumb enough to sign up with a company that grants itself rights to all your content they really shouldn't be surprised to find that company doing stuff like this.

[Steve Hill]

A larger group is still there...

http://ed.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2219762655

That group has 47987 members, and why do we even care??

[adnim]

Facebook

Should be ignored. As should any site with TOC's that gives you as a user no rights and allows them to treat you like sh1t.

[Anonymous Coward]

Are

I'd go for R as in I.R. Baboon / I am Weasel cartoon.

And because

(handle) are belong to us

sounds better than

(handle) is belong to us

*grin*

[Anonymous Coward]

That's "I M Weasel"....

... I R is the baboon.

[Law]

about right

Reminds me of my friends problem a few weeks ago... he put an alias into facebook when he signed up, so instead of "joe jim bloggs", he called himself "joe jim"..... after he realised he could make his profile private to people he didnt like, he asked them to change his name to his real name.... after a week he got a reply saying his request was either unacceptable and/or misleading..... so basically, facebook refused to let him be called who he was... and then they told him he couldn't request it again for several weeks.

In the mean time, my wife changed her name to her maiden name so her friends would know who she was within a day.... and 2 weeks later changed it again to her married name. No questions asked..... slightly odd!! Is this a sexism thing?? I wonder!

I'm actually considering closing my facebook account... I must admit, it is nice seeing friends I haven't been in contact with for 15 years, but with problems using facebook app's, the constant stream of privacy issues, and this latest censorship or admin-cockup, I am starting to realise they aren't the harmless little alternative networking site they started out as.

[Joe]

Re: All your groups

Shouldn't that be *is* belong to us? ;)

[The Mighty Spang]

Jim Davidson is a C***?

That pales into insignificance compared to the importance of "I Hate Ricky Gervais Even More Than I Hate Bono & I Really Fucking Hate Bono"

[Anonymous Coward]

To virtually be or not virtually to be

Phuck' em, get some real friends and do what you did before the "Internet Social Notworking" revolution. Real beer beats virtual beer any day of the week. Anyway does anyone really need Twofacedbook? There should be a law against wiping out 20,000 people. Pulling Faces indeed.

[Anonymous Coward]

The only people we hate more than the Romans...

see this group :) - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=4915837877&ref=mf

[Anonymous Coward]

you have no rights!

So you sign up to a site which has TOCs stating it can do what it likes, when it likes, if it likes and get pissed off when they actually do that?

Do you expect to have rights just because the site is now internationally popular?

If we can't trust sites which take our money and have very strict guidance under our laws how can you trust a site which you use for free and for no purpose!

[Tom Martin]

Perhaps more to it than there seems

Mysteriously, a few months ago, a similar thing happened with a group for 2007 Imperial College London freshers. I can vouch that there was nothing dodgy/incriminating in there, and we were all completely baffled. The group vanished for a couple of weeks as the creator tried to get some kind of response from Facebook. When they eventually got back to her, they said it was removed in error and will be restored very shortly, and so it was... I think it must just be a case of Facebook Absconding Group Syndrome

[pctechxp]

who cares about facebook

Got an e-mail a month ago from a 'friend' I hadn't heard from in months inviting me to join this site.

I declined and sent them a mail asking them not to put my address into such sites as I already have a problem with spam, I also asked them how they were, I'm still waiting for a response to my mail...

Who needs friends that want to generate more spam for you/expose you to potential ID fraud.

[GerardFarrell]

hmmmmm

Erm, tell em to shut up and use bebo? or one of the myriad other online groupie hugging i wanna be myself blog pages?

[A. Lewis]

@Rich

It was explained in the article...

Basically on facebook you can record a custom 'status' message for all your friends to see, but it begins with an unalterable "is", for example: "John Doe is ...". This results in lots of people either not realising or not caring enough and putting "Sally smith is has just got back from the shops". Moreover, it limits the sorts of status messages you can set.

[Oliverh]

@ Chris Williams (fool)

As is the norm with the reg of late, your attention to detail is outstanding!

You counter Tim's argument that it was a fault, with:

"I'd have thought the same, except for that I asked the company what had happened to it, and they responded by telling me about how they can remove anything they please for whatever reason they please, not that it could be a fault."

When Tim stated:

"but suspect that if they have, it may be rather less embarassing to hide behind their terms of use."

Conratulations, you missed the point. Tim guessed that they might have spun you a yarn rather than tell you the truth, and you argue, moronically, that they would never have spun you a yarn and would have told you the truth when you asked. Keep up the good work.

Glad to see you suck though.

Oliver Hussick

Not El Reg, thankfully.

[Chris Williams]

@Oliverh (reader)

Hi,

No, Oliver, I have not missed the point. My argument was it is far worse for a company like Facebook to be assumed to be gagging dissent than it is to have a minor technical problem.

I'm sorry if you needed this spelling out more explicitly. Keep up the scrutiny.

Chris Williams