Dan Antion

Why Would They Do This?

Jinx – checking out the soccer net.

There’s a title that could be applied to so many things. Let me start by saying, this post isn’t political, nor is it about any of the popular contentious points gripping society (according to social media and the stuff that claims to be news). This is about things that seem too good to be true, things that seem too odd to have explanation and things that just make that talisman part of your body itch and tingle.

Disney – In case you don’t know it, Disney is into television and streaming. Disney owns portions, often majority interests in, ESPN, National Geographic, Hulu, ABC, ESPN, etc., etc. Disney owns a lot of other entertainment stuff – click to see a full list – but I’m only interested in streaming (for now). You see, I pay $11.99 per month to access Hulu without commercials.

I switched to Hulu because Netflix didn’t carry “The Twilight Zone – Season 4” (the one-hour episodes, including “Miniature” “Passage on the Lady Anne” “The Parallel” “Printer’s Devil” and “TheThirty-Fathom Grave” and yes, I can be that petty.

Disney will soon be offering to let me bundle Hulu with Disney+ ($6.99/mo) and ESPN+($4.99/mo) for $12.99. I know you don’t like math on Mondays, so I’ll do it for you – that’s $23.97 worth of streaming services for $12.99. I may take this offer, but not until I see the fine print. If said fine print includes anything resembling “*for 12 months” I’m going to pass.

I’ve been there. “Do this for 12 months, forget that the fee is going up until you’re being charge $23 and then think about all you’ll be missing if you stop.” Who did that to me? Oh, yeah, COX Cable, the guys I fled like a burning barn when I switched to YouTube TV and Hulu.

Maybe Disney just wants to lock me into their world. Get my $13 each month before someone else does. We’ll see on November 12th, when the offers are actually available.

Facebook – Why does Facebook do anything? For the benefit of Facebook. You have to remember that above all else whenever Facebook asks/suggests/threatens/cajoles you to do anything. Facebook wants me to spend money to automatically support the No Facilities Facebook page. No thanks! Recently, Facebook has been sharing the NF page with fewer and fewer people. They have also made it harder for me (Dan) to act on my page. The post I had on Thursday landed on Facebook, from WordPress, with a great big 404-Error where the featured image should have been. The image was available, but I couldn’t fix it. I deleted the post and reposted it, but it didn’t appear. It was listed in a sidebar column of “Posts by Guests.” Yeah, that’s me, a guest on No Facilities.

I posted a link to that blog post under my (Dan’s) Facebook account. A lot of people read it. Several liked it, some commented. Facebook wants me to connect with those people in Messenger. Obviously, I have friends and I should spend more time chatting with them in Facebook’s chatty-app. In fact, Facebook sent me an alert on my phone from Messenger – something it normally does when someone sends me a message. When I opened Messenger, it was like I was a new subscriber. They wanted me to turn on alerts from everything Facebook does. Then they suggested I upload my contact list so I could send Facebook messages to everyone.

Sorry, Facebook. I know you want to be the Twitter/WhatsApp/SnapChat/iMessage replacement, but I’m not interested. I’m not interested in sharing anymore information with you and I’m certainly not interested in being the promotional vehicle from which you try to ensnare my friends.

WordPress – I know I’ve written about WP before, but this week was extra-screwy. A new version of the WordPress app for iPhone/iOS was released (a couple of times) recently. It supports the new iOS ‘Dark Mode’ which I actually like.

I like it because read and unread messages are different shade of gray (which I can differentiate) instead of different shades of blue (which I can’t).

I used the new app to Like and reply to 25 comments on my blog. For each one, I saw the star change color (indicating Like) and the banner message “Reply Sent” appear. The following day, I replied to a new comment on one of those posts and I noticed that none of the 25 replies had been posted – NONE OF THEM!

What’s up with all these changes to WordPress? Well, they are tweaking the Block Editor and I think they are paying more attention to that project than everything else. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the great big push to use the Block Editor, a.k.a. Guttenberg begin soon.

“You looking at me?”
These guys were running behind, and they survived the storm with most of their leaves.
“The field is fine, just a little frost. Go check out the net.”
Jinx – checking out the soccer net.
Access road closed due to storm damage.
The storm cleared that tree.
The day before the storm, this tree was a bright yellow ball.
When we can’t sit outside.
Tired, frozen lilacs.
The only red leaves in our yard.
We’ll see you guys in the spring.
The Connecticut River is still running low.
Frost
I don’t know what this plant is, but the frost makes it stand out.
“Good morning MiMi. Rise and shine!…or not.”
“I thought we were getting an extra hour of sleep today”

95 comments

    • One of my primary missions in life is to give Facebook precisely ZERO Dollars. Useless is a good word for them. As for WordPress, if this were an occasional hick-up, I could roll with it, but these incidents are happening more and more frequently. Thanks for sharing this, Roberta.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  2. I’m still pissed that Disney acquired the right to Star Wars. They’ll ruin it by saturating the market like they do everything else. Damn you George Lucas. As for FB, meh. I just use it as tool to keep up with far away friends. I’ve never had a problem with mobile WP, although I don’t use it compose blog posts as the formatting for photos usually goes wonky.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  3. Timely post for all of us who are up earlier than normal because of the time change.:-( So, with a large good cup of coffee in hand, I will say I currently pay an amount to Comcast for cable and internet that in the past was a good sized car payment. I keep looking at changing that but I still want the major networks and I can’t figure out how to access them. FB is a mere shadow of its original self. I’ll leave it at that because I think at this point it is useless except for family exchange of photos. I have to admit I use WP on a laptop, and it hasn’t changed a lot so far although I still lament the loss of the spell checker. They allow us to use basic or fancy themes so I sure wish they’d allow us to use basic posting for those of us in a certain age group and something fancier for those in the under 30 crowd. Happy first Monday of retirement, Dan. :-)

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • Thanks Judy. I rarely post on FB, other than the feed from WordPress. I only do that for the folks that prefer to find it on FB. I belong to a few private groups, but that’s about the only place I ever post.

      I actually found it was cheaper to “binder” the lowest tier cable with a mid-range internet from COX, than it would have been to drop all tv. That lets my wife watch breaking news with one remote. Everything else is Hulu and YouTube TV.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  4. Hey Dan, how about you go back to work for just long enough to straighten WP out. I’ve been yelling for years that when something works – WP wants to fix it anyway!! And we suffer with the glitches.
    I’m not a FB person, but I understand the kind of trouble you’re having. (and if YOU’RE having trouble, can you just imagine how lost in a fog I would be?!! LOL)

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  5. I’m still trying to figure out what to do with Netflix. It continues to fail to impress – it’s actually worse here than in the US – and yet our alternatives are limited.

    … and WordPress? I just keep my head down and hope the gremlins don’t find me!!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  6. I said my piece about WP and knock wood it’s working so far. The frost photos are pretty, Dan. We’re cold down here but not that cold! I never noticed what wildly wonderful ‘eyebrows’ MiMi has. Let the poor girl have her beauty sleep. Off to work for me……lucky you!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Thanks Lois. It’s been below 30°f in the mornings, but it’s been warming up into the 50s.

      I should put a watch in the picture with MiMi to give proper context about the length of her beauty sleep. I’m not waking her up at the crack of dawn.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  7. Happy Monday Dan. Considering ‘none of this should be this hard’ the weather channel just ran a black friday commercial where the coopted Santa. Oh yeah and it is not even Turkey week yet. Just how many twisted emperors do we have out there selling everything including their souls for the dark side ? One at dizzyknee, one at FB, one at… and the list goes on. Let’s just go back to happy Monday and skip the rest.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  8. My favorite streaming services have been Netflix and CBS All Access because…Star Trek and all versions of NCIS. Even though we have Hulu, I rarely use it. When Natasha and I go our separate ways next year, I’m ditching Sling and Hulu and sticking with antenna and the aforementioned streaming services. It’s really all I need.

    WordPress on my phone…ugh. That’s why I’m not currently using it to comment on your post. It’s stupid how I can like some posts and not others, and how it incessantly asks me to log in, even though I just did 5 and 10 minutes ago, and then it still won’t like a post. It’s sooooo frustrating!

    Would you like to trade sleeping MiMi for annoying I-can’t-tell-we’ve-fallen-back-an-hour-so-I’ll-wake-up-mom-at-3:30-AM-and-be-a-total-jerk-for-the-next-90-minutes Mr. Gibbs? Ugh.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • Thanks John. That’s a great analogy. I don’t care much about Disney, but ESPN+ would allow me to see WVU lose more often. I hate the way ESPN’s app puts news headlines in my feed and then, when I click on them, it says “oh, sorry, that’s on ESPN+.”

      Like

      Reply

  10. You know the ills I have been experiencing with WP, Dan. I now attribute it to the app and have deleted it for now. We shall see. I will give it a couple of weeks to iron out the glitches, but it is so frustrating when posts and comments vaporize.

    The thing FB does now that frustrates me is telling me how many of my Instagram follows now have FB pages they think I should follow. No thank you. I hardly interact with my ‘friends’ let alone people I do not know. I am building a FB page for my jewelry and art endeavors, but that may be short lived. I already see them trying to get me to buy ads and I have not even published the page yet!

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  11. Again, my small world looks pretty good when I read about all the problems you and your readers are having. I’ll just keep following my blogging friends and staying away from all the troublesome sites!!

    Geez Louise Dan, you couldn’t let MiMi enjoy the extra hour? Lol.

    I really like the photo of the frost covered leaf. Also the two trees, where one is all but naked and the other is still holding on to most of its leaves!! The plant you can’t identify? It looks like Wooly Lambs Ear……but don’t hold me to it!

    Enjoy your first week creating your own schedule……or not!
    🐾Ginger 🐾

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • “Wooly Lambs Ear ??” I’ll go with that. It’s pretty with the frost.

      MiMi did get her extra hour, and then some. She seems to see being up before noon as an option. I try to quietly snag a picture of her sleeping, but I can’t resist giving her a little scritch.

      Thanks Ginger. I feel like a true retiree – I have to go to a wake tonight and a doctor’s appointment tomorrow :(

      Like

      Reply

  12. I hear you! I have a few pet peeves myself concerning social media: I despise the way cable forces us to buy packages which makes us pay for stuff we don’t even watch. If it wasn’t for my husband having to have all his sports channels, we wouldn’t have cable at all! I’ve been disgusted with Facebook for a long time, and WordPress is a strange mystery to me at times. Socialism is subtly but surely being crammed down our throats more and more all the time. We no longer have the freedom to pick and choose; other people are doing that for us. And that makes me angry!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  15. I get the persistent nag message from WordPress about there being an “easier” way to create posts. I’m still not convinced that it actually “is.”

    As for Facebook, they nag me about spending money to “boost” my posts on The Sound of One Hand Typing’s page. I pretty much ignore Facebook, anyway.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  16. Doing it for themselves and their bottom line only.

    I dumped fb years ago and haven’t missed it.
    WP isn’t causing me problems but I am still using the old editor. I hope when the make me change it’s not painful.

    The frosty foliage looks pretty.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  17. Noooo, WordPress – don’t make me use the Guttenberg editor! I’m afraid that would be the end of blogging for me. I like the old editor.

    As for Facebook, I can’t say I’ve had any problems, but then I do everything on a regular old desktop computer. The more I hear people complain, the happier I am that I don’t have a smartphone.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  18. Well I thought it was just me…guess not. I deleted my FB account months ago. I miss seeing family photos but it’s just not worth it. You can’t do anything without seeing their “sign-in with FB” – irritating! With the Apple iPad IOS upgrade I’m finding myself in a tizzy. Tried to change and undo it with my granddaughter’s new Mac, but need different cords I don’t have. My yahoo mail “upgrades” all the time, adding addresses I never use, and deleting ones I do. Apparently if I get an email ad, they add it to my contact list, but there’s no way to delete them. Frankly I am just sick of all this upgrade crap. Maybe I should just live in a tent with a lantern. I have basic Dish tv provided by the apartment that is auto charged in my rent at $75 each month, no choice. I rarely turn it on even. I have Netflix which I share with the fam and Amazon prime on my iPad. No commercials there, which is why I don’t watch regular tv.
    Sorry, I sort of ranted there. . .a definite Monday peeve.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  19. I haven’t switched to Guttenberg yet, Dan. Have you? I think we have about a year to switch (I believe December 2020). I don’t pay FB to promote my blog. I just have a free blog from WP. It’s a hobby for me – not a job.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • I have tried Gutenberg on several occasions but each time, I’d get two or three posts and then something would go screwy and I’d revert back to Classic. I’m getting ready to try again. I just want this to be easy. Like you said, it’s not my job.

      Like

      Reply

  20. Hi Dan, Interesting post. I am personally terrified of the WordPress block editor. I accidentally installed it one time and couldn’t make heads or tales of anything. I eventually got it back to normal, and have never been so relieved. I hope they aren’t planning to force us to use that???

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  21. OK, I am on FB for two groups — and occasionally a group of friends. They drive me nuts. I may well drop them altogether. Especially with their political crap they do.
    I hear you on Disney and while we still own the biz (until we retire) we have Prime so we have all that, so we don’t think too much about it. But that fine print thing gets us — and frankly M calls them and bitches and say then shut me down and they always extend whatever for another year.
    I really really want WP to stop the changes. Now they don’t do spellcheck and I am dyslexic so that is a pisser and yes Firefox does but come on. If it was already in place why change it? I need to get my actual website running (do you do that kind of stuff) and if they change it too much then I will bow out. They never listen to those of us that are happy with what we got. Idiots.
    I may be done with this rant!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • The only thing I am sure of, Kate is that WordPress is not going to stop changing until the platform is solidly on the new editor. They want to appeal to the commercial users (our company website was on WordPress). We were using an add-on product that provided a content development environment very much like the block editor. It was good for commercial webpages, but it’s not great for blogging.

      Facebook seems to be struggling to remain relevant, by squeezing more out of the community. They want money, and they want more data about us.

      I’m not sure what you want to do with your website (or which website you mean). I have some experience in design and configuration, but there are aspects that I am not familiar with.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  22. We’ve been with Netflix since 2007. Before streaming. Back when they mailed you discs, mmhm. We loooooove it. Hulu is okay. We have been off and on with them a few times, but mostly on. I like how you can be all, “No one’s watching this…” and suspend it until someone wants to watch again.
    I haven’t been on FB in weeks. I kinda dread it. It doesn’t make me happy. It used to, back when Netflix sent discs… Now I just see it as a chore/time suck. And I don’t have it on my phone and I don’t have Messenger on my phone and life is better that way. I hate WP on my phone and only use it while traveling — still pretty much go through Google to DO stuff.
    Great pics to bring some cheer to Monday. Movie quote birds, sitting dog, disturbed cats lol! The frosted leaf and the tinted lilacs are my faves here, but that yellow tree pleases me muchly :)

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • Your description of facebook (since they’re now using all CAPS, I’ve switched to all lower case) is a good one. I try to stay in touch with some folks who are still out there. When they go, I’m gone. I only ever use messenger when I’ve been notified that a message is waiting. I p*****me off when that message is from facebook trying to get me to facebook more.

      Hulu has the shows I like (older). I don’t have the attention span for serial shows and I don’t have the interest in shows that make me watch them intently. I like to read or do something else while watching.

      I’m glad you like the pictures. We’re running out of autumn :(

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  23. Hi Dan… you are so right about the intro offers not being worth it if the other months are crazy high…
    And not on Facebook – but did here they are more into “groups” now and pages are no longer a priority – oh the changes that come and go…

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  25. “Why does Facebook do anything? For the benefit of Facebook.” Very well put. It explains everything FB does.
    An author I follow on Twitter also posted a complaint about her FB page. I didn’t understand why she was so agitated and thought that perhaps the problem with her page was only a one-time server error, but now I can see an ulterior motive on the part of the company.
    It is funny how the nobility of human endeavors have a time limit. Some things that are started with the noblest of intentions almost always end up getting corrupted in one way or another. Sad.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • It’s always good to see you, Peter. I love the way you step back and see the world. Facebook forced writer/bloggers who publish on other platforms to create a FB Page. The WordPress Publicise feature cannot publish to my facebook timeline, only to a facebook page. Then, they started asking for money to “promote” my page. They know it’s my page when they try to sell me ads, but when I open my page, I am a guest. They are doing everything they can to force me to buy advertising. I will never do that. I only have a handful of followers who seem to prefer finding my blog entries on facebook – they know where to look, and they find it.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

    • It it wrong, and it’s not just me. I feel bad for the people who are trying to make a living and had hoped these pages would support that. Not only are the ads expensive, they’re ineffective.

      We had a job opening a few years ago. We paid to advertise on facebook. They assured us they would present the ad to thousands of people within 25 miles of our office. We received precisely two inquires, both from people in Taiwan.

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

  27. Of the topics you talked about the one that I have my eye on is the new Disney+ streaming that might be of value to us. We’ve got Hulu, Netflix, and Acorn which seem to keep us appropriately entertained. I don’t want another one unless it’s a guaranteed value added proposition, but who can tell until the service has been around for a few years to see if they maintain their quality of programming. Not sure where I’m going with this comment, but there you have it. Indecision.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  29. My take on what you just wrote? We subscribe to only a few channels and that’s it. That can get costly! I deleted my FB page completely after someone attempted to hack into it. It’s just not worth the bother anymore and besides I honestly don’t support what FB stands for. WP …. I do a lot of “liking” from my phone due to the fact it is the only place I can call up all those who liked a certain post. That way I can at least like one of their posts. There have been times my like doesn’t even appear when I actually go to that site via my laptop. sighs Blogging is time-consuming as you well know and I really try to be fair to all who come to my site. It’s gotten nuts lately with comments that take me furever to get through. This is the main reason why I do not do other social media. TIME. As a photographer and writer I much prefer creating then getting buried alive under comments. Don’t get me wrong. I love talking …. as is evidence here. Yet …. my life is so big, Dan, if you know what I mean, outside of WP. As for the editor … I will not let go of the original one. NO!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  30. Many years ago when I had a different blog, I used to be a volunteer on the wordpress dot com forums. I had a brief look the other day at their new ‘advice for volunteers’ and was not surprised to see this: “Be teachable. WordPress.com changes every day, and no one knows every aspect of the platform.” That, I presume includes staff (who, it seems, are no longer called ‘Happiness Engineers’… I wonder why? ;)

    My thought about wp is that it’s gearing itself up to being ONLY for the big commercial bloggers. And eventually we smaller ones who like to write about our interests and our day to day lives, will just go under.

    Did you know each new theme now only comes with the block editor? Unless I’ve misunderstood, apparently in those, it can’t be turned off.

    Facebook – yech. I got out of there. But while on there, if you use it on a pc at all, you could reduce some of your woes by using the fbpurity add on with your browser. (Just avoid using it with Chrome.)

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Thanks for this. I didn’t know about the new themes being block editor only. That makes sense from their point of view. I think it will be hard for small personal blogs to adapt. That’s a shame.

      I visit Facebook from lots of devices but I don’t post much. I ignore all ads, as I don’t trust fb to police them.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  32. Oh nooooo…
    Every once in a while I give Hulu a passing thought but haven’t pulled the trigger yet. We’re making do with Netflix and Prime plus have a Sling subscription — what else could I possibly need? (except that whole Handmaids Tale everybody’s talking about but whatever)
    Facebook gives me conniptions. I’m almost ready to disband the blog page altogether. I don’t get a lot of traffic from there and since Facebook stopped letting me post to my personal page I have to manually drop the link there every morning anyway.
    My WP app stopped loading blog comments this week — I was shocked when I got on my laptop and found at least 7 I hadn’t replied to! I thought it was just me but maybe it’s being buggy for everyone this week…

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Add your thoughts or join the discussion. One relevant link is OK, more require moderation. Markdown is supported.

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.