For some reason I never really caught on to the whole myspacebook idea. Even when I try, I find it a tad confusing...for goodness sakes I have to learn the user interface for every one of those stupid sites. Here's a revolutionary thought...before any of those sites existed, I had my own actual web page...how's that for ultimate flexibility, control, and privacy?

This shit never happens to me, you know why? Because I have a life. When I want to "socialize" I go MEET my friends in person and we do ACTIVITIES together, shoot darts, play pool, go fishing, drink beers, go bowling, have bbqs, so on and so forth. I don't go online and spill out my personal life to complete strangers so they can tag me and poke me. Whatever happens to you now is well deserved.

Facebook et al is never seeing me join, ever.

Why does this always happen. I've used several social networking/blogging sites. livejournal, myspace and now facebook. All these sites start out innocent and useful. Free accounts with no or unobtrusive advertising and friendly mods.

Then after a couple of years, things start to go bad. They start pumping out ad's, charging for 'premium' accounts, random account bans (livejournal) and eventually sell your details to companies with commercial interests.

Someone needs to make a wikipedia-style not-for-profit community run social networking site.

You use a service which is free then complain when they try to make money off your personal data? What did you think they were gonna do? Or were you under the impression Facebook was run as some bizarre charitable organisation for the Internet's benefit?

Seriously...

An extra y there. So, along with the he/she business, a clear example of a complete lack of proof-reading here. Again. Come on, make an effort.

is she?

:)

Look Nick, Randi Zuckerberg is a woman, for which the correct pronoun is 'she', not 'he'. The clue to her gender is in the word 'sister', clearly stated in the original Torygraph article you lifted.

I always wondered where Facebook got its money.

Facebook always has been first and foremost a data mining exercise. The only matter in dispute is who's behind it from that point of view.

I was active on my space, after almost 2 years the site got... a little too advertised filled for me. I change to facebook, simple layout like I like almost 2 years and now they want to make money out of my personal information? Guess it's time to search for another community site.