This is the first of several editorials where I shall chronicle the trials and tribulations of my personal journey disconnecting from Facebook. For the past couple of years, I've been "that guy" at the party who rants about Facebook and tries to rally others around me to ditch Facebook — while still being hopelessly addicted to its services myself. After all that procrastination, 2019 is finally going to be the year where I consciously detangle my life from Facebook's grasp. We've all been following the endless stream of troubling news associated from Facebook — from secretly conducting psychological tests on its users, the reverberating impacts from the Cambridge Analytica scandal, the constant data breaches, and the way Facebook was utilized to promote a campaign of genocide in Myanmar — and yet removing myself from Facebook's clutches was still "too personally inconvenient" to seriously consider, an argument I've heard back from many people I've talked to over the years. Verizon is offering the Pixel 4a for just $10/mo on new Unlimited lines My first steps towards leaving Facebook started with deleting the Facebook app from my phone, a symbolic and important step to take. If I wanted to check in on Facebook, I would now need to log into Facebook through a web browser. Next, I switched to Facebook Messenger Lite to get rid of all the bloated features found in the main app. These two simple moves permanently eliminated the most annoying Facebook notifications from my phone and is something I recommend to everyone. But the next big step would actually involve shutting down my profile itself — and that's precisely when you start realizing just how thirsty Facebook is for your attention. The best designed page on Facebook

The Facebook team has been adding new features over the years, but in my opinion the most carefully designed page on the whole platform is the retention page when you try to deactivate your profile. I'm going off memory here a bit but one of the first things Facebook shows you when you click through to deactivate your account is a short list of some of your friends and their smiling faces with a message, paraphrasing here, that says "if you leave Facebook you won't be able to connect with all your friends who still use Facebook" — and I'll admit that this dumb ploy worked on me multiple times. Facebook's retention page is a masterclass into guilting you into staying connected. How will I keep in touch with some of these people? All these years I've been friending people on Facebook instead of getting their phone numbers or emails. I stalled at this screen many times over the years, but this time I pushed on. Next, Facebook wants to know why you're leaving — and you're required to give a reason if you want to deactivate your account. Whichever option you pick, a window instantly pops up with more information from Facebook about their features and controls. To me, this process felt like telling your romantic partner that you want to break up, only for them to respond "But wait, baby, I can change!" It's all been carefully designed to make you second guess your decision and lure you back into staying on the platform. This time, I decided to go with the option "Other, please explain further" and went off on a little rant that made me feel a bit better even though I'm pretty sure no human eyes will ever read what I wrote there. A cathartic experience nonetheless. 🎶Ooh, ooh baby, I want you back 🎶