According to Facebook, a friend of mine (who is also a Facebook ‘friend’) ‘likes’ Vodafone. This was an excuse for the company to place an ad in my Facebook news feed:

My friend has never ‘liked’ Vodafone on Facebook. He does have a Facebook account, which he never uses. His wife shares the account and almost never uses it. And she’s only ever ‘liked’ one thing – a post from an Australian relative.

So how come my friend is showing up as ‘liking’ Vodafone? He is a Vodafone customer, but he’s never aspired to be their publicity agent. Now he’s highly pissed off that his name is being used without permission to endorse the company. And I’m pissed off that another ad is cluttering my Facebook news feed.

Is this a case of false pretences?

It can’t be long now before I kill my Facebook account. I’ve been considering it for several years as the service has become creepier and creepier. The only thing that keeps me on board and dropping in every couple of weeks, is that occasionally there’s interesting family information among the 75 percent that’s trivia and dross. And it is useful on rare emergency occasions like Christchurch earthquakes.