Sunday, July 26, 2009

And how you built a tower tumbling through the trees/ In holy rattlesnakes that fell all around your feet

Home!! It's so good to be home. So so good to be home.

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Facebook, a social phenomenon that I doggedly resisted for a good long time, but eventually succumbed to the pressure of, has begun to frighten me. There's a little application which takes it upon itself to inform you of other "people you may know" who use Facebook. Tell me how this works, please. I understand that a program can figure out that I know Bob and Sue and that Bob and Sue both know Mark, so there's a reasonable chance I might know Mark too. That part I can deal with. But tell me how it knows about people that DON'T share any common friends with me? How is that possible, seriously?

Today Facebook told me I might know a woman I used to work with, very briefly, in another city about three years ago. Someone with whom I share no common friends. Someone I barely know, really. So how does Facebook know???

Today Facebook also suggested I might know a girl whose teaching practicum I supervised - again, several years ago, in another city. No common friends, no common threads. How is this possible?

It's really freaking me out.

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2 comments:

What's black and white and Ivy all over? said...

It pulls info from your email account. You actually give it permission to do this at some point. Which is how it knew that I know my husband despite the fact that we have no mutual friends. Creeptacular.

mischief said...

What? That's insane. How does it get into my email account? That's really really scary.