Quitting Facebook: What Happens When You Deactivate?

Why deactivate? I just went straight for deletion. The only problem is I have to wait 14 days and will probably accidentally log-in, reactivating my account, and have to start the countdown all over. But, I have a solution which involves editing my hosts file to redirect facebook.com to wikipedia.org.

What about deleting your account, waiting the 14 days, and then creating a new profile that just contains your contact information so you can reach your friends? Would that effectively let you start fresh? Facebook served a purpose for me when I was a freshman in college, but now that I'm older I don't really want that stuff associated with me. It is really unclear what remnants will remain from the old account.

This is an idea I have been toying with for several months now. I have been wary from the beginning and (for the most part) not published anything that I may regret. Still, the carelessness and plain stupidity around there (sadly even from some of my friends) it something that I have grown annoyed over time.

The one reason that has been holding me back is that I feel not having a facebook account is like not having an email back in the 90's. Most people in my social and even professional circle expect that. And there is of course the issue of impresonation.

My ideal solution would be to be shown like a ghost account. Someone that is searchable and can be found to have been here, but does not comes around anymore. Since either deactivating or deleting your account makes you loose visibility, my solution is just avoid to log in. I should probably send a good bye message to my so called friends... maybe this month or the next...

Oh the irony of using Google to help you delete your Facebook for reasons of privacy.

A site that splits a fairly short article over three pages probably shouldn't chastise another site for riding the line between unsavory and pathetic.

Don't do that. It will reboot the internet.