Gamers don't like Facebook/Social Media?

T

thegamersblog

CAG Veteran
Hi,

I'm new to CAG and the owner of TheGamersBlog and I've held several promotionals for free games and one of the stipulations of being qualified for it is to just like us on facebook. I've seen hundreds of hits come in for this give away and a good number of people say they don't have facebook or don't want to use it. Is this a growing trend amoung the gaming commmunity?

I have a large group I dwell with in the gaming ranks and this seems to be a common thing amoung them. Is this the same amoungst the rest of the gaming community? What do you guys think of Facebook, Google+, etc? Is this just the gaming community? I've actually run into some extreme hatred of facebook to the point of beligerence.
 
The thing is, gaming forums are still home to more hardcore gamers (although it's becoming more mainstream) -- and hardcore gamers are often more introverted than casual gamers, and with that you'll have quite a few with a jaded outlook on social media.

I have nothing against it, personally. Love me some facebook.

Also, not saying you're introverted if you don't like facebook. Before someone blows up.
 
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I have a facebook account, and I check it regularly, but I'm not a fan of it.

And definitely not a fan of "Likes" for contests and such. They have to be really good to get me to click through to them.
 
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It irritates me when companies have exclusive facebook contests like that.
There seems to be an assumption that everyone is on facebook or should be, and those with no interest in maintaining an account there are simply to be left out.
 
I like Facebook, but just for sharing photos with friends and family etc. Not a big status updater or anything like that.

And I'm with the poster above that I hate contests that require you to like a page etc. I usually avoid those. I don't want to like or follow anything unless it's something I'm a fan of and want to like it to share that info with friends/family etc.

Agree with camoor on blogs. But I've never been much of one to care about others (especially random people on the net) opinions on things. So blogs have never appealed to me in anyway--no interest in reading them or writing one.
 
Being a gamer has nothing to do with me not wanting to spread pictures of myself, intimate details, information about my daily life and so allover the internet.

Im not narsacistic enough to think the entire world wants to know the details of my life and what Im doing constantly.

And honestly the more it grows the less privacy people have. Every month I see dozens of stories of marriages ending, fights, job loss and so on related to facebook alone and if there are that many each month then there a hundred or so more you dont hear about everyday. I dont want to incriminate myself on purpose or by accident to jack shit.

There are just a few people Id let know about my personal life and me and I dont need facebook to do that.
 
I have no problem with Google+/Twitter/Facebook...I just hate it when blogs and such have me tweeting and liking stuff to enter contests. It's effectively mandating that I promote their stuff just to enter a contest that I'll likely not win. If I'm going to shill for someone, I usually prefer to be paid straight up.
 
I have an account but rarely use it and have no photos uploaded. I guess I just don't see the point of it. My friends use e-mail or text messaging to communicate and since I joined, I get friend requests from people I haven't seen in 10 years (I never talked to them in high school so why would I want to be friends on Facebook?) or worse from strangers.

[quote name='looploop']It irritates me when companies have exclusive facebook contests like that.
There seems to be an assumption that everyone is on facebook or should be, and those with no interest in maintaining an account there are simply to be left out.[/QUOTE]

That's how I feel, not everyone uses Facebook but I am still interested in deals or contests, just not on Facebook.
 
[quote name='gargus']Being a gamer has nothing to do with me not wanting to spread pictures of myself, intimate details, information about my daily life and so allover the internet.

Im not narsacistic enough to think the entire world wants to know the details of my life and what Im doing constantly.

And honestly the more it grows the less privacy people have. Every month I see dozens of stories of marriages ending, fights, job loss and so on related to facebook alone and if there are that many each month then there a hundred or so more you dont hear about everyday. I dont want to incriminate myself on purpose or by accident to jack shit.

There are just a few people Id let know about my personal life and me and I dont need facebook to do that.[/QUOTE]
My sentiments exactly. People are far too 'connected' nowadays and think that other people really give a shit about what they're doing in their self important lil lives.

Besides which, when I was on MySpace years ago it seemed like more or less a popularity contest. Some folks obviously just wanted to see how many 'friends' they could get on the site. I set my permissions to deny every last friend request I got on there unless I knew them personally.
 
[quote name='sdclippers']I was hooked on Facebook then just got burned out on it.[/QUOTE]

This is pretty much what happened to me. It's such an unproductive time sink. I still like having it around to sometimes check up on people I haven't heard from in a while (ie. people who aren't exactly significant parts of my life), but that's pretty much it now.
 
I use Facebook regularly and have a google+ account. Although I think one problem is that there is so many people who post stupid shit that it tends to make us not want to go there.

Seriously I get people who post status updates about their fucking dog and other stupid shit. I don't give a fuck. I want to find out meaningful things.

Now I do use facebook extensively for the like feature. It is a great way to keep in tune with what my favorite bands are up to and when they are releasing new stuff.
 
I enjoy the anonymity of CAG...facebook has my actual picture--and I don't need more stalkers. It's not my fault I'm super hot...I don't want to be your friend (and I'm really sick of losers poking me).
 
I am a gamer, but I also don't use social networks because they annoy me. Maybe that's why I dislike Steam in part, because friends can annoy me with IMs when I'm trying to play. In MMOs, spatial chat is used for shit talking, not RL bullshit. If people want to get at me, that's what ventrilo, forums, email, and phone calls are for. Not this twitter/fB/IM crap.
 
Nothing against Facebook, I have an account and check it probably once a month. I just don't really care to know all about the social lives of anyone I don't already interact with daily in my offline life.
 
You know I actually have to agree with most of the statements above and I can see where it would be frsutrating to be asked to like someone if you clearly do not.

I also agree that facebook is probably the biggest waste of time on the planet and I think the more accuret definition of Facebook would be "BragBook" because this is really what it is "Look Installed a new toilet myself", "look My baby took it's first crap", "look at my brand new house and cars that you can't afford". This type of stuff I can't handle.

Personally I like forums more then I like facebook, by a long mile in fact. But one can't deny the marketing potential of facebook either. The ability to update your followers 'instantly' is nice. While I don't like facebook it still serves it's purpose.

The problem with forums, now, with the gigantic amount of 'causal' gamers which I would consider on the lower end of the intelligence scale *not always true but normally is* is that most of them don't want ot get involved in communities. I call it the xbox/facebook syndrome. They would rather be online screaming "Penis" at the top of their lungs then contribute to the group of intelligent individuals. Even if they aren't at that maturity level getting people to sign up for 'another account' is a annoying propostition. Most people already have 500000 accounts and don't want anymore.

Sorry I apologize for the long post :D

*PS i took into account what you said about "requiring" facebook for my future contests and opened them for everyone :D
 
[quote name='thegamersblog']You know I actually have to agree with most of the statements above and I can see where it would be frsutrating to be asked to like someone if you clearly do not.

I also agree that facebook is probably the biggest waste of time on the planet and I think the more accuret definition of Facebook would be "BragBook" because this is really what it is "Look Installed a new toilet myself", "look My baby took it's first crap", "look at my brand new house and cars that you can't afford". This type of stuff I can't handle.

Personally I like forums more then I like facebook, by a long mile in fact. But one can't deny the marketing potential of facebook either. The ability to update your followers 'instantly' is nice. While I don't like facebook it still serves it's purpose.

The problem with forums, now, with the gigantic amount of 'causal' gamers which I would consider on the lower end of the intelligence scale *not always true but normally is* is that most of them don't want ot get involved in communities.

Sorry I apologize for the long post :D

*PS i took into account what you said about "requiring" facebook for my future contests and opened them for everyone :D[/QUOTE]

Yeah facebook is essentially Brag Book which is annoying to an extent. Especially when it's worthless stuff. Facebook does have it's uses with the like feature though. In some small cases it works out nicely like with the more obscure or unknown bands/companies who use it. This way it's easy to stay on top with new releases and such. Other than that, it's not really useful.

Forums always had idiots on it. The one exception being CAG, most forums are full of idiots.
 
Sad thing is that alot of 'obscure' people as you callit use it to get sponsers and support for the projects ie. blogs, bands, free speach, etc. In those cases that is most likely what they are trying to do. When they go to get sponsers the first thing the sponser/supporter is going to do is see what kind of numbers they have supporting them. If they have 100, 200, 500, 1000, 10000+ likes on FB it can make an incredible difference on the amount of support/sponsership they are willing to give them.

[quote name='Sir_Fragalot']Yeah facebook is essentially Brag Book which is annoying to an extent. Especially when it's worthless stuff. Facebook does have it's uses with the like feature though. In some small cases it works out nicely like with the more obscure or unknown bands/companies who use it. This way it's easy to stay on top with new releases and such. Other than that, it's not really useful.

Forums always had idiots on it. The one exception being CAG, most forums are full of idiots.[/QUOTE]
 
[quote name='thegamersblog']Sad thing is that alot of 'obscure' people as you callit use it to get sponsers and support for the projects ie. blogs, bands, free speach, etc. In those cases that is most likely what they are trying to do. When they go to get sponsers the first thing the sponser/supporter is going to do is see what kind of numbers they have supporting them. If they have 100, 200, 500, 1000, 10000+ likes on FB it can make an incredible difference on the amount of support/sponsership they are willing to give them.[/QUOTE]
That's true in a sense but on the other hand it does keep me informed which I use it for. There are cases where I only found out the band had a new album out due to facebook. Even if it is for promotion efforts, it's a way to find out news and stuff.
 
[quote name='gargus']Being a gamer has nothing to do with me not wanting to spread pictures of myself, intimate details, information about my daily life and so allover the internet.

Im not narsacistic enough to think the entire world wants to know the details of my life and what Im doing constantly.

And honestly the more it grows the less privacy people have. Every month I see dozens of stories of marriages ending, fights, job loss and so on related to facebook alone and if there are that many each month then there a hundred or so more you dont hear about everyday. I dont want to incriminate myself on purpose or by accident to jack shit.

There are just a few people Id let know about my personal life and me and I dont need facebook to do that.[/QUOTE]

Exactly x1000000000.
 
There are privacy options
The quality of your status updates is up to you
What photos you want to share are up to you
Some people like to network for other reasons beyond narcissism

For high schoolers, sure, it is just an outlet to make yourself look good. Though for college I find it invaluable in getting parties and events together, keeping up with friends from other schools, and hopefully seeing some fun stuff pop up on the news feed from other people.

It seems people's biggest problem with facebook here are the people, so everyone's experience will be different.
 
Yeah, like anything, Facebook is what you make of it.

If you don't like people who post random shit, don't friend them or hide their posts in your newsfeed so you don't see their status updates (but can still get messages from them etc.).

If you don't want your stuff accessible, set the privacy settings as high as possible and only friend people you want to see whatever you post, and don't post anything you don't want people seeing etc.

That said, it's not for everyone. Anyone that's totally introverted and just doesn't care about even close friends and family's personal lives in general is going to have no use for a site like Facebook obviously.

But otherwise, it's useful for keeping in touch with old friends who live far away that you probably wouldn't call or e-mail otherwise, sharing photos with friends and family etc. even if you don't give a crap about random status updates and don't post much on the site yourself.
 
[quote name='gargus']Being a gamer has nothing to do with me not wanting to spread pictures of myself, intimate details, information about my daily life and so allover the internet.

Im not narsacistic enough to think the entire world wants to know the details of my life and what Im doing constantly.

And honestly the more it grows the less privacy people have. Every month I see dozens of stories of marriages ending, fights, job loss and so on related to facebook alone and if there are that many each month then there a hundred or so more you dont hear about everyday. I dont want to incriminate myself on purpose or by accident to jack shit.

There are just a few people Id let know about my personal life and me and I dont need facebook to do that.[/QUOTE]

I could not possibly agree with anyone more than I agree with this person and this post.
I have personally known people who have gotten fired, divorced, or not hired because of facebook.
There is abosolutly no need in saying or doing something that you think is innocent in your personal life, and someone else construes as something that they do not agree with in your professional life. Therefore causing issues. Don't kid yourselves, when you put in an application and they are actually considering you, they look at your facebook page. It can make or break the deal. Even in your home. ANYONE can find you ANYTIME!
IT IS JUST NOT WORTH IT!
 
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All of those types problems can be avoided by using common sense in what you post on your Facebook page and who you give access to it.

Facebook isn't the problem, morons not using common sense in what they post is the problem.
 
I am not saying it is facebook's fault.
All I am saying is that yes it is the "stupid" things that are posted on it, and not even by you. You cannot control what anyone else says or does either. And now with the ID linking and the "picture recognition" it's even worse.

Like talking about a weekend excursion, or who they said you slept with, or what someone else says you did, or said about their job, or even (in several cases I know) accidently "outing" you.

ANYONE can find you ANYTIME and learn ANYTHING that ANYONE is willing to tell them.
I am not knocking Facebook itself, just how it can be used / misused, or mismanaged.
It is something that is just not for me.
 
True on other people posting stuff, but you can easily enough untag yourself in photos etc. (and I'm pretty sure you can turn off the photo recognition so it doesn't automatically tag pictures).

And besides, your friends can be posting stuff about you on Facebook even if you don't have an account yourself--then you just don't know about it unless someone tells you it was posted!

But in anycase, I get your concerns and agree that Facebook isn't for people that worry a lot about their privacy. I just don't worry about that kind of stuff. I don't do anything I'm ashamed of so I don't care what people find out about me. And I wouldn't want a job where they wouldn't hire me because there's a picture of me holding a beer posted on Facebook or something anyway.
 
Almost every place of employment "googles" and "facebooks" you before they hire you. It's almost a common practice now-a-days. There is good reason for it to. At my last job we did that to everyone who we looked into hiring because it really shows what the individual is like and alot of people post up their party pics of themselves getting smashed and we don't want that. We actually disqualified a couple individuals based on what we found on their profiles and when competition for a job is tight you have to have something to pick someone over the other and sometimes facebook is that thing. Is it right? Perhaps not but it does happen. Very few people actually tell the truth in an interview. Interviewing is like dating you put up this perfect facade to give the impression that you are the best canidate but in reality you may or may not be. Facebook gives a glimpse into what the person is "truly like". If you have a position that requires someone to be on call, like I had to be 24 hours a day, someone who has party pics might not be the best first for the position. Why? Because what if they get called in the middle of the night and are plastered?

I used to be pretty bad about posting up on whatever on Facebook until I realized how easily that information was readable. Once I figured it out I locked down my profile to the point that only certain people within my friends list could see certain things.

There were a couple of gals at a local office I did support for in my home town that were fired because of face book. One of them posted something along the lines "God my boss is such a douche and I can't believe that we had to sit through another one of those boring meetings". Well her friend had her boss on her wall and her boss found it. They both got fired for the incident.


[quote name='dmaul1114']True on other people posting stuff, but you can easily enough untag yourself in photos etc. (and I'm pretty sure you can turn off the photo recognition so it doesn't automatically tag pictures).

And besides, your friends can be posting stuff about you on Facebook even if you don't have an account yourself--then you just don't know about it unless someone tells you it was posted!

But in anycase, I get your concerns and agree that Facebook isn't for people that worry a lot about their privacy. I just don't worry about that kind of stuff. I don't do anything I'm ashamed of so I don't care what people find out about me. And I wouldn't want a job where they wouldn't hire me because there's a picture of me holding a beer posted on Facebook or something anyway.[/QUOTE]
 
Thank god I don't work for a shitty company like that. If I were that 'boss', I'd view the criticism as something that needs improvement (whether on my end or theirs). Better yet, I wouldn't even be on the site because what people do in their spare time is none of my business.
 
That's terribly naive to not hire someone merely because they have a human life outside of the bullshit they give you in the interview (and you're asking for that bullshit, they don't have much choice in how to answer stock interview questions). You could of easily passed up the best possible candidate for a position.

Expect to hire someone who doesn't get smashed on the weekends? Get in touch with reality -- if anything that sounds like a plus. Immediately linking party pics to not being reliable doesn't even make sense. And I'm not saying you should have your profile public like that, but I've always find it absurd that if a potential employee is discovered to having a life, he's already dismissed.

But it's all good, my facebook is just pictures of me at a desk reading poetry -- like normal people. Just let the bullshit train keep chugging, because as long as employers keep hiring the best bullshitters, the better this country will be run.
 
[quote name='thegamersblog']Almost every place of employment "googles" and "facebooks" you before they hire you. It's almost a common practice now-a-days. There is good reason for it to. At my last job we did that to everyone who we looked into hiring because it really shows what the individual is like and alot of people post up their party pics of themselves getting smashed and we don't want that. We actually disqualified a couple individuals based on what we found on their profiles and when competition for a job is tight you have to have something to pick someone over the other and sometimes facebook is that thing. Is it right? Perhaps not but it does happen. Very few people actually tell the truth in an interview. Interviewing is like dating you put up this perfect facade to give the impression that you are the best canidate but in reality you may or may not be. Facebook gives a glimpse into what the person is "truly like". If you have a position that requires someone to be on call, like I had to be 24 hours a day, someone who has party pics might not be the best first for the position. Why? Because what if they get called in the middle of the night and are plastered?
[/QUOTE]
First of all this is stalking, and should be illegal. Second of your not going to hire someone because you stalked them and didn't like what you saw. Wow, that is childish.

Granted it is a person's fault for what they put on their facebook but then again why would you say no to a person over a facebook. It should be about how qualified they are for the job, and not what they do in their social life.
 
Don't get my wrong Fragalot... I totally agree with you. I was just stating what I've seen alot of companies do and what mine did for that matter. Having said that I understand why so many places do it. Personally, I put that up there with requiring personalitiy tests and disqualifying someone because they like the color green instead of red. I've been disqualified several times because I don't pass the personality profiling test. I applied for Gallup a few years back and was told that not only did I not qualifiy for the position but that I would never be able to apply for it again for the rest of my life... rough no?

I agree whole heartedly that it's bullshit but employers have thousands of resumes that they wittle down to a few applicants with little or difference between them and they can and will use whatever methods they can to find out more about the potential applicant. It's an "unoffical" background check if you will that employers can get away with and not have to pay for.

[quote name='Sir_Fragalot']First of all this is stalking, and should be illegal. Second of your not going to hire someone because you stalked them and didn't like what you saw. Wow, that is childish.

Granted it is a person's fault for what they put on their facebook but then again why would you say no to a person over a facebook. It should be about how qualified they are for the job, and not what they do in their social life.[/QUOTE]
 
[quote name='thegamersblog']Almost every place of employment "googles" and "facebooks" you before they hire you. It's almost a common practice now-a-days. There is good reason for it to. At my last job we did that to everyone who we looked into hiring because it really shows what the individual is like and alot of people post up their party pics of themselves getting smashed and we don't want that. We actually disqualified a couple individuals based on what we found on their profiles and when competition for a job is tight you have to have something to pick someone over the other and sometimes facebook is that thing. Is it right? Perhaps not but it does happen. Very few people actually tell the truth in an interview. Interviewing is like dating you put up this perfect facade to give the impression that you are the best canidate but in reality you may or may not be. Facebook gives a glimpse into what the person is "truly like". If you have a position that requires someone to be on call, like I had to be 24 hours a day, someone who has party pics might not be the best first for the position. Why? Because what if they get called in the middle of the night and are plastered?

I used to be pretty bad about posting up on whatever on Facebook until I realized how easily that information was readable. Once I figured it out I locked down my profile to the point that only certain people within my friends list could see certain things.

There were a couple of gals at a local office I did support for in my home town that were fired because of face book. One of them posted something along the lines "God my boss is such a douche and I can't believe that we had to sit through another one of those boring meetings". Well her friend had her boss on her wall and her boss found it. They both got fired for the incident.[/QUOTE]


And I wouldn't want to work for a place like that.

From my experience being on hiring committees etc., that type of stuff doesn't happen in academia fortunately.

All we look at when hiring additional professors is their record (how much the publish, how much grant money they have received) and their letters of recommendation. After that it's down to how the do on their interview for those that get invited to give talks and meet with the faculty etc.

We don't really care about anything other than them being productive and not being an asshole. But that's academia. There's not really a job out there (besides being self employed) that's as focused on giving employees freedom to do whatever they want--as long as they're productive.
 
I also agree that facebook is probably the biggest waste of time on the planet and I think the more accuret definition of Facebook would be "BragBook" because this is really what it is.

Personally I like forums more then I like facebook, by a long mile in fact.
Click to expand...

Yeah there are braggarts on facebook, but really whenever you invite the opportunity to share an opinion you're going to run that risk, even on forums... how many of these dead deal threads keep going because people continue bumping them days and weeks later to let everyone know, as if you were concerned, that they received their copy of the game?

As far as privacy goes, I think I'm far more concerned with some random dude on a forum checking my IP and posting my personal info than slipping up and talking shit about my boss on FB.

The problem with forums, now, with the gigantic amount of 'causal' gamers which I would consider on the lower end of the intelligence scale *not always true but normally is* is that most of them don't want ot get involved in communities. I call it the xbox/facebook syndrome. They would rather be online screaming "Penis" at the top of their lungs then contribute to the group of intelligent individuals.
Click to expand...
Well at least you're humble. In my opinion people are instantly considered smarter than me by NOT hanging out on forums.

[quote name='dmaul1114']And I wouldn't want to work for a place like that.
All we look at when hiring additional professors is their record (how much the publish, how much grant money they have received) and their letters of recommendation.
We don't really care about anything other than them being productive and not being an asshole. [/QUOTE]

But how do you know they're not assholes? Anyone can throw on a smile for an interview. The way I see it, checking a Facebook page is just one further step to that "asshole check", giving an employer something more of a personal snapshot of your character than you'd ever get in a formal setting. Even though I'm speaking as the person who's always been on the interviewee end of the hiring process, I don't really think I mind this so much. It seems like people are reacting to this with the idea that they're gonna look at your page and go "eww a democrat" or pour through your photos until they find one with a beer in your hand but I think they're probably looking for more flagrant and distressing patterns than that. We're talking as if personal life and work life are distinct but I think anyone who's worked a job before knows that there will be times when these two elements collide. Ultimately the whole thing is avoidable anyways so long as you keep your information private.
 
[quote name='iamsmart']
But how do you know they're not assholes? Anyone can throw on a smile for an interview. [/QUOTE]

Well my field is pretty small in terms of major research departments, so it's a matter of reputation.

If it's a person that's been a professor for a while, then they're probably known by at least some on the faculty who can vouch for them or speak up if they've heard they were an asshole etc.

For students coming out of grad schools with Ph Ds, their references are hugely important both in backing up their ability and having someone people on the faculty can ask more general questions about.

In any case, I don't think a Facebook profile would help you tell if someone's an asshole either. The person with a lot of party pics could be super productive and very nice, and the person with only nice family photos up could be a major asshole.

So it's always a crap shoot. Personally, I don't worry much about the asshole part so much as our work is largely independent and other than some administrative duties there isn't any forced collaboration. So I really only care about hiring whoever fits our current needs best and who shows the most potential for being productive in publishing and bringing in grant money and will thus help the department move forward. As long as they're doing their work, I really couldn't care less if they're an asshole as I can just not collaborate with them and thus largely ignore them.

Of course it's very different in fields that involve teamwork etc.
 
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i hate that shit and i dont see the point of connecting ti to gaming. i also get annoyed at contests where you have to use twitter or facebook to enter especially twitter i hate that shit more than ryan seacrest.
 
I don't use social network sites because my employer basically datamines them to get info/spy on its employees. Plus there have been people fired in our district for excessive and inappropriate Facebook/My Space use while at work. So because a few bad apples who thought it was cool to post their drunken and naked Vegas party photos from a work PC while on the clock, our employer now monitors the bunch for social network site use.

Cheapassgamer though? Flies completely under the radar.

My husband stopped using Facebook because the people he friended (old high school buddies who had drifted apart) kept sending him messages with TMI, often with pictures attached. We threw up in our mouths a little when someone sent us pictures of their child being born out of their overweight wife's crotch. No Facebook exclusive discount code is worth having to deal with THAT.
 
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