Facebook considered harmful for adults (a letter from my aunt)

"I know he is a linux user and I worry he will hack me."

For this I must share with you: http://www.adequacy.org/stories/2001.12.2.42056.2147.html

It is a scary world we live in. I am always worried about some linux user waiting a dark alley to break my windows and steal my identities..

First thought: your aunt is trolling you.

Second (and more serious) thought: This speaks to the fear our elders have with computers. Many of us used this to help ourselves through college as technical repair, and Best Buy has done a good job as well. This, however, reminds me that we should be thinking about startups that solve this pain. It's the 50-year old equivalent to "will this help me get laid?" What will give that target demographic peace of mind about their computer use?

Maybe it's just my own raging adulthood, but I don't get the joke here, much less see what would cause you to fall off your bed laughing.

She fears that her computer may be vulnerable to hackers, and believes that Linux users are more likely to be sophisticated computer users who "know what they are doing." Both sound like reasonable assumptions to me.

She finds it creepy that someone she hardly knows went to the bother to look for her on Facebook, and then attempted to "Friend" her. Once again, I have to agree. Speaking only for myself, I tend to take a Groucho Marxian position, and think that anybody who actually wanted to "Friend" me on Facebook must be such a loser as to be someone I'd never actually want to be friends with, and conversely, all of my real friends know me well enough to communicate with me through other, more appropriate channels.

So, tell me: what's so funny? Unless what you mean is really "Facebook considered pointless by adults", in which case I have to concur.

Perhaps you should shop laughing and start listening...

1. 90% of the rest of the world has no idea what we do. It's all magic to them. But they're not dummies. So when they say something ridiculous, we should help them, not laugh at them.

2. Most of your future customers will (obviously) come from that 90%. If they sense your attitude, they will take their business elsewhere.

3. Their fears and ignorance = your learning opportunity about your market.

4. She's your aunt, for crying out loud, and she actually bothered to email you. Show a little compasion and be glad. Lots of us never hear from our relatives.

This is the big gap between the Internet generation(s) and previous: when your life wasn't automatically public, there was a much greater aspect of fear to the thought of losing your privacy. I recently was helping my mother to send a large collection of pictures to her own father. I told her that, since the pictures were in Picasa, the simplest method would be to enable the Photo Sync feature for the album, and then send her dad the link to the uploaded album (though not in so few words.) She seemed to be fine with this, until, in a slight rephrasal, I told her that she could send the same link to her sister, because the pictures were "on the web." She froze up at this with a look of shock and revulsion, And told me to take them down. I explained that the link was private, and that no one could access it but the people she sent it to; I explained that people put pictures of their houses and vacations up completely publically all the time, and nothig ever happens to them; I explained that hackers really don't care about her pictures, but she wouldn't listen to any of it. Her response: "loose lips sink ships."

A lot of my thirtysomething friends put things on their FB profiles that would be useful in a social engineering attack. Things like when they graduated high school, photos of their first car, etc, often as the answers to "25 Things," or quizes, or such.

Some of those nuggets of information provide answers to questions that online banks ask for account verification.

I honestly think she did a bang up job assessing what might be a threat, and then seeking help before making a rash decision she wasn't comfortable with.

She articulated her fears pretty well, and she had a clue that Linux was a platform for savvy individuals that would put her at an immediate disadvantage to him.

I wish more people let alone motherly aunt figures could articulate their fears that well.