Category Archives: Facebook

Welcome to Your Facebook Interview!

Hi! Glad you could make it. Hey, before we begin, give me your real name and email address. Yes, it has to be a real email address and, yes, you must give us your real name. OK good, thanks. Now, tell us about yourself. Here’s what we need to know:

1. How old are you?

2. Are you male or female?

3. What is your current location? Yes, we need city, state and country.

4. For security purposes only, we need your phone number. Better give us your cell number too.

5. Where did you go to school? Try to list every school that you attended…ever.

6. Where have you worked in the past? Yes, we need a complete history.

7. Now we need a recent photo of you, your family and friends, your home…anything to make you more interesting to us. If you have a bikini photo, even better. We ask guys if they have a photo where they’re not wearing a shirt. We love that kind of thing. What was that? Yes, we will use your photos for our own promotions and we won’t tell you about it. OK? Privacy? Well…we have some privacy settings but they’re really hard to figure out and we keep changing them, almost every month. Better leave your stuff open to the public. It’s better that way.

8. What do you like? Yes, we know. There are so many things to like in the world, right? Well, we’ve broken everything up into categories. Music, video, hobbies…all laid out for you. Why do we need these? It’s simple really. We sell your information to advertisers. Once you tell us everything about yourself, we turn around and tune the ads that you see to your own demographic. Do you make any money from all of this? Certainly not! This is our company, not yours. We just use your information, we’re not about to pay you for anything. It’s a privilege to be with us, you should know that!

9. We also need some of your financial details…well, we would like them. Maybe you could give us your credit card number, simple things like that. Security? Oh yes, we have pretty good security here. What’s that? Well, we have been broken into a few times but not much was stolen. No, not much. Just a complete list of usernames and passwords, nothing major.

Photo of Facebook Logo
Look familiar!

 

We think you get the point. Share, reveal personal details, give out your personal information just like that, let complete strangers see your photos….it’s all there on Facebook. The point of this article is simply to make you think about what you’re doing. Hand all of this stuff out and let Facebook make money on it. Is that what you signed up for?

Photo of Facebook Warning
Facebook is very helpful, that’s for sure.

Sign up for Facebook and your profile photo might end up in a facepile somewhere. Anyone in the world could click on your photo and be taken directly to your Facebook profile page. Here’s an example:

Photo of Facepile
If you see something like this, click on a face and see what happens.

 

Make sure you set your privacy settings accordingly to avoid being seen on a website. You have no control over where Facebook posts things like this but you can control whether they can use your photo or not.

We’re simply trying to make you think. Be smart, learn all you can about Facebook privacy before you reveal too much of yourself to strangers.

Photo of Time Cover
This man is a billionaire because of your information.

 

Thanks for reading! Let us know if you have problems with anything on Facebook. We’ll try to help.

Graph Search on Facebook

Depending on where you are, Facebook might have enabled its new Graph Search feature. On our Canadian profiles Graph Search is not enabled but we discovered that it is available on a profile that is supposedly in England. Here are some screenshots and explanations from the tour that we took:

1. As soon as Graph Search is enabled for you, you’ll get this pop out menu:

Photo of Graph Search  1
The search bar is gone. You have to type your search parameters just to the right of the Facebook icon. For now, click the Take a Tour button.

 

2. During the tour, Facebook will suggest some search ideas for you by filling in the search bar. Follow the tour through and you’ll get the general idea of Graph Search.

Photo of Graph Search  2
Search terms are pre-filled during the tour.

 

3. Once you click the search button, you’re presented with the main subject, if that subject has a Facebook page, plus any relation that the main subject has with your friends, strangers, etc. There is even a general search result at the bottom which includes results that are outside of Facebook.

Photo of Graph 3
Maybe Facebook is threatening Google’s search monopoly.

 

4. Next, pick a topic and see if your friends ‘like’ that topic. You can narrow down your friend’s location by city, country, etc.

Photo of Graph 4
We’re not sure why Facebook specifies ‘simple phrases’. Any ideas?

 

5. Here is a search result, personalized … just for you’! 

Photo of Graph 5
This result is fine tuned, supposedly but we’re not sure how you’d use it.

Is this supposed to give you more insight into your friend’s likes or tastes? If your likes are hidden, will they be discovered through Graph Search? We’ll let you know about this later on once we get used to it ourselves.

 

6. At the end of the tour, you’ll get this menu. You can either replay the tour or start using Graph Search on your own.

Photo of Graph 6
It all looks so interesting, right? Or not, depending on how much Graph Search reveals about you.

 

7. Even more suggestions for you from Facebook:

Photo of Graph 7
Maybe instead of Graph Search, Timeline Search would be more appropriate. After all, this is historical information, isn’t it?

 

8. When Graph Search is enabled, your Facebook pages will look slightly different. The search bar is now prominent, the white section is missing and the word Facebook is missing. To get to your normal Facebook page, as opposed to your own Timeline, click on the word Home, third from the right. The pale blue letters to the right of the Facebook icon are where you click to search. Click on your profile photo to get to your Timeline.

Photo of Graph 8
It’s all different once Graph Search is enabled for you.

 

We’re not sure that Graph Search will be a success, in fact we tend to think it will be a dud. There are fears that this search will enable stalking but, as we’ve proved before, there are many ways to stalk people on Facebook. Let us know what you think by commenting below. If you have questions, let us know.

Thanks for reading!

How to Beat Facebook at Its Own Game

Facebook loves the fact that people share everything on their platform. In fact, the more you share, the more money Facebook makes on your information and preferences. If you’re reading this, you’re probably a bit concerned about privacy and how Facebook plays fast and loose with it. Here’s how to tune your profile so you can trick Facebook into thinking you’re someone other than who you really are.

1. While Facebook pretends that you have to use your real name on your profile, there is no real reason to do this. On Facebook, and on the Internet in general, you can be whoever you want to be. If you’re worried about whether your friends will recognize you, keep your real last name or, if you’re a female, use your maiden name. There are many ways around the ‘real name’ restriction but just remember that you don’t have to play by the rules here. Why is this important? Well, once Facebook has your real name, they can sell your information to third party advertisers, complete with your home city or state. This leads us to the next available spoof.

2. Don’t use your real city/town/country. Even if your IP address says that you are coming from Timbuktu, you can always tell Facebook that you live in Cincinnati, and vice versa. As long as your friends know who you are and where you really live, if they are real friends of course, you can tell Facebook that you live somewhere else.

3. Why does Facebook have to know how old you are? Simply because they can tune their ads to your age demographic. Why let them? You don’t have to give your real age when signing up and, if you do, you don’t have to show the year you were born. Adjust your privacy settings to show only the date, not the year. We all know that young teens or pre-teens pretend to be older when they sign up for Facebook. You can do the same thing …in reverse.

4. When you’re posting a photo of your house/dog/cat/kids, tag the photo with some random location. Facebook doesn’t have to know where you go or what you do. Your friends will know that it’s your house/dog/cat or kid, Facebook doesn’t have to.

5. There is no reason to share your sex, your marriage status, your date of birth, your political views, etc. Your friends already know you or they can ask if they want more information. Facebook pretends that this information is vital to your success on the site but, come on, why would anyone share this stuff in public?

Here are some photos of different settings that are available. Many of our friends do not use their real name while others change their name later on. You’re allowed to do one change on the same profile so change to a nickname or just make up a new one. It’s simple to message someone and say, ” Hey, this is me. I changed my name.”

Photo of Facebook photo.
This photo was taken in Toronto. You can tell Facebook that it was taken just about anywhere.

 

Photo of Facebook photo 2.
Use this page to hide your personal information from Facebook and strangers.

 

Remember to hide what you can, change everything else and pretty much tell Facebook to stuff it. There is no need to share any personal information with them. Good luck and let us know if you have questions about any of this. We’re here to help.

Thanks for reading!

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A Dangerous Facebook App

There are thousands of Facebook games and apps, most of them are fun, entertaining and relatively safe. Some aren’t. Here is an anatomy of one Facebook app that we feel is dangerous and sneaky. Use the details in this post to judge other Facebook apps. Hopefully, you’ll be a smarter Facebook user after this.

Here’s the scenario. You get a request from one of your friends:

Photo of App Request
Seems like a simple request, one of many you probably get each week.

 

This request looks innocuous enough, right? Just wait till you accept. Let’s see what happens then.

 

Photo of App Invitation 2
Oh great! You’ll never forget another birthday. Hmmmm.

 

The nastiness begins as soon as you click ‘Go to App’. The screen will flash then, all of a sudden, you’re not in Kansas (Facebook) anymore.

Photo of App Invitation 3
Are you still on Facebook? What’s with all the ads?

 

You were on Facebook, right? Suddenly, you’re not. Every other app leaves the Facebook name up at the top. This tricky app doesn’t. Lots of ads but no way to get back to Facebook. When you see this, you should stop immediately. An app that takes you away from the relative security of Facebook is trying to trick you. Watch out for this.

Read the page carefully. This app will add your friend’s birthdays, see the check mark beside number 1? It will also send you birthday reminders, see check number 2. Lastly, it will kindly accept requests on your behalf, check number 3. Conveniently, they’re already checked for you. (That was sarcasm, in case you missed it) What do you do now?  Run!

If you click the word Continue, here’s what you get:

Photo of App Invitation 4
We’ve blacked out the names for privacy.

 

Depending on the number of friends you have, you will get a page like this for every 49 names on your list. If you choose to Cancel this prompt, another 49 names pop up. But wait! What is that check mark down at the bottom? This one:

Photo of Game Invitation 5
If you don’t uncheck the box, this app will send out requests any time it wants to.

 

Do you see how devious all of this is? Do you see how rapidly you’d become very unpopular on Facebook?

We think that you’ve got the general idea here. This is a pretty sick app, not in a good way. When you come across something like this, warn your friends and immediately delete it from your app list. We’ll show you how to do that next time.

Thanks for reading!

Download Facebook Albums

Please Note: Since we wrote this review, ‘Download FB Album mod’ has changed its settings and asks form more permissions than we feel is safe. Here are the permissions it is asking for now: 

Photo of FB Album permissions.
Too many permission for a Facebook downloading app.

There is no reason why this extension has to access ALL of your data on websites, that would include passwords, by the way. Nor is there any reason for it to access your other tabs or browsing activity. It seems that the creators are involved in data mining, selling your information to advertisers, etc. Beware! We’re going back to Fotobounce. 

If you want to download whole photo albums on Facebook, you don’t have too many choices. The old ways, Fotobounce and others, only work sometimes, if at all now. We’ve discovered a brand new system that will download whole albums quickly and easily. Yay us! Here’s the scoop:

1. You have to be using Google Chrome as a browser. We suggest Chrome should be your default browser anyway so go to Google and download it, it you aren’t using it now.

TIP: When you are downloading software, make sure you go to the source. We’ve noticed that fake Chrome sites exist. We can only assume that these sites will install a modified version of Chrome, probably filled with some kind of malware. Go to google.com and take the link from there.

2. Once Chrome is installed, head over to the Google Web Store, everything is free so don’t worry about the word ‘store’. What you’re going to do is install an extension, a little bit of software that is added to Chrome which will download full Facebook photo albums. Here’s the link: Google Web Store

3. What you’re looking for is: Download FB Album Mod. This is an ‘extension’, not an app. Here are a couple of links to the download page for this extension:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/download-fb-album-mod/cgjnhhjpfcdhbhlcmmjppicjmgfkppok?hl=en

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/search-extensions/Download%20FB%20Album%20mod?hl=en

4. Download and install the mod. You don’t have to reboot your computer or even restart Chrome.

5. Now for the fun part. Head over to Facebook and find an album that you want to save. Here is the process in pictures:

Photo of Facebook Album  1
Up on the top right of your URL bar, look for this symbol. Click it.

TIP: Please note that this icon only appears when you are on a Facebook page.

6. After you click the icon, this menu appears:

Photo of Facebook Album  2
Choose Normal. You can also choose to download the captions with each photo.

 

7. A new tab opens when you click Normal. The album will load on that page and a message will be shown at  the top. It flashes on and off so be prepared to read it. Here it is:

Photo of Facebook Album  3
Use the CTRL + s keys to save the album to your computer.

 

8. The save menu comes up next. It will give the name of the album and save it as an htm file, in other words as a complete web page. Click OK to save the file.

Saved as a Web Page, an htm file.
Saved as a Web Page, an htm file.

9. Once the file is saved, and for a large album this could take a while, head over to your download folder. The photos will be in a folder, as opposed to a single set of files, so look for the folder icon with the correct name.

Photo of Facebook Album  5
Look for the folder icon with the name of the album you just saved.

 

10. Double click on the folder. Inside that folder will be all of the photos in the album. You’re done!

Photo of Facebook Album  7
Here are the photos in this album.

 

As of February 5th, 2013, this system works. None of the others ways that we have written about in previous posts seem to work now. Why? Probably because of new privacy settings that Facebook is using. Fotobounce will still work with some albums but it’s much more difficult to use and it still stops working on large albums. This system, using Download FB Album Mod, works perfectly. Let us know if you have a problem with it.

Thanks for reading

NOTE: For this post we used https://www.facebook.com/Riddlesmessywardrobe  page. Riddle is one of our favorite cosplay stars. Stop by and like her page.