Do you allow Facebook announce that's it's your birthday on your birthday?

Your own fault for giving your real birth date.

That has nothing to do with it. If it didn’t have my real birthday, and suddenly random people started wishing me a happy birthday on a random day, it would not only make me uncomfortable, but also embarrassed as hell.

Yes, FB has my real birthdate. I’ve had a FB page for 9 years, and when I first signed up, there wasn’t nearly the concern about privacy as there is now.

And I don’t have “random strangers” with access to my info.

I have my privacy settings so only my friends can see my stuff and I believe I’ve even further “upped” the settings so nobody can see my friends’ list and nobody can see my wall, either (although I may have put the wall settings back to “friends only”).

FB can announce it’s my birthday and only my friends will see it, so no random strangers are seeing anything. Yes, some Fluther friends are my FB friends but I don’t consider those to be “random strangers.”

My settings aren’t that strict, but my birthday announcement only appears to my friends. I like it. People post cute cartoons and cheerful pictures. It doesn’t embarrass me at all.

@zenvelo I don’t literally mean “random strangers.” I mean people on my friends list who I am not that close to in real life, or whom I only know through Facebook. My concern is not with privacy.

@jca My settings are the same, but I have 438 “friends,” but I’m only really close with about 20 of those. Many of them are old class mates and family members in the Pacific Northwest, and even in Holland, that I’ve never even met. Why would I want to announce that it’s my birthday, like these people, who I don’t really know all that well, are obligated to say something? Who cares if it’s my birthday?

@Dutchess_III, why do you feel they are obligated to acknowledge your birthday? They’re really not. I don’t say Happy Birthday to everybody on my list, and I don’t feel bad if they don’t say it to me. But then, I think you must take it more seriously than I do. I just figure that it’s Facebook. If I miss a few birthdays, nobody seems upset, if some of my FB friends miss mine, no big deal.

For me, @Dutchess_III it’s the same as @canidmajor. I, too have a whole lot of FB friends. If I don’t want to acknowledge someone’s birthday, I don’t. If I do, I do. No hard feelings either way. Some people I acknowledge their birthday in real life, and then don’t on FB.

I don’t feel that they are obligated. But they might feel that they are, and I want to avoid that possibility.
Like I said, it just feels like begging for attention.

I look at it like I’m not responsible for people’s thoughts and opinions.

It’s not that serious. It’s Facebook.

If you don’t want the attention, make it where it doesn’t tell anybody it’s your birthday.

Yep, I enjoy it. I also enjoy posting birthday wishes every day to the friends and family who have their birthdays visible. I love birthdays, I think it’s an underrated event. Taking one day out of the year to appreciate and celebrate your life (and for your loved ones to do the same) is good stuff.

I am glad the reminders come up. I lose track too easily. My own birthday comes up, but it is just one on a list of many and does not make me feel self concious.
If you are bothered by yours then getting rid of it is the right move.

I didn’t realize their settings allowed that. (The settings options allowed change so often.) Mine does, which means I get birthday wishes on the fake birthdate I gave Facebook. I sometimes feel very very slightly bad when someone is wishing me happy birthday and it’s not the right date.

Sigh. I did change it so it doesn’t appear, @jca, as the first sentence in the details states.

You feel like you’re begging for attention?

Yes, that’s what it feels like to me.

@Dutchess_III I do not “Facebook” anything.

I like getting the reminders of my friends birthdays.
I post very little on facebook so an announcement of my birthday doesn’t feel like I’m begging for attention.

I allow it. I see nothing wrong with having a reminder to wish a loved one or friend happy birthday. It beats having to write it on a calendar.

Having a facebook account pretty much means you (in general) are begging for attention, especially if most of your friends are people you’ve never met.

Sigh. I know you did, @Dutchess_III.

Oh, I don’t know if that’s true. Some people, yeah. I suppose. I just like sharing stories and stuff that happens, especially when it comes to my grandkids. I just like to write, too. I get many comments and messages that say if they have a hard day, they just come home and start looking through my posts and invariably will find something that makes them laugh. That makes me feel good. Maybe that’s me begging for attention. I don’t know.

I have all the important birthdays in my phone, and they get a personal message or phone call from me.

Then why did you feel the need to give me advice on how to stop it from posting, @jca? I’m just looking for opinions, thoughts. Not advice.

@Dutchess_III: I answered how I wanted to answer it. I’m not looking to argue about how I answered it.

No.
Since I have embraced self hatred, I don’t feel I deserve happy birthday wishes.
Some friends and family still mention it on FB, but I ask them not to.

@filmfann WTH? Self hate? No!

Yes.

Yes.

___

I like the reminder as I’m absolutely lousy at remembering dates and I don’t use my phone regularly. I’m on FB daily – it’s my main non-work scheduling centre. I’m in a few groups where we make all our arrangements by way of FB.

Every now and then I’ll look at the people who I’m getting birthday announcements about. If I have no idea how they got on my friend list (it’s a fairly big list for a nobody) I delete them. I sometimes feel bad for unfriending them on their birthday but not bad enough to keep them.

Sometimes you get a pile of friends with the same birthday and it’s fun figuring out what, if anything, they have in common.

While I do notice birthdays, I don’t necessarily acknowledge them unless they’re good friends.

__

So, yeah, my birthday is up there.

Facebook is weird to me.
I was so busy with work and parenting and being married for so long that I kinda missed out on the whole Facebook thing.
I recently made a profile and friended a few people I know and some old highschool friends, but started getting requests from people I never met before, some would message me and ask me personal questions like it’s a dating site or something.
It feels creepy to me, like anyone can just stalk you through Facebook from their own home.
I felt some anxiety when my birthday was a day away so I just changed my birth date and changed it back later.
I didn’t want the attention either for some reason.
I don’t know, Facebook’s just not for me so I left.
If I wanna talk I’ll text my friends or come to fluther to get some feedback.
If I like or comment on a woman’s Facebook post I feel like her friend’s and ex boyfriends etc. are immediately checking out my profile to see who I am and keeping track of everyone she interacts with.
If I want a date I’ll just go on a dating site, it just seems a little safer to me than flirting on Facebook.

nope