2010 May | Mark Evans Tech

Last night, I left Twitter.

It wasn’t by designed but in trying set up a new Twitter account for a client, I accidentally de-activated @markevans. Believe me, it a sad story.

In the process, I have discovered that clicking on this button, there’s apparently no going back.

According to Twitter, once an account has been de-activated, it can’t be brought back to life because “account restoration is not available at this time”.

While my departure from Twitter is entirely my fault, it seems strange that Twitter just can’t switch a switch to restore it. At the very least, I’d be happy to start over with @markevans but the username is locked in limbo.

For now, I’ve done a few things: filled out an online form on Twitter’s support section, sent an e-mail to restore@twitter.com and sent a tweet to Biz Stone. If @markevans does come back to life soon, it would be a major miracle but I have my fingers crossed.

In the meantime, I’ve set up a new Twitter account (@markconsulting), and started to re-follow some of the 300 people who had been following. As for the 5,000 people who were following me, it will take awhile before that rebounds.

On one hand, the whole thing is terribly disappointing given it had been something I had nurtured for nearly three years. On the other hand, it’s not the end of the world. Life is full of bumps in the road, and all you can do sometimes is simply take a deep breath and keep moving forward.

To paraphrase Prince, the tweeter formerly known as @markevans is now @markconsulting. If you were following @markevans, come on over to @markconsulting – same great content, brand new name….at least, I hope, for the time being.

Update: The good news is I have heard from Twitter support, and it appears – fingers crossed – that I may be able to gain access to @markevans and my e-mail address. I’m not sure whether this means the account will come back to life with all the friends and followers intact but it’s a positive development.

Facebook: Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don’t

Joshua Errett had a good column in Now Magazine about Facebook’s latest strategic salvos for Web domination. A comment that resonated was the reality that even if you oppose Facebook’s everything-is-public approach, it is difficult, if not impossible, to avoid playing along.

With more than 400 million users, Facebook is an online “Goliath”, and even though Goliath may not be behaving particularly well, he’s still the biggest guy around so you better play nice.

It’s one of the reasons why thousands of Web sites have already embraced Facebook’s new Graph API, which means that if you’re logged in to Facebook and then visit a third-party Web site using the Graph API, your experience will be magically personalized. By “magically”, the Web site will already know a lot about you by tapping into what’s available publicly on your Facebook profile.

If this is a trade-off that you’re willing to accept as the cost of personalization, that’s fine. But if you’re concerned about your privacy and where your information is available, I’d recommend spending 15 minutes tweaking your Facebook privacy settings. (Note: Here’s a good overview from the Electronic Frontier Foundation on Facebook’s evolving privacy policies over the years.)

Despite some major concerns about the new Facebook, many Web sites will politely fall into line because they have no other choice. If they decide not to use the Graph API and not offer a “Like” feature on their sites, it means not offering a feature that many of users want or think they want. It’s like opening a coffee shop and deciding not to offer sugar because it causes cavities.

As Errett points out, Web sites and Facebook users will accept’s Facebook’s new approach unless there’s another social networking option that’s more user-friendly and more concerned about privacy.

In the meantime, it’s business as usual. It doesn’t mean you have to like it but just be aware of the game’s new rules.

For some of my other thoughts about Facebook (and there’s plenty), here are some recent posts:

- Has Facebook Just Repackaged Beacon? Does Anyone Care?

- A Must-Do: Check Your Facebook Privacy Settings

- A Fork in the Road for Online Privacy

@markevans, Please Come Back!

Facebook: Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don’t