Category Archives: Facebook Secrets

Facebook, Facebook 101, Facebook Secrets, Facebook Tricks, Hide Likes from Timeline

Facebook 101 – Part 6 – How to hide page likes on Facebook

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Here’s now to hide page likes from your Facebook timeline. Page likes don’t show up on the newsfeed or side ticker, only on your timeline. There is no reason why anyone needs to know that you like a certain company’s page or some megastar’s page either. That’s your business, isn’t it? Here’s how to keep that information off of your timeline.

1. Log-in to Facebook and head over to your Profile page. Basically, click on your name, just the right of center. That will bring up your timeline.

2. Click on the Activity Log box just to the right of your name.

3. Anything you have done in the last little while is at the top. To the right of each entry is an icon. If you have liked a Facebook page, it will show up there.

4. Click the icon on the far right and choose ‘Hide from timeline’. You’re done.

You have to be quick about this. Make sure you have Facebook open and are logged in before you like a page that you want to hide from your timeline. Go the page and like it, then head back to your profile and follow the steps we’ve described above. No one but you will know what pages you like.

Thanks for reading! Next up is hiding your other likes on your timeline and from the newsfeed or ticker.

TIP: Remember that you cannot hide the fact that you liked a photo or a comment or that you made a comment on a photo. All of those things are wide open and show up on both your timeline and your friend’s newsfeeds and tickers. There’s nothing you can do about any of that except unlike the photo or delete the comment. Watch out for that, OK?

Facebook, Facebook 101, Facebook Games, Facebook Secrets, Facebook Tricks

Facebook 101 – Part 3 Games!

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One of the best parts of Facebook, depending on how much time you have to spare, is the games that you can play. Facebook games are everywhere it seems. Once you get some friends added to your list, they will very likely start to send you invitations to join them in their favorite online games. We’re not going to explain each game here but they run the gamut from intelligent word games through silly cooking games to amusing ‘I spy’ ones. Some are copies of board games you know while others are designed specifically for Facebook.

When it comes time to add a game on Facebook, the process is deceptively simple…on the surface. There are some things you should be concerned with, however. We’ll run through the process for you and, hopefully, make it as painless as possible. We’re not against the games that are everywhere on Facebook, we’re just a bit concerned about the way they reach out to your other friends and pretty much spam the heck out of them. We’ll help you avoid the traps.

TIP: Part of the game experience on Facebook is building your own neighborhood or network in each one. Some games are more dependent on the number of friends that you play or interact with than others. Some of your friends are more interested in games, to the point of becoming fanatical about them, than other friends who don’t even play games. Remember to limit yourself at the start to friends who you know  play games and enjoy being added to your own field of play. If you’re not careful, you’ll start to lose friends simply because of the game spam that is possible on Facebook.

Here’s what you see when you want to start playing a game. Facebook wants you to know what the game will know about you and how it interacts with you, that kind of thing:

Adding a game to Facebook
This is where you say yes and get to play, or no and don't get to play.

Here you see some details on how the game is going to work with you, or against you, on Facebook. In order to play the game, you have to accept this agreement. You can change the email settings later, we’ll show you how, but for now, there is only one part that you can change. Do you really want your friends to know you are playing this game? If you’re OK with that, and in most cases it’s fine, look down on the bottom left and choose your level of openness.  You can change your setting here before you click Play Game. Where you see the word Friends in this photo, click on the little arrow to bring down this menu:

Sharing settings
Choose who you want to share your game posts with here.

This is where you decide who gets to see your actions in the game, your successes, your scores and if you beat someone badly. Take note of the last one. If you cream somebody in Words With Friends, do you think they would like everyone to know about it? Ah, the pleasure and dangers of games on Facebook, right? Take note of this menu because you can use it in other places as well as here. The last one on the top list is ‘Custom’. That is where you choose to share with some friends but not others. Keep that in mind when you are sharing certain kinds of things. It might come in handy.

OK, so once you’ve set all that up, click on Play Game and have some fun. What follows is fairly self-explanatory. The rules are there, the scores, everything you need. All the games will try to push you to spend money but DON’T! There is no need at all to spend anything on Facebook. Don’t even think about giving Facebook or a game your credit card information!

Once you’re comfortable with the game, head back to your main page and set some privacy settings for that game. Click on Facebook up on the top left of the page then click on the arrow to the right of the word Home on the top right of that page. On the menu that pops down, click on Account Settings. Then, on the top left again, click on the word Apps.

The game you just added should be there on that page. This is the menu that you want to see:

Choose your privacy settings here.
Sort out everything here before you forget.

If you don’t want the game to email you, click on the words ‘The app sends you a notification’ and choose ‘Never’. That way your email inbox won’t be full of stuff from the game, right? Then choose who can see the game’s posts on your timeline and you’re all set. Click ‘Close’ and you’re done!

Next time we’ll discuss how to opt out of appearing in Facebook ads all across the Internet. Believe it or not, it’s possible that your profile pic could be seen by millions of people all over the world without you even knowing about it. Next post, folks. Be there!

Thanks for reading. Comments, questions, they’re all welcome.

 

Facebook, Facebook 101, Facebook Secrets, Facebook Tricks

Facebook 101 – Part 3 Control your shares

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On Facebook, you can control who sees the things that you share. The different settings are: everyone, just friends, friends except acquaintances, only me (you), custom or close friends. As you can see, if you want to adjust the privacy controls, you can actually fine tune them to match quite a few of your preferences. Some things might be fine for everyone or for friends. Some other things might only be suitable to close friends and not acquaintances. Obviously, in order to differentiate between friends, close friends and acquaintances, you have to sort out your list of friends.

Right now, let’s work on sharing something. Last time, we asked you to put up a new status message. Let’s share a photo. Here are the steps:

1. Before you begin, find out where the photo is on your computer. We like to keep things on our desktop, or in My Documents, but on the desktop is preferred. Why?  My Documents is simply a link to a folder inside the Windows folder. To access the things inside of it, you have to sort through a list of folders to find the one you want. We prefer to make a new folder on the desktop, name it My Stuff, and plunk everything in there. Then, when it comes time to back up the computer, we just burn that folder to a DVD. Anyway, find a pic somewhere on your computer. You can download one from the Internet, too. Usually downloads are saved in a Downloads folder, right?

2. On your main Facebook page, the one you get to when you click Facebook up on the top left, look for the ‘What’s on your mind?’ slot at the top of the page. There are three choices there. Click on ‘Add photo/video’.

3. The next box that pops down will show ‘Upload photo/video’/Use webcam/Create photo album’. Right now we are only uploading a single pic. Click ‘Upload photo/video’.

4. The next little menu asks you to ‘Say something about this…’. You can do this later so for now, click on the Choose File button. What pops up now is a map, more or less, of a folder on your computer. On the far left, at the top, look for Desktop or Downloads. Click on a folder, depending on where the photo is. When you see the photo you want to share, click on it then choose ‘Open’ down on the bottom right. Truth be told, you aren’t actually opening the picture. All you’re doing is saying to Facebook or Windows “This is the photo I want.” That menu will close.

5. You’re back on your Facebook page now but to the right of Choose File should be a bunch of letters or numbers that end in ‘.jpg’. That’s the file name, if you don’t know already. Write some words in the space above it, something like ‘This is me when I was five’ or whatever it is you want to describe the photo.

6. On the lower right of that box, look for the word ‘Post’. You can’t miss it. It’s in blue. Just to the left of it is a little down arrow. It probably has the word ‘Public’ in small letters. Click on the arrow and choose who you want to share the photo with. Choose Friends. Then click the word ‘Post’.

7. There you go! You’ve just shared a photo on Facebook. At this point, that photo is only available to your friends. You can customize that setting by choosing the Custom option and typing in people you want to hide the photo from or open up the photo to Friends of friends. Once you figure out the settings, it’s easy to adjust your privacy settings to your own level of security. It’s far better to do it now when you’re learning about Facebook.

TIP: This is a caveat about tags and tagging.  Keep this in mind constantly when you are using Facebook. While you may not know what a tag is, anyone who is ‘tagged’ in a photo or note or video can see the shared item, no matter what your privacy settings are. Unless you adjust your settings, friends of people who are tagged can also see the post (the thing you shared).

Tip: Tagging someone means that you highlight their name in the photo or video by typing in a menu. That person will get a notice that they have been tagged and will, probably, come and see what that thing is that they’ve been tagged in. It’s another way of saying, “Hey! Take a look at this!” You can’t prevent tags but you can adjust who sees the item after it’s tagged.

Last Tip: Facebook is all about sharing. To a certain extent, you can control who sees what you share. If you don’t want people to see something, don’t share it. It’s as simple as that. Facebook changes its policies all the time. Get used to that. What isn’t shared today might be shared tomorrow. If you post something, someone at Facebook may see it. No matter what you put on Facebook someone will see it, even if that someone works at Facebook. Forewarned is forearmed. Don’t post something that you wouldn’t want your friends…or family…to see. But Facebook is fun, so relax and enjoy it.

Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

 

Facebook, Facebook 101, Facebook Secrets, Facebook Tricks, Timeline

Facebook 101- Part Two – your profile picture

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Once you’ve set up your new Facebook account, it’s time to decide what face you want to present to the world. Do you want an old photo of yourself so that your high school friends can find you? Do you want a recent photo so your friends at work will recognize you? How about a family pic from a few years ago? Now is the time to decide who you will interact with on Facebook. Your profile photo will be visible to everyone, if you have your privacy settings set up that way, or it will only be available to friends, again depending on your settings. We will get to those later.

In the new Facebook, you actually have two profile photos. One is thumbnail size and the other is larger. Think of the larger one as a background image, something that illustrates your interests or your hobbies, maybe scenery that you love. You don’t really want your ‘Cover’ photo to be too personal. Keep it pretty but impersonal.

Your profile pic can be anything you want, but if you are young or female, you might not want to put a knockout profile photo up. There are stalkers who troll Facebook for attractive women. A generic photo that is only available to your friends makes a lot of sense unless you are trying to simply meet people. In that case,   you’re on your own.

Once you have your photos set up, it’s time to look for friends. You can search them out yourself or you can send them an email with the link to your Facebook account in it. Sound difficult? Well, if you know your friend’s email address, Facebook will send them an email which includes a link to your profile. Quick as a wink, your friend is added. There are many ways to add people but you can rest assured that Facebook takes care of it all. You can search for old friends at school or work or even in your own neighbourhood. All of these search choices are available from your profile page. Just click on the Find Friends link on the top right side. Here is what you want to see:

Click on any link on this page to find friends.
There are lots of choices here to look for friends on Facebook.

While we would prefer you to email your friends using the Facebook system described above, you can also sign into each of the listed social networking applications and send messages to your friends that way. Why don’t we advise that? Simply, trusting your account password to a third party, even if it is Facebook, seems risky to us. If you decide to go this route, make sure you change your password immediately afterward.

Once you start to add friends, you can start to interact with them. For now, type a light-hearted message in the ‘What’s on your mind’ box on the main page of Facebook. In this box you can also share a link or a photo or video or just ask a question. To share a link, simply copy the link from the top of your browser window and paste it into the box. Facebook finds the site, gives a short description of it that is visible to your friends and then chooses a small photo from the site. Sometimes you can choose which photo to use, sometimes it’s only a single choice. Then, at the top of the box, say something about the link. Then click Post and you’ve officially shared something on Facebook. Pat yourself on the back!

Next time, we’ll get into privacy settings. With Facebook, you get to choose who sees your stuff. More on that next time.

Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

 

Facebook, Facebook Secrets, Facebook Tricks

Facebook 101 – Part 1 – Opening a new account

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This is the first post in a new series about Facebook. Over the next few weeks, we will post entries on everything about Facebook, from signing up for a new profile to editing your privacy settings. We’ve already discussed many of these settings in detail but this time we’ll concentrate on Facebook from beginning to end, with everything set up the way you want it, not the way Facebook wants it.

Here’s how to set up a new Facebook account. Why should we post something this simple? Believe it or not, some people aren’t as computer aware as you might think. To some, Facebook is a complete mystery. Some people just don’t get it. That’s why Computers Made Simple is here. We’ll clear out all the uncertainty and, hopefully, make the path to enlightenment as simple as possible.

Step 1: All you need to start a Facebook account is an email address. After that, it’s just a matter of how much information you want to give to Facebook. If this account is for you to interact with your friends, you’ll have to use a familiar name or a nickname in order for them to realize that it’s you. Starting at this page: http://www.facebook.com/ , this is what you’ll see.

The first step in getting a Facebook profile
Name, email and password. Select sex and birth date as well.

This is where you signup. Choose your name, it doesn’t have to be your real name, and then choose which email address you want to use (you will receive a LOT of email from Facebook to start but we’ll tell you how to change the settings later) and make up a password. Choose a password that is unique to Facebook and one that is difficult for anyone to guess. People will try to hack your Facebook account sometimes.

Next, choose your sex and a birthday. Obviously, you can lie about this, the birthday part anyway, but you don’t have to do that because we will show you later how to hide your age from Facebook.

If you have some time, read the Terms and the Data Use Policy shown in fine print at the bottom. If your language isn’t English, Facebook offers pages in many other languages.

Step 2: Once you click on Sign Up, Facebook will send you an email which you will use to confirm that you applied for a new account. Go to your email account now and look for an email from Facebook. If there isn’t a new piece of mail in your inbox, make sure to check your Junk Mail box. Here is what you’ll see when you find the email:

The email that will confirm your new Facebook account.
Click on the words 'Complete Sign Up'

Step 3: Once you click on the words Complete Sign Up, Facebook will send you yet another email which tells you that everything is cool. You can see how this is going to go, right? Facebook loves to keep in touch with you, to the point of almost spamming your email account with endless new messages. Next time, we’ll let you know how to stop the email madness.

Step 4: The next screen you see looks innocent but avoid filling out your email details just yet. Facebook wants to send an invitation to all of the people on your email contact list to join you on Facebook. Personally, I don’t want all of my email contacts on Facebook. I also don’t want to give Facebook my email password, even though they say they will keep it safe and only use it once. Right, I’ve heard that kind of thing before. Ignore the Skip this Step warning (twice) and ignore the rest of the set up pages. You can do all of this later when we get to editing your personal information.

For now, take some time to think about who you want to join you on Facebook. Think about how much information you want to share with them and with Facebook itself. Do you want everyone to know how old you are? Really? Facebook will use this to tune ads which are directed at your particular demographic group. Is that the kind of thing you want?

That’s enough for now. You’re signed up, that’s a start. Next time we’ll talk about how to dress up your profile.

Thanks for reading!