ANGRY MOB

It seems that hardly a week goes by without the Daily Mail pointing out the evils of social networking - apart from Myspace, not sure why the Daily Mail refuses to attack the Murdoch-owned social networking site. Today is another warning of the 'horrors' of using Facebook as a loving, middle-class married couple are almost torn asunder by the evil social networking site. Previously Facebook has put a husband in a coma and has also been singled out for causing cancer; so today's story is just another example of how Facebook is definitely out to ruin your life.

Today's article: 'How Facebook nearly destroyed our marriage' manages to plumb new depths of utter stupidity. Essentially the whole story can be summarised thus: a married couple create a page, allow open access (anyone can view it) they put up wedding / honeymoon photos up etc and one day a spam message was left saying that the husband (Gary) had given the spammer chlamydia and that Gary must therefore also have it. Wife is obviously stupid, doesn't trust her husband and has a big crisis.

Yet the Daily Mail suggests that this is not an example of people being too stupid to use the Internet, but another case of people 'fall[ing] foul of Facebook'. Furthermore they suggest that:

So this example of people being unaware of spam is actually another 'horror' perpetrated by Facebook. The thing the Daily Mail seems to brazenly overlook is that the online community is like any other: it has its fair share of shits. For example, if you visit the Daily Mail website you will see no-end of ignorant, hateful and racist comments plastered over the site, yet (as the Daily Mail points out next to them) these are the thoughts of the commentator, not the newspaper and therefore the Daily Mail takes no responsibility for them (even though they are moderated). However, when someone joins Facebook with the sole purpose of spamming people with the kind of message above, then Facebook is the evil force, not the user.

Regarding the stupidity of the wife being so quick to fall for the hoax (and basically take the word of a stranger over the word of her husband) a poster over at Mailwatch has pointed out:

I wouldn't worry about it too much; that couple got an email yesterday telling them they've won the Moroccan National Lottery. Jane said:

"Once I've simply popped in my name, address, bank details and my mother's PIN code, we'll be the dog's richest bollocks."