I have long held suspicions that the Like button on Facebook is not your friend.
I’m sure you’ve seen some of the pictures floating around Facebook that seem to make no sense. There seems to be no end to the litany of crossword puzzles asking you to “type the first word you see.” Maybe you’ve seen a picture of… well, almost anything that might elicit a reaction, asking you to “share if you agree, Like of you don’t.”
How about the innumerable political posts, calling for impeachment or support? Are all those posts really put out there by people who care? Then, of course, you see a good number of “If I get 100,000 likes, my dad will take me to Disneyland.” It all seems quite innocent, but you need to understand that this is big business, and commenting or liking is not in your best interest.
Here’s a perfect example: have you seen the colorful picture of a prism with the image from the cover of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album in it? It’s accompanied buy the caption: “OMG it really works! Step 1: Click on the Picture. Step 2: Hit Like. Step 3: Comment “MOVE” Then see the Magic!!” The picture has 1000’s of likes and comments, so there MUST be something to this. You make the leap, click and comment, and BOOM… crickets.
While what you expect to happen obviously doesn’t, something else happens. Your activity has now spread this image and the page into the news feed of all your friends.
