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Comment by stephengillie | Hacker News Reader

Facebook accountholdership has become so mainstream that only people who could be described as "fringe elements" don't have an account. It's like someone (in the developed world) not owning a microwave or a bed.

Even if the account provided no utility, I don't see why any intelligent person wouldn't maintain one, just to avoid this type of stigma. Maybe you "just don't use it much" because you're "busy with other things".

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I consider Facebook to be an unethical company, and I do not wish to provide them with advertising revenue. "Maintaining" an account with Facebook provides them with analytics data and advertising revenue from me that they would not otherwise have. I seriously doubt that I'm the only person who chooses to refrain from some online services for this reason, and I don't feel I have suffered any negative repercussions from making this choice.

You don't have to load the site to maintain an account - you can do that from the app or even Twitter, for various meanings of the word "maintain".

    It's like someone (in the developed world) not owning a
    microwave or a bed.

No, it's like someone not owning a television, video game console, bible, or other popular source of useless entertainment.

    Even if the account provided no utility, I don't see
    why any intelligent person wouldn't maintain one, just
    to avoid this type of stigma.

In my experience, on the rare occasions that intelligent people concern themselves with stigma, it is stigma perceived by peers, not stigma perceived by unintelligent people. Why should an intelligent person be concerned that unintelligent people perceive a stigma due to the intelligent person's lack of a Facebook account, television, video game console, bible, etc.?

If everyone thought the way you do and concerned themselves with stigmas perceived by unintelligent people, there would be no social progress.

"Even if the account provided no utility, I don't see why any intelligent person wouldn't maintain one, just to avoid this type of stigma."

Because if someone is dumb enough to believe that I'm a psychopath because I don't have a Facebook account, I don't really give a crap what they think of me. And I sure as hell wouldn't want to work for them, date them, etc.

>Even if the account provided no utility, I don't see why any intelligent person wouldn't maintain one, just to avoid this type of stigma.

Exactly...what do they have to hide, I wonder?

And why not hide it in plain sight?

I wouldn't have one if it weren't for pressure from my family. I'd actually enjoy the associated stigma. It's useful to incite irrational stigma as a way to filter out dumb people.

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