The always outspoken Jason Calacanis sent out an email late last night to his list serve JasonNation stating his plans to delete his Facebook page this Friday at 1:00pm PT. What’s more, he’s planning to broadcast it live on the Web.
Calacanis says:
“Simply put, I no longer trust Facebook or Mark Zuckerberg with my information.”
“We trusted Zuckerberg with our personal information and he has abused
that trust over and over again. He won’t even come forward and discuss
the issue with anyone in the industry–including his own users!”
Calacanis will be joining a growing list of other Web personalities who have also deleted there Facebook pages, such as Leo Laporte and Peter Rojas. He also encouraged others to delete their profiles and posted videos on YouTube of them doing it.
“If you’re going to join me (and folks like Leo Laporte and Peter
Rojas) in leaving Facebook, please consider recording yourself doing
so. Post that video to YouTube”
Facebook may not be concerned because of the explosive growth they have been experiencing for some time now. However, as more and more high profile Web personalities begin to leave it will be interesting to see how Facebook reacts. Will Zuckerberg break his silence?
Update: Zuckerberg has indeed broken his silence.
Photo Attribution: Lady Mixy UK
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
This was already done by Leo Laporte. Seems as though @jason is trying to be just like Leo. First "This Week In" <– so unoriginal and now Delete Facebook online.
There were already a bunch of people that were going to get off Facebook on May 31st so Jason is just cutting to the chase.
I'm too ingrained in Facebook for marketing purposes to be able to delete my profile. Otherwise I would seriously consider it.
The thing is that the percentage of people that use Facebook who actually *know* who Leo LaPorte and Jason Calacanis are … is absolutely miniscule. The majority simply doesn't care. They love Facebook and will stay. It's how they communicated with their friends and family. Does Jason Calacanis really think that what he says is going to affect the 99% of Facebook users who've never even HEARD of him? If he does, he's patently mistaken.
I think you are discounting the "concentric circles" effect of the world. The 1% who know him (if even that many) are influenced in their communication with another 10% and so this message radiates outward. Will I repost this? Perhaps not, but it will certainly influence my postings on FB in general. I continue to believe that in 10 years social networking will be an embedded part of our social interactions, but FB won't be a large part of it. Things like this will contribute to its demise.
Thanks Melissa…I said to myself, "Who the heck is Jason Calacanis?" For that matter, who is Leo and Pete? Maybe I'm out of the loop, but these are some pretty self-important people to think they are leading a revolution. Face it people, Zuckerberg and Facebook will continue to do what is necessary to monetize their business. Control what you put on Facebook and stop complaining that big, bad MZ is ruining your privacy.
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