Robby on Rails: Saying Goodbye Was Never This Hardthoughts.sort_by{|t| t[:topic]}.collect tag:www.robbyonrails.com,2005:TypoTypo2007-12-02T00:09:43-05:00Robby Russellurn:uuid:259e1138-6774-4ce5-bc8d-279bcaf765a12007-12-02T00:07:00-05:002007-12-02T00:09:43-05:00Saying Goodbye Was Never This Hard<p>There was a post the other day on Signal vs Noise about the pain of opting out of mailing lists titled, <a href="http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/723-redonkulous-unsubscribe-delays">Redonkulous unsubscribe delays</a>, which I was reminded of after the following experience.</p>
<p>Earlier today, I got an email notification from my old <a href="http://friendster.com">Friendster</a> account, which ended up being spam. I hadn’t logged into the account in ages and looked around at my profile and others. No meaningful interaction between my friends in a few years. It’s felt like a ghost town. So, I thought… “should I just delete my account?” I was thinking about doing the same thing with my <a href="http://facebook.com">Facebook</a> account as well, because I’m getting tired of being invited to applications a few times a day due to a friend leaving my name checked when they sign up for a game. (this is getting old…)</p>
<p>So, I decided to kill the Friendster account, which I’ve had since February 2003. Oh… the good ole days of social-networking sites.</p>
<p>Upon filling out a form I got the following error with the notification, “Please list the other social networking site you switched to.”</p>
<div class="thumbnail"><a href="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-213815/"><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-213815.jpg/preview.jpg" alt="Friendster Cancel Account" /></a><br /><a style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Trebuchet, sans-serif, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 10px; color: #808080" href="http://plasq.com/skitch">Uploaded with Skitch!</a></div>
<p>The tone of this error message is very rude and helped support my decision to leave the site.</p>
<p>While I appreciate that they’re looking for feedback, they shouldn’t demand it out of me. As a result, my response was…</p>
<div class="thumbnail"><a href="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-214935/"><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-214935.jpg/preview.jpg" alt="Friendster Cancel Account" /></a><br /><a style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Trebuchet, sans-serif, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 10px; color: #808080" href="http://plasq.com/skitch">Uploaded with Skitch!</a></div>
<p>Wait a minute. You’re demanding that I list the sites that I’m switching to… <strong>in 20 characters or less</strong>? Thanks for giving me the opportunity to <span class="caps">LOLBUG</span> you. Sigh. Who makes these interaction decisions there?</p>
<p>If they really wanted to get some useful feedback, perhaps they could have asked me nicer.</p>
<p>So, I decided to head over to Facebook and compare their process.</p>
<p><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/facebook___deactivate_account-20071201-215619.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>At first glance, this looks very much like the form that I was presented with on Friendster. Except that I can only select one reason why I am leaving and I can think of a few. However, when I made a selection… something surprised me.</p>
<p><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/facebook___deactivate_account-20071201-220041.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Okay, so maybe I’ll leave my Facebook account around for the time being. Perhaps there is a Facebook application out there that will be get my attention.. but to date, this has yet to happen.</p>
<p><small>This post is dedicated to the memory of Robby Russell’s Friendster Profile. Feb. 2003 – Dec. 2007. R.I.P.</small></p><p>There was a post the other day on Signal vs Noise about the pain of opting out of mailing lists titled, <a href="http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/723-redonkulous-unsubscribe-delays">Redonkulous unsubscribe delays</a>, which I was reminded of after the following experience.</p>
<p>Earlier today, I got an email notification from my old <a href="http://friendster.com">Friendster</a> account, which ended up being spam. I hadn’t logged into the account in ages and looked around at my profile and others. No meaningful interaction between my friends in a few years. It’s felt like a ghost town. So, I thought… “should I just delete my account?” I was thinking about doing the same thing with my <a href="http://facebook.com">Facebook</a> account as well, because I’m getting tired of being invited to applications a few times a day due to a friend leaving my name checked when they sign up for a game. (this is getting old…)</p>
<p>So, I decided to kill the Friendster account, which I’ve had since February 2003. Oh… the good ole days of social-networking sites.</p>
<p>Upon filling out a form I got the following error with the notification, “Please list the other social networking site you switched to.”</p>
<div class="thumbnail"><a href="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-213815/"><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-213815.jpg/preview.jpg" alt="Friendster Cancel Account" /></a><br /><a style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Trebuchet, sans-serif, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 10px; color: #808080" href="http://plasq.com/skitch">Uploaded with Skitch!</a></div>
<p>The tone of this error message is very rude and helped support my decision to leave the site.</p>
<p>While I appreciate that they’re looking for feedback, they shouldn’t demand it out of me. As a result, my response was…</p>
<div class="thumbnail"><a href="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-214935/"><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/friendster_cancel_account-20071201-214935.jpg/preview.jpg" alt="Friendster Cancel Account" /></a><br /><a style="font-family: Lucida Grande, Trebuchet, sans-serif, Helvetica, Arial; font-size: 10px; color: #808080" href="http://plasq.com/skitch">Uploaded with Skitch!</a></div>
<p>Wait a minute. You’re demanding that I list the sites that I’m switching to… <strong>in 20 characters or less</strong>? Thanks for giving me the opportunity to <span class="caps">LOLBUG</span> you. Sigh. Who makes these interaction decisions there?</p>
<p>If they really wanted to get some useful feedback, perhaps they could have asked me nicer.</p>
<p>So, I decided to head over to Facebook and compare their process.</p>
<p><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/facebook___deactivate_account-20071201-215619.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>At first glance, this looks very much like the form that I was presented with on Friendster. Except that I can only select one reason why I am leaving and I can think of a few. However, when I made a selection… something surprised me.</p>
<p><img src="http://myskitch.com/robbyrussell/facebook___deactivate_account-20071201-220041.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Okay, so maybe I’ll leave my Facebook account around for the time being. Perhaps there is a Facebook application out there that will be get my attention.. but to date, this has yet to happen.</p>
<p><small>This post is dedicated to the memory of Robby Russell’s Friendster Profile. Feb. 2003 – Dec. 2007. R.I.P.</small></p>