Testing Facebook graph algorithm, what does it happen if you join Facebook in 2016?
Two years and two months ago I decided to permanently delete my Facebook account. There were two reasons: one was the fear of Facebook owning too much data about me and the other was removing the gossiping.
The only time I missed having Facebook is when my friends were doing long trips and they were posting their updates on Facebook. The solution was easy and not really innovative, on their return I met with them and talked for hours about their trips. But I haven’t missed the gossiping a single moment.
It’s also true that sometimes is more convenient joining a website or app with your Facebook account than with your email, so you already have your friends there (specially when you want to test new products for work like I do). That’s the main reason I’m coming back. But I have some rules: I won’t download the Facebook app to avoid creating an habit and I will only log in into Facebook on Incognito mode to avoid Facebook getting information about me while I browse other websites.
Getting a new account
So, last Monday I tried to create a new account with my email. Facebook rejected it saying there was already another account with that email. Then, I tried to recover the password but it said there was no account with that email. Is there or isn’t there? The same happened with my mobile phone. This shouldn’t be as complex as Schrödinger’s cat. Facebook should use quantum computing on more serious stuff, not for social networking.
Dear Facebook, didn’t we agree two years ago to permanently delete my account and any data you had about me? By Spanish and European privacy laws, this is illegal. I’m not going to start a case against Facebook but the penalty fee could probably be on the millions of euros if there is a pattern of not removing all the data they have.
I remembered I had another Facebook account I used for testing on a previous job; so I logged in and as it was empty of data, I decided to use it as my new Facebook account. I changed the email to a new one I’ve created (it didn’t allowed me to change it to my main one), I uploaded a pic and I completed some info about jobs and education.
Starting the Facebook graph experiment
At this time I had only one contact. I wanted to do an experiment, how many days would it take to become Facebook friends again with all the people I’ve personally known on high school, college in Spain, college in USA, work, events and hobbies? The requisite was that I couldn’t search for anyone, I was only going to use the “people you may know” section of Facebook.
Day 1–10.30 am
- As this wasn’t a new account, some people have tried to add me over the years. I accept three friends from college, my father, an aunt and a cousin.
- From that moment, all friends recommendations are poor, they are all friends of my cousin. No one related to my other contacts.
- I click on friends in common with one of my college friends and I add 10 college friends. I stop to check if my general friends recommendations have changed.
- They are still poor, but at the bottom I find another 4 college friends.
- I click on friends in common with my father, and I add my brother and another cousin.
- I still have no connections with people from my school so I search for a friend and I add him. This should be a huge tip for Facebook.
- Going back to friends recommendations, I find at the bottom a friend from my first startup and another college friend.
- At this moment I am really surprised at the poor quality of the recommendation; Facebook should have already crossed graphs and recommend me more college friends from Spain, from USA (2 contacts who should have opened the doors), from my school (1 contact) and my first job (2 contacts).
- Surprisingly it recommends me two friends who aren’t in those circles but we have someone in common.
- I decide not to click more on remove suggestion; I want to see if Facebook learns that I don’t know/want to connect with them.
11.30 am
- I have 6 contacts.
- Recommendations are really poor. It recommends me another college friend and another cousin.
12.30 pm
- I have 11 contacts.
- Using again the “friends in common with” feature, I find 6 college friends and two friends from San Francisco (we have someone in common).
- I use the friends in common with my school and I get really poor suggestions. Or no one have added that piece of information, or Facebook does a really bad job at looking at the birthdate (I should know everyone from my year).
- I complete more info about my college degrees (Spain and USA) and my jobs.
- I use the friends in common with my jobs an I find two people on my first startup and another two on my second. There are still people missing.
1.30 pm
- I have 17 contacts.
- No one has friended me yet.
- Recommendations are still poor, I am less frightened of the Facebook graph power.
9.30 pm
- I have 28 contacts.
- 3 people have friended me.
- Recommendations are still poor, I find two friends from college (one of them also from USA) and the first one from my school!
Tuesday night, one day later
- I have 42 contacts.
- Another 2 people have friended me.
- The general recommendations are poor, so I need to use again the friends in common with.
- Through a college friend, I find another two; one of them came to USA also.
- Through a school friend, I find another two. I still miss dozens of people.
- Through a Spanish college friend who went also to the college in USA, I find only one friend from USA; and it’s not the closest one.
- I start to glance over the feed and I do understand why millenials aren’t using Facebook so much. It’s full of likes of stuff I don’t care.
Thursday night, three days later
- I have 54 contacts.
- I still miss two close friends from school and two close friends from USA. We have enough connections in common, but Facebook isn’t recommending them.
- I ask one friend from the American college to accept my request (he doesn’t use Facebook often). When he does, I use the friends in common feature with him and I add 14 people. Facebook weren’t recommending those despite we had 3 friends in common with all of them.
- After adding them, it seems Facebook has learnt that I may know people in that circle and starts suggesting me more people.
Saturday evening, five days later
- I have 66 contacts.
- Recommendations are still poor and I still miss close friends. I find one at the bottom of the main list, and I start to see friends from other startups.
- Facebook is still recommending me people I haven’t added nor removed. It should have learnt that I don’t know them.
Sunday night, six days later
- I have 73 contacts.
- I find a colleague from my first startup, but the rest of the recommendations are poor.
Summary
- At the beginning of the experiment, I provided Facebook with information about my school, colleges and jobs. This should have given a lot of tips for recommendations.
- It recommended me friends from the Spanish college quickly, but it didn’t recommend me friends from my school and the American college. I had to search for friends in common.
- I used a new email, an email no one had. I believe this could be one of the causes of the poor performance of the graph algorithm.
- Facebook doesn’t seem to infer that if it recommends me someone five times and I don’t click on Add as a friend, I don’t know him. This is basic.
- It seems to have problems with people who belong to two social circles at the same time; Facebook recommends friends from one of them but not from the other.
- I have been able to reconstruct, more or less, my social circles in Facebook thanks to the “friends in common with” feature. It has been key. I would recommend Facebook to make it more predominant, instead of a filter no one sees. If it were for Facebook recommendations alone, I would have 10–20 contacts only.
- Of course, I still miss many people from other social circles; but as we don’t have anyone in common, it’s normal and I’m even glad they hadn’t appeared!
