I don’t trust Facebook. Never have, and never will. Unfortunately, with their actions they’ve lowered my trust from minimal levels to less than zero.

Unfortunately, they’ve got me by the cajones. Their client base includes my connections. I have to decide whether my distrust of Facebook is great enough to sever my easy access of up to date information from those close to me. How important is that data to me?

I’d like to start off by saying that I view social networking as a tool to communicate with others, a tool that offers the ability to share both textual and non-textual (e.g. images) information in an efficient multicast (for the non-technical, basically a shotgun blast at everyone), and to receive feedback on that information. This shapes my perspective on how I use tools like Facebook or Twitter, and I thought I’d share a few details on how my social networking experience is affected, and will be affected.

First, because I view Facebook as a tool to communicate textual and non-textual information, I restrict my usage accordingly. I do not play games or add many apps to my profile. The few apps that I have added are utility apps, that pull and share information from other online locations (e.g. Twitter feed). Games and other apps are in my opinion a foolish waste of time, and not information I feel pertinent to my connections.

Second, because sharing on Facebook is a multi-cast or shotgun blast of information, I have implemented some fairly strict permissioning. Very few people are allowed to comment and/or read my wall or feed. Information that I feel is relavent or interesting to a particular group of people will be made available to those individuals. Work connections (sorry to those of you in my work connection groups) will have no access whatsoever to my wall, and very limited commenting abilities. I’m not interested in feedback from most individuals. If they deem it important to provide feedback, they can send me a private communication.

In the end, it comes down to information control. Information that I don’t mind sharing to the world will be done on Twitter. Facebook’s variety of information types are generally more personal, and therefore I feel should be more restricted. I’ve become less and less enchanted with Facebook’s attempt and hypocrisy of sharing all personal data, and this has led me to evaluate how important it is to me, and how it should fit into my life. My connections might find less and less information and commenting abilities being granted to them, but in the long run, my personal information is too important to share willy-nilly with everyone.

Update: You have an image on the Internet. I believe one should be conscientious about what they and others project about themselves on the Internet. Spelling, grammar, images, and textual content (forum posts, signatures, etc. ) all speak volumes about who you are as a person. This is why it is so vital to control the information you share on social networking sites.