Bernard Meisler of ReadWriteWeb has put together an interesting article on a curious phenomena occurring on the world’s largest social network, Facebook: people “liking” things that they definitely don’t like, and even scarier, dead people “liking” things, apparently from beyond the grave. In short, Mr. Meisler after noticing some out-of-character “liking” behavior among his friends, did an informal poll and discovered that many of them found “likes” in their history that they don’t remember making, and some of them so at odds with their own personal beliefs as to be outright offensive, ie. a dedicated vegetarian “liking” the McDonald’s Facebook page.
Facebook, of course, denies that this is possible (except that it seems it is possible), and in the case of folks who are still alive (and presumably in control of their own Facebook accounts) attributes the anomalous “likes” to either pilot-error or a forgotten action. In the case of those who have passed on, apparently if the deceased’s page is not “memorialized”, Facebook can still dredge up past history and “refresh” their stream to simulate (and presumably stimulate) activity. I personally witnessed this on the account of a friend who recently passed the previous year, so it definitely does occur.
What this means for you:
Check your Facebook history, specifically your “Likes” history. This can be done by clicking your name in the upper right of the Facebook interface, and click the “Activity Log” button on your page. See any pages you don’t remember liking? If you do, let us know!
