Worried about Facebook stealing your info? Worry not
Image courtesy of Raw Pixel by way of a Creative Commons license.
OK FB haters, I’m going to do something I vowed not to do because, frankly, I was hoping the people who haven’t figured it out would never figure it out as they tend to be the loudest complainers.
Let’s say your favorite website (or the Website You Love to Hate) switches its commenting system to FB. It’s a well-known fact that if you start a FB account you are damned to the Lake of Fire for all eternity as the Cloven-Hoofed One has admin access to FB’s user database. Yet you yearn (that’s a lot of Y’s) to post your profane epistles (that’s a lot of P’s) on the Website You Love to Hate.
What to do?
Make a FB account strictly for commenting at the Website You Love to Hate.
To start an account you must provide FB with (a) a first name, (b) a last name, and (c) a working e-mail address. From there the Cloven-Hoofed One does the rest, somehow (through dark majick no doubt) ascertaining your credit card number, the surface address of your firstborn’s firstborn, and that little folder in your My Documents folder with all those, ahem, * pictures. *
How do you thwart the intrusions of His Horned Self?
You go to a place like Mail.com and sign up for an e-mail address. Let’s call it [email protected]. Let me reassure all you AOL users on dailup, it’s FREE! You’ll have lots of money left over for the 2 o’clock buffet at Golden Corral.
Then your return to the hated halls of FB, type in “Crabby” as your first name (or “CrabbyT” if you think you might record your complaints as a rap album), “Crabopolis” as your last name, and “CrabbyTCrabopolis” as your e-mail address. You may also need to type in a Captcha but don’t worry, it ain’t captchaing your soul, and BAM! You’ve got a FB commenting account.
Let’s say at a later date you’re on the Website You Love to Hate and want to leave a comment. You type in your thoughts (and I’m using the term loosely), you hit ENTER, and a prompt asks you to sign in to your FB account. You type in your e-mail addy, your password, and BAM (Emeril, are you listening?), your insights (loosely) appear for everybody to savor.
Your credit card information is safe. You have not surrendered your firstborn’s firstborn’s surface address. And nobody but you and your teenage son will see that hidden folder of pictures.
And here’s an important distinction. I’ll use all caps because I want to make sure you hear me: YOU NEED NEVER VISIT THE HATED HALLS OF FB.You remain on the Website You Love to Hate without having to “friend” anybody or “tweet” (somebody actually said that).
So please. Enough of the sturm und drang. The Earth will still (that’s a lot of L’s) spin on its axis. The stars will remain in the heavens. Lady Gaga will wear a dress made of Skittles.
Life will go on.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, Ello and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .