back to article Automatic Facebook couple pages: Nauseating sign of desperation

A week after Facebook introduced the nauseating idea of automatic couple pages, it has been rolled out to users across the globe, inducing reactions such as: "creepy and intrusive", "retch-inducing" and "smug". Facebook's new couple page, credit Facebook Here is your relationship Facebook users who have listed themselves …

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  1. Sordid Details
    WTF?

    Yoinks!

    Yep, me and the missus are on there.

    After I'd stopped throwing up, I began to wonder what Facebook are doing about the security side of things. Me and 'er indoors have separate settings to control who can see what, so can anyone see this page? Highest common denominator of settings? Something else entirely that I can't find the options for?

    I'm seriously thinking about killing my Facebook account now, but I'm afraid that if I stop liking the "Physicists 4 Angular Momentum" page, the world may stop turning...

    1. The BigYin

      Re: Yoinks!

      Facebook is a public forum, and this is how you should treat everything you post there. If you don't want it known to the world and total strangers - don't post it.

      I know they have privacy controls, but leak still happens.

      1. Steven Roper
        Thumb Up

        @ The Big Yin

        Absolutely. I have the same attitude as you do there. As I've posted elsewhere, my approach to Facebook is that I post nothing on there that I wouldn't sign on the countertop of a police station in front of an officer.

        What I might post in El Reg comments threads, on the other hand...

      2. ItsNotMe
        Mushroom

        @The BigYin

        You are absolutely correct. I've said it before...and I'll say it again.

        IF ONE IS STUPID ENOUGH TO POST PERSONAL INFO ON ANY OF THESE LAME SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES...THEN JUST DEAL WITH THE CONSEQUENSES...AND STOP THE D@MN WHINING ABOUT YOUR "PRIVACY" BEING INVADED FFS!

      3. This post has been deleted by its author

        1. rvt
          Devil

          Re: Yoinks!

          The cattle doesn't care, thatst the fun Facebook and other social sites have. If one cow or pig dies, you just grow new cattle, and nobody cares as long as there stock is large enough.

    2. I like noodles
      FAIL

      Re: Yoinks!

      My missus and I are there too.

      It's not just cheesy, it's naff - you'd barely think we'd ever met.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Yoinks!

      "Yep, me and the missus are on there.

      After I'd stopped throwing up, "

      You married her - you must've seen her before that ...

      Apologies to the missus - couldn't resist :)

      1. Sordid Details
        Pint

        Re: Yoinks!

        It was dark, I was drunk...

        1. Shagbag
          Thumb Down

          Readers' Wives

          This is voyeurism at its worst. Facebook has successfully plumbed new depths. I am anxiously awaiting Facebook to monetise the XXX version of these images to see whether or not I should cancel my subscription to Readers' Wives.

        2. This post has been deleted by its author

    4. This post has been deleted by its author

      1. Quinch
        Joke

        Re: Yoinks!

        Oh, please. You know as well as I that the planetary angular momentum is achieved solely through well-fed human females.

      2. MesonW
        Meh

        Re: Yoinks!

        I "closed" my facebook account largely because I was being tagged in pics other people had taken of me, in effect disclosing me and my family to anyone they were friends with.

    5. Gritzwally Philbin
      Pint

      Re: Yoinks!

      Getting off of facebook...

      Remember, when you go for the kill of your account and start to remove the posts you've made, plan on doing it over a few weeks. Just quitting facebook doesn't get your information out and just abandoning it could see it used for anything. Give it time and go down your wall and pull off all your posts, then as you empty that queue, their servers will dig down and start to pull up older posts. Eventually, you'll get to posts you've made on *other* people's pages - and THAT is the stuff that keeps you perpetually in their system.

      Get all of that deleted so when you log in you will have NO posts on your wall/timeline page.

      At that point, start to 'unfriend' people. Do this dead last, as if you do it first, you'll not be able to delete posts you've made on their pages and you'll be stuck in facebook's system.

      You know that you've done it correctly, if when you login after a month or so, FB is showing you random names of people that you do not know.

      Took me six weeks to get all my data OFF of facebook.

      Good luck.

    6. The Man Who Fell To Earth Silver badge
      Go

      Can't wait!

      I can't wait for the inevitable lawsuit that will arise when Facebook automatically makes a Couples Page for a closeted gay couple. Even better will the blow back when Facebook automatically makes a Couples Page for a closeted gay couple who live in a repressive country, like Iran, where being gay gets you the death penalty.

      My my, what has Zuckerberg wrought?

  2. Steven 1
    Stop

    *chunder*

    Glad me and the Mrs binned our accounts sometime back!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: *chunder*

      Me and my wife scaled back our Facebook presence - we now basically just use the messenger part of it to contact friends who no longer bother with email/phones.

      I'm tempted to mark ourselves as married and see how Facebook copes with a couple with no mutual photos, likes, comments or wall postings!

    2. This post has been deleted by its author

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: *chunder*

        "Every time there is a Facebook story, there is someone saying that they don't have an account (either never had or deleted theirs).

        What exactly are you adding to this?"

        I wasn't personally involved in the Peterloo massacre either, but I may have opinions about it.

        (Hint, people have opinions about things, that's what the comments system is for, you bellend)

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: *chunder*

            Except that the sentiment at issue is mostly ""I've never been in a massacre, because they seem like a bit of a bad idea".

            I suspect you probably also have thoughts about things that you've never done too- unless you're one of those rare mountaineering tantric breakdancing orchestral astronauts?

            (If you are, links to videos, stat)

          2. Ian Yates
            Joke

            Re: *chunder*

            <StretchingAnalogy>

            I was in a massacre once, but it was rubbish so I got out

            </StretchingAnalogy>

            1. TeeCee Gold badge
              Joke

              Re: *chunder*

              I was in a massacre once, but I'd taken one of the antimassacres off my Gran's armchairs along so I was safe.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: *chunder*

                I am glad that I'm not the only one who made that misreading.. :P

              2. This post has been deleted by its author

            2. Archibald Trumpetbeetle
              Unhappy

              Re: *chunder*

              I was in a massacre once, then I took an arrow to the knee!

              1. greenawayr
                Coat

                Re: *chunder*

                I was in a massacre once, then I got a professional to measure it and it turned out to be a standard acre.

                1. Muscleguy
                  Coat

                  Re: *chunder*

                  That's because acres only have mass in Flatland.

        2. rvt
          Devil

          Re: *chunder*

          I don't have an account and I never will have an account!

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: *chunder*

      I was in a massacre once.

      Dead end job, so I gave it up

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge
        Coat

        Re: *chunder*

        I was in mascara once. Looked damn fine if I do say so myself.

  3. Silverburn
    Mushroom

    I initially wondered in which parallel universe this seemed like a good idea. Then I realised...the "marketing" universe.

    <-- Drop one of these on it, Facebook. Right now. Without delay.

    1. JDX Gold badge

      What exactly is wrong with a page aggregating data relevant to two connections in a social network? This seems like a perfectly sensible use of their graph to me... if you find it cheesy don't look at the page, but I'm sure lots will like it.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        But who would look at it? Not the data miners, they have automated tools. Not the couple, they see each other IRL. What's left is creepy.

        1. David Ward 1

          perhaps friends and family who are not close by would would like to filter the pictures of you as a couple from the ones of you out with your mates?

      2. sabroni Silver badge

        @JDX

        >> What exactly is wrong with a page aggregating data relevant to two connections in a social network? <<

        The fact you ask that question, and the way you worded it, makes me think that human interaction isn't your strong point.

        1. The Man Who Fell To Earth Silver badge
          Mushroom

          Re: @JDX

          Or JDX is the dumb ass at Facebook who thought up this hideousness.

        2. JDX Gold badge

          Re: @JDX

          I can see you guys wouldn't like the feature, because

          a)you can count your friends on one hand

          b)neither you or your equally nerdy few friends are in relationships

          Still, let's mature and say a feature we don't like is stupid, and anyone who doesn't agree with you is also stupid. Doesn't make you look like the dumb-ass in this situation. Nope, not one bit.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: @JDX

            > Still, let's mature and say a feature we don't like is stupid, and anyone who doesn't agree with you is also stupid. Doesn't make you look like the dumb-ass in this situation. Nope, not one bit.

            You could always read what people actually say. They are calling it nauseating and creepy. In fact, the only place the word "stupid" occurs in the comments is in your comment.

      3. chr0m4t1c

        @JDX

        There's theoretically nothing wrong with it, but to do it without asking me, without giving me any control over the content, without allowing me to see what the privacy controls are set to, allowing me to change them or allowing me to delete it is completely unconscionable.

        This would be better served by something created on the fly when you want to look at it that could also be turned into a page if you want, not something like this.

      4. Don Quioxte

        Ex-husbands

        Ex-husbands, stalkers, ex-boy friends, shall I go on?

        I just closed my FB account because there is an issue of safety with this latest train wreck. I won't endanger my partner.

  4. Pooka
    Pint

    This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

    So......

    April and Bob are in a relationship, Facebook the ever friendly stalker creates a page for them. April splits up with Bob and starts doing the horizontal boogie with Charles. One thing leads to another - BLAMMO! - April is now seeing Charles....

    Does April/Bob page get deleted?

    Or are we left with hundreds of pages of April's conquests, successfully and fauthfully?

    Beer, because they must've been on some good stuff when they came up with this one!

    1. Jemma

      Re: This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

      Nope...

      What happens is that the ex finds out shes with someone else, gets his prize uzi out (lovingly converted with a .45 ACP receiver & micro uzi bolt set), goes to her place of work/favourite bar and conducts a scientific test on how many women and children you can cut in half in the space of two 30 round magazines.

      The police turn up and shoot him. Facebook gets off scot free & the girl spends the rest of her life learning about the results of 5 .45 hits to the abdomen and their effect on the internal organs...

      And everyone lives happily ever after, except the dead ones...

      1. mccp

        Re: angry much?

        There is some weird shit on this website.

        1. Jemma

          Re: angry much?

          If thats aimed at me then you should be aware... There was a boy of 17 stabbed to death in my town and both facebook and twatter are implicated in the arrangements for his ' ceasing to be a problem'. Thats not to mention the three women shot by exes, or in one case batty parents, various teens raped & murdered, and the odd stalking case related to facebook - and thats just off the top of my head. Still think I am odd for loathing the zuckwit and the IPO he rode in on?

          1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
            Holmes

            Re: angry much?

            Well, sounds like your town will be first in line when ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE strikes.

            But what has that to do with Facebook, except that you call it "related to facebook"? Might as well be "related to telecoms".

          2. Anonymous Coward
            WTF?

            Re: angry much?

            "Still think I am odd for loathing the zuckwit and the IPO he rode in on?"

            Don't blame the tool for what the idiot who used it did with it. Violent retards will always find a way to cause trouble. You think those people wouldn't have used a phone if facebook or twitter didn't exist? If people are worried about their security then they shouldn't post personal information on a public forum. End of.

            1. Jemma

              Re: angry much?

              What is it you fail to get? No Zuckwit = no Facebook. No Facebook = couple not violently murdered for unfriending murderers daughter on Facebook. No Facebook incitement to murder = no murder.

              Its called a chain of causality by the cops.

              Now, if I go and tell someone falsely that someone else is a pedo and that someone else ends up on the wrong side of a katana, the police will charge me so quick my feet won't touch. All well and good. Facebook outs teens as gay, putting them at risk of their lives and enables murder and other crimes, and all that happens is people whinge over crappy share prices. Both situations there is culpability, the individual ends up starring in a Diane Fossey documentary, the corporate CEO walks away with millions. Can someone explain to me, like I'm 5 years old, how that's in any way 'right'?

              1. PsychicMonkey
                FAIL

                Re: angry much?

                facebook doesn't do any of these things. "People" do these things, liek the old saying, guns don't kill people, people kill people.

                Sure facebook may make it easier, but it doesn't do it.

                You telling someone that x is a peado is no different to you typing on facebook or twitter that x is a peado, it's still on you, not the medium you choose to communicate it.

                I think my 5 year old could undestand that, can you?

                1. Alan_Peery
                  FAIL

                  Re: angry much?

                  That's only a partial truth. Yes, it was the people that did the deed and might very well have done so anyway without Facebook, but having a depersonalized-not-in-physical-presence space in which to start off in a bad groove doesn't help.

                2. Sean Timarco Baggaley
                  WTF?

                  "liek the old saying, guns don't kill people, people kill people."

                  But guns do make it a bloody sight easier to kill in the heat of passion, and also make it less dangerous for the killer as they can shoot their victim from afar, instead of having to get up close and personal.

                  Guns make it much easier to kill. They reduce the obstacles that would otherwise get in the way of an angry scrote and his intended victim. Those obstacles get in your way, slowing you down and giving you more opportunities to reflect and withdraw. That's the problem. Gun control isn't about banning guns entirely (although there really is no excuse for carrying one on your person at all times. Seriously: you do not live in the Wild West any more.)

                  Technology – and guns are also technology – is all about making things easier to do. Guns are a labour-saving device, like a washing machine. To pretend that guns are utterly harmless and should be made freely available is the height of idiocy. (And, of course, it's unlikely the authors of the US Constitution's Second Amendment had modern weaponry in mind when drafting it. The word "arms" also covered lances, knives and pitchforks. The word used is "arms", not "firearms".

                  A good revolver would set you back $17 – around $300 in today's money – which is outside the range of most of the population at the time, for whom $1-3 / day was considered a decent wage. A Winchester rifle was $40 – $700 in today's money; the equivalent of buying an iPad. Even ammunition cost 50 cents, which is a substantial chunk of a day's pay for the poorer workers.

                  It's clear that, in the context of the time when that Second Amendment was signed into law, firearms were unlikely to have been foremost in the legislators' minds. It was an age of cavalries, cannons and lancers. The hoi polloi were not expected to have guns in their handbags.

              2. Anonymous Coward
                FAIL

                Re: angry much?

                "What is it you fail to get? No Zuckwit = no Facebook. No Facebook = couple not violently murdered for unfriending murderers daughter on Facebook. No Facebook incitement to murder = no murder."

                Oh grow up FFS. If you want to do down that line of reasoning then you might as well call for every means of communication to be shut down.

                "Oh noooess! Someone upset someone else by text message and caused a fight - quick , lets ban SMS!"

                "Oh noooesss , someone ordered a hit by phone - quick , lets ban phones! Graham-Bell was like totally eeevil dude!"

                Do you realise what a complete moron you sound?

              3. Loyal Commenter Silver badge

                Re: angry much?

                "What is it you fail to get? No Zuckwit = no Facebook. No Facebook = couple not violently murdered for unfriending murderers daughter on Facebook. No Facebook incitement to murder = no murder."

                No Zuckerberg = someone else comes up with the same thing under a different name.

                No facebook = crazy stalker stalks people using some other means.

                It seems more than a little like looking for someone to blame when someone goes crazy and kills a bunch of people. What was the last thing the killer drank? X Cola? Ban X cola now! What, he was wearing clothes when he did it? Ban clothes!

                In other words, just because X might lead to Y, and Y might lead to Z, doesn't mean X leads to Z. I think you may need to go back to school and study 'causality 101' again.

              4. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: angry much?

                "Facebook outs teens as gay, putting them at risk of their lives and enables murder and other crimes"

                If you're living around people whose lives are endangered if their homosexuality is revealed, you have problems a fuck of a lot more systemic than Facebook, like basic failure of civilised society. I think you're flailing around for someone or something easy and simple to blame, rather than addressing the main issue.

              5. chris 233
                Coat

                Re: angry much?

                @jemma:

                > Facebook outs teens as gay, putting them at risk of their lives and enables murder and other crimes,

                Not a fan of facebook, but teen in your example did themselves place that information on public forum. If they didn't want to be outed, surely they would keep that information to theyselves, hmm?

              6. Minophis
                Meh

                Re: angry much?

                I hate Facebook as much as most people but I have to say that they are not responsible here.

                No Facebook != couple not violently murdered for unfriending murderers daughter on Facebook

                No Facebook = couple violently murdered for ignoring murderers daughter at party/insulting her new dress/splashing mud on her shoes/doing almost any trivial thing that upset her enough for her clearly unstable father to take dispropertionate retribution

                If a company makes hammer intended for hammering in nails and someone uses one to bash someones brains in it is not the companies fault. You can't say that the murder would never have happened in a world without hammers, because the murderer would have found something else.

                Also people managed to plot and incite murders, riots and all kinds of mayhem long before Facebook and Twitter. I imagine that if you took social media sites away the people who do these things through facebook twitter would be doing the same thing with email, or text messages, or notes passed round and quite converstaions in the pub

              7. greenawayr
                Thumb Up

                Re: angry much?

                Numpty tries to arrange riot on Facebook, gets arrested.

                Numpty tries to arrange riot without facebook, riot insues damage caused, livelihoods ruined blah, blah, blah.

                Facebook = plods snitch without doing a thing.

            2. Alan_Peery

              Re: angry much?

              People find it much easier to be unpleasant at a distance, or seems to be the consensus amongst physchologists. This unpleasantness can cascade in an online situation, and I think that is probably what @Jemma was referring to.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: angry much?

                Alan,

                Or put more simply...

                http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19

                (warning, swears within!)

              2. greenawayr

                Re: angry much?

                @Alan

                You mean like an online comments board?

          3. This post has been deleted by its author

          4. Senior Ugli
            Joke

            Re: angry much?

            meh all this is true, but could you really blame zuckerburg for putting the platform there? I think its more a downfall of the human race that they resort to childish bitching and bullying over a computer. Granted, if it wasnt in place online then less beef would happen, BUT you have to have the idiot mindset in the first place to go on FB and post death threats, cock pictures etc.

            Its kinda like a digital jeremy kyle at some points, but without ya boy Jezza to moderate.

          5. PsychicMonkey
            Big Brother

            Re: angry much?

            " Still think I am odd"

            yes.

          6. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: angry much?

            "both facebook and twatter are implicated in the arrangements for his ' ceasing to be a problem'"

            now are you trying to say that he would still be alive if twatter(sic) and facebook had not been around? Well in that case you can also lay blame on the maker of the knife and the shop that sold it, and while you are at it lay blame on creation and evolution as responsible for the construction and layout of the human body that designed it in such a way that it is susceptible to catastrophic failure due to puncture wounds with sharp implements...

            you can blame nobody but the person who used the weapon responsible for the death of another person, no matter what the surrounding facts are !!,

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: angry much?

              "now are you trying to say that he would still be alive if twatter(sic) and facebook had not been around?"

              <redneck>

              Guns don't kill people, Facebook kills people!

              </redneck>

          7. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: angry much?

            "Still think I am odd for loathing the zuckwit and the IPO he rode in on?"

            Yes because all that shit would still likely have happened even without the existence of Facebook or Twitter.

          8. greenawayr

            Re: angry much?

            You don't live in Midsomer do you?

        2. ratfox
          Boffin

          Get your names right

          It's Alice and Bob, not April.

          1. ranger

            Re: Get your names right

            That what Alice thought until she saw the Facebook page...

        3. Anonymous Coward 15
          Devil

          Re: angry much?

          You think there's weird shit here, don't ever go to 4chan.

          1. The Wild Tomcat

            Re: angry much?

            Wrong. 4chan doesn't archive everything for ever and ever and ever.

      2. VinnyR

        Re: This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

        I think that is more down to lax gun control than facebook or twitter. Information always gets passed somehow. I don't like facebook much but it is not their fault if people decide to go nuts.

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "What happens is that the ex finds out shes with someone else, gets his prize uzi out [...yadda yadda...] the girl spends the rest of her life learning about the results of 5 .45 hits to the abdomen and their effect on the internal organs..."

        Fur Q approves.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          "Fur Q approves"

          ..magazine like a big testicle gland..

          Fur Q, sir. You have earwormed me.

      4. greenawayr

        Re: This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

        American???

    2. Thomas 4
      Meh

      Re: This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

      Well, I guess it's better than Amazon's couples page.

      "If you have enjoyed shagging this person, why not try shagging other people enjoyed by them?"

      The business with the star ratings was an unnecessary cruelty, I felt. -.-

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: better than Amazon's couples page.

        AAA+++ comment, would read again!

        The rest of this angle left as an exercise. Some things really are better left unsaid.

      2. handle

        @Thomas 4 - Amazon's couples page

        "If you have enjoyed shagging this person, why not try shagging other people enjoyed by them?"

        I got it from Agnes

        She got it from Jim

        We all agree it must have been Louise who gave it to him

        She got it from Harry who got it from Marie

        And everybody knows that Marie...

        Got it from me

        Giles got it from Daphne

        She got it from Joan

        Who picked it up in County Cork a-kissin' the Blarney Stone

        Pierre gave it to Sheila who must have brought it there

        He got it from Francois and Jacques...

        Haha, Lucky Pierre

        Max got it from Edith who gets it every spring

        She got it from her Daddy who just gives her everything

        She then gave it to Daniel whose spaniel has it now

        Our dentist even got it...

        And we're still wondering how

        Ah, but I got it from Agnes

        Or maybe it was Sue

        Or Millie or Billie or Gillie or Willie - it doesn't matter who

        It might have been at the club or at the pub, or in the loo

        And if you will be my friend then I might...

        (Mind you, I said "might")...

        Give it to you

        (Tom Lehrer)

      3. AndrueC Silver badge
        Joke

        Re: This strikes me as more than a little desparate....

        "Share this shag with another person".

  5. Bakunin
    Devil

    Repeat after me ...

    "You are not the customer, you are the product."

    So how much of an uproar will be needed for Facebook to offer an easy way to turn this off?

    1. JDX Gold badge

      Re: Repeat after me ...

      To turn off seeing data which is already available, and simply presented in a different format? Who cares. If you don't want that data on FB, don't tell them about your relationship. But sine the entire point of a social network is to build connections, you've probably missed the point and shouldn't use the service.

      If you don't use the service, then your commentary on what FB should or shouldn't do is fairly pointless. It'd be like someone who can't drive talking about what's wrong with the new Ferrari.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Repeat after me ...

        You almost had a point, right up until the bit where real-life businesses started becoming more and more integrated with Facebook(tm). After that point it starts getting progressively harder to NOT have anything to do with Facebook.

        I was all set to sign up for the Spotify service when it became clear that it was turning out to be a really good streaming music service ... the door slammed shut on that idea with it turns out you HAVE to have a Facebook account to join Spotify. Even more irritating, Last.FM - which I do have an account on, switched to using Spotify as its streaming play-on-demand service , so I'm double screwed.

        Maybe I'm just being belligerant, but I have started to disassociating myself with companies I deal with who of late have started insisting that I 'Like' them on Facebook. Personally I prefer to live my life without Web 2 "social media" - there exist plenty of ways to communicate and share stuff without Web 2.0 that aren't necessarily any worse, and in fact offer you greater individual freedom.

        While I respect that fact that a lot of younger people get a lot out of it (I fondly remember the days of bulletin boarding over dial-up modem where people used to 'hang out' in a primitive on-line way!!) I'm getting annoyed with being co-erced into signing up for reasons other than my own needs.

  6. Roger Greenwood
    Happy

    What if . . .

    you were in a relationship with more than one other? Maybe then, having a real (if complicated) life, you won't actually need facebook.

    Maybe they have already thought of this and facebook for philanderers is coming soon.

    Icon:- Because we don't smile enough.

    1. Bob Vistakin
      Holmes

      Re: What if . . .

      A Mitch Romney type Mormon you mean? They'd need a 1-many entity relationship manager. Then again, they're in San Francisco, so it'd need to be many-many.

      1. JDX Gold badge

        Re: What if . . .

        Mormons don't have multiple spouses, certainly not legally. That was rather a long time ago.

        Romney certainly only has one wife; to suggest otherwise is simply ignorant AND stupid because polygamy is illegal in the USA and nobody would get to run for president without their party running very thorough background checks due to the uproar if something like this was found.

      2. MJI Silver badge

        Re: What if . . .

        Too many Ms for Romney!

    2. Psyx
      Thumb Up

      Re: What if . . .

      "Maybe they have already thought of this and facebook for philanderers is coming soon."

      Facebook has an option for "In an open relationship with..."

      1. JDX Gold badge

        Re: What if . . .

        But IIRC you can only select one person to have an open relationship with? Not sure what happens if two people try to indicate they have an open relationship with you.

        1. AndrueC Silver badge
          Joke

          Re: What if . . .

          >Not sure what happens if two people try to indicate they have an open relationship with you.

          Your friends start looking at you enviously?

  7. Matt J
    Facepalm

    What's the big deal?

    So they're mashing up public data where people have actively chosen to set up a link between accounts? What a horribly creepy thing to do...

    And as for the couples page - are people really scared that this is a privacy issue? The URL www.facebook.com/us sort of gives the game away that it's going to be specific to each user, with no (intentional) way of seeing those of others.

    Don't get me wrong. Facebook do lots of potentially creepy stuff, but it must be a slow news day if this is the privacy scare of the moment...

    1. TRT Silver badge

      Re: What's the big deal?

      They're making assumptions about the nature of your relationship and imposing a social-norm template on them. That's what's wrong. I do not and never shall be a part of this evil facebook thing.

      1. JDX Gold badge

        @TRT

        So you're upset because they assume you're normal?

        1. TRT Silver badge

          Re: @TRT

          Oh, I'm not. I won't let Facebook make any assumptions about me, because I wouldn't touch them with yours. But assume makes an ass out of u and me. And I think anyone would and should have the right to determine how and when others see their interactions with someone else. It's the online equivalent of someone patrolling the park entrance and supergluing together the hands of anyone who enters the gates as a "couple".

          Not only that, but it's a change to an established thing, as the person somewhere here who had "married" someone else for some other reason to do with finding a way around Facebook's interface.

          1. El Andy

            Re: @TRT

            Except there isn't anything there other than what you and your partner put on there. So it's not like there is any information on that page that isn't already on your (or your partners) FB page. The only possible issue is privacy leaks if you have different settings on things (or different "friends" on FB), but as long as that's taken care of sensibly there really isn't much to be upset about.

            It might be a bit twee and I'm not really sure there is much of a point to it, but there's also little reason to get bothered about it.

    2. Matt_payne666
      Thumb Up

      Re: What's the big deal?

      Bingo... content aggregation at its best... this is what facebook is for, you sign up, you sell your personal data to them in return for webhosting... they then market your details in various ways...

      This can only help couples on FB, just think... you have broken up with your beloved, your in tears, close to the edge, this saves the task of putting up a gut wrenching attention grabbing status... you just change your marital status and everyone is instantly emailed...

      Christ, ive seen an upside!! just friend all the fit girls you can find, when you get the automated breakup email, dive in for some rebound sex!!

    3. J 3
      Paris Hilton

      Re: What's the big deal?

      That's what I was asking myself too. It's not like typing the /us will allow me to see other couple's pages. Silly, yes; stalker-enabling? Hardly. But then...

      But then I tried something else, which I do not know whether it was available before this. I went to a married friend's page. I've never met his wife, and she's not a "friend" on FB either. The word married in "Married to ..." was a link. When I clicked on it, it created a page showing the relationship. A URL of the form www.facebook.com/user_name1?and=user_name2

      Of course then I tried to replace user2 with my user tag or whatever it's called. Voi là, a page showing my FB relationship to my friend. It's the same as clicking on the "see friendship" link on a friend's page. So, it's not couple specific, and nothing new I assume. Just a new, teenage-ish URL, to do something that was already possible. Or did I miss something.

  8. Anonymous Custard
    FAIL

    Divorce

    So what happens when things become "it's complicated"?

    Are we gonna get arguments from divorce lawyers?

    "You have the page, I don't want it!"

    "No you have it, I don't want it either"

    1. JDX Gold badge

      Re: Divorce

      Maybe it only does it for certain relationship types?

      FB doesn't let you list past relationships does it, it would be fun if you could see a list of past girlfriends/boyfriends/divorces.

      1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

        Re: Divorce

        I've got an idea for a new website. It's a combination of Facebook and Tripadvisor. All we need to do is to add user-ratings to couples pages, and we've got a brilliant resource for helping us to avoid bunny-boilers and bastards.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Divorce

          "I've got an idea for a new website. It's a combination of Facebook and Tripadvisor"

          Soo, registered "faceadvisor" and "tripbook" yet? :)

          1. The Wild Tomcat
            Unhappy

            Re: Divorce

            I wanted "failbook" but a domaineer is holding it.

    2. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

      Re: Divorce

      > So what happens when things become "it's complicated"?

      It creates couple pages for you & the wife, you & the mistress, you & the girlfriend.

      Or maybe it gets complicated *after* it's created those pages...

      1. Thomas 4

        Re: Divorce

        If you are in a successful and stable menage a trois relationship, I strongly suspect you have more entertaining things to do with your time than worry about a Facebook page.

        1. Esskay
          Joke

          Re: Divorce

          Can't wait to see Google+ respond to this with "Google Relationship Analytics" - number of partners, amount of sexual intercourse with each one, average length of relationship, country of origin... All laid out in cute pie and line graphs.

          (Although the "Audience Retention" graph might be somewhat depressing for some...)

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    As a bigamist

    this could cause certain problems for me.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Really don't see the big deal here. It's kinda sweet. Move on.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      The Overly Attached Girlfriend meme posts on El Reg?

  11. DigiTime
    Go

    Couples.

    I know at least 5 people who's relationship status is married; only they are "married" to their best friends of the same gender. I bet that there are many more of these "couples" out there. I can't wait to point this new feature out to them to see the look on their faces!

    1. JDX Gold badge

      Re: Couples.

      Could cause some confusion when applying for a job and the company checks up on them. "So do you want to bring your boyfriend to the Xmas party?"

  12. Forget It
    FAIL

    Even the word Menage à trois begins with the word MEN !

    1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
      Happy

      So? The word shebopdadoowop begins with SHE...

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    How Embarassing... I have 4 wives

    FB only shows one :(

  14. JDX Gold badge

    I don't really see a problem

    It's a bit saccharin but sure, why not.

    I read the title and thought FB was figuring out who you were in a couple with from photos/activity, now THAT would be creepy.

  15. chiller

    After reading it was apparent that carrots do in fact sit a long time in the gut, I am sure I have not eaten any for a week.

    1. hplasm
      Coat

      It depends-

      which end of the gut they go in...

  16. Himalayaman

    Now implement this for mistresses/lovers and the party can begin!

  17. BigG
    Gimp

    General Petraeus

    Busted by facebook - that is all.

    1. dssf

      Re: General Petraeus

      Or, was he betrayed?

  18. tojb
    Thumb Down

    Contempt for users = destined to fail

    Remember when google was one of many competing search engines, but the only one with a clean no-hassle start page that did what it said on the tin and nothing else? Remember how they did quite well out of that? Now does anyone remember altavista? AOL? Thought so. Facebook, your days are numbered.

    1. JDX Gold badge

      Re: Contempt for users = destined to fail

      People have been saying that since FB had about 1 million users. They said the same about eBay too.

      1. Anonymous Coward 15

        Re: Contempt for users = destined to fail

        New eBay look sucks donkey dicks, although admittedly not a major change. What pisses me off more is the removal of wildcard searching.

        1. Stoneshop

          Re: Contempt for users = destined to fail

          What pisses me off more is the removal of wildcard searching.

          So they told me, but I find it still works, well after the cutoff date.

    2. dssf

      Re: Contempt for users = destined to fail

      Acceleration to fb' "end of days" would come if 3/4 of users posted in thei pages, "ll, 60% of things i post to fb are false, misleading, and confusing to verify. From DAY ONE!"But, i suspect that fb would filter those words out before sponsors and downstream buyers see our posts aggregated for them...

    3. El Andy

      Re: Contempt for users = destined to fail

      AltaVista died off because (a) Google came along and gave better results (b) there is pretty much no reason to remain loyal to a search engine, you've invested nothing in it.

      To get people away from Facebook requires something much better to come along to justify giving up all the invested time in FB to rebuild it all on a different social network. The luke warm response to Google+ (is it still going?) should be pretty good evidence of that. And every single day that passes with people uploading more stuff to FB, it becomes less and less likely they'll see value in moving away from it.

  19. Neil B
    WTF?

    This is actually one of the less absurd innovations FB has deployed.

    Still, I get it. We few elite Reg commentards are required to hate all social media. I'll get right on that.

  20. Andrew Waite

    Public Forum

    Repeat after me: any content you post to a public server is public, I don't care what the 'privacy' settings say.

    Want it to be private? Don't post it.

    Also, given the supposed purpose of these pages, why is FB still pushing singles and 'meet mature women' in the ads?

  21. MJI Silver badge

    Arghhhhh

    My wife set up an account in my name to use to get Farmville crap.

    I made sure the picture is not of me, my wife has a Smurf.

    1 blank us page, no pictures of use (thank god) no small blue people with funny hats and no sci fi soldiers with red goggles

  22. DJ 2
    Joke

    well.

    As my GF doesn't post photos and hardly ever updates her status, seems that I am on my own and the GF is ficticious. <insert geek joke here>. but she does exist, really she does just check facebook.com/us .. er right ok.

  23. TRT Silver badge
    Happy

    "You don't need to be a dyspeptic technology hack to find this nauseating."

    Priceless!

    Obligatory note:

    Facebook is evil.

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    OK. Seen the page. I was particularly amused by the way their much-vaunted targeted advertising is presenting me a "meet singles in your area" ad on that page...The missus will be thrilled.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Too many ads for "meeting" singles in your area?

      Most browsers make a privacy / incognito mode that is useful for surfing pr0n. Using that should shake off the tracking cookies that are building a profile of your "interests".

      Remember: targeted advertising crosses websites thanks to modern ad networks.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Too many ads for "meeting" singles in your area?

        Nice theory, but I can pretty much guarantee I'm not getting served "meet singles" ads because of pr0n habits. I know all about remarketing since its something I have to do for a living. FB are serving me irrelevant crap because they stopped paying lip service to targeting and user control a while ago when it turned out they needed the money quick smart. I also get shitloads of betting ads and I've never stepped inside a bookies or used an online gambling site in my life.

      2. TeeCee Gold badge
        Meh

        Re: Too many ads for "meeting" singles in your area?

        The bastards are already wise to that one.

        If you turn off tracking, the ruddy ad networks serve a continuous diet of singles sites, russian/asian babes chatrooms, gambling and everything else from their seedier range.

        I think it's a deliberate attempt to get you to cough up your data.....

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    not just couples

    on the right side of the page are links between friends, not just married couples.

    It's a bit gimmicky, but, at least it shows I have more in common with my wife than I thought... anon.. well..

  26. Richard 12 Silver badge
    FAIL

    The photo on mine is my father-in-law and his DOG!

    I don't think you could get a more abject fail even if you tried...

    1. David Pollard
      Joke

      Re: The photo on mine is my father-in-law and his DOG!

      Relationship: best friend

      1. Jemma

        Re: The photo on mine is my father-in-law and his DOG!

        You haven't met one of my ex's then. Most people take labradors for a 'walk' not something that shares most of the same letters...

        Its amazing how that image sticks in the mind even years later. I think the technical term is a woofgasm.

        I'll (not) have what shes having...

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And for those who are completely and utterly single

    Will it show a picture of you and your right hand?

  28. Aoyagi Aichou
    Big Brother

    Happy

    I can't begin to describe how happy am I that I have never created a FB account. I was happy before, discouraging people from FB, but this is a great way to make it clear that it's going exactly where I thought it would.

    In other words, Facebook is the spawn of satan stealing your thoughts, blahblah.

  29. Justice
    Thumb Down

    Just the thought of it...

    Mini-sick in my mouth.

  30. Roger Kynaston
    Stop

    Are they

    Doing the same for same sex couples? There really could be a safety aspect there when some homophobe decides that they need to burn in hell or whatever and takes steps to put themself there with a shotgun or whatever.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Are they

      or alternatively (in case they don't) some homosexual decides FB needs to have their asses sued for discrimination, safety or not.

  31. NomNomNom

    time for me to set up an account for Cake

    1. hplasm
      Happy

      So

      Is the Cake true now or not? I forget...

      1. Silverburn

        Re: So

        The cake is Null. My companion cube said so.

        1. TeeCee Gold badge
          Coat

          Re: So

          "My companion cube said so."

          Mine won't talk to me. I'm considering unfriending it on Facebook....

  32. Silverburn
    Happy

    Keyword aggregator

    ok, so to summarise the upvoting public's thoughts on this new feature:

    Creepy, evil, chunder, scary, cheesy, naff, weird, shit, shebopdadoowop, saccharin, absurd, mini-sick, satan...

    Translated into "marketing": "Roaring success"

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So plain friendship pages a also creepy?

    So what do you guys think of the plain "Browser Friendship" sub section where Facebook makes pages of you and any of your friends?

    It's the same page except with any random friends. It's almost like a search feature for friendships.

    1. Tom 38

      Re: So plain friendship pages a also creepy?

      The entirety of facebook is creepy.

  34. Craig Graham 1
    Stop

    All OTT.

    Aside from the "/us" link, which only you can go to for obvious reasons, all this does is takes two people and presents the common parts of their timelines. Look at the URL and you see the other person; change it to someone else and it gives the events you have in common with them. After clicking on the link on here and seeing stuff in common with my partner, I tried it with my son and an acquaintance. It's nothing to do with relationship data, and the page is generated on the fly, so it's not like someone's comment on pages of past relationships continuing to lurk as self sustaining entities. So, like, chill.

    1. J 3

      Re: All OTT.

      Yep, pretty much my conclusions in another comment.

      I also tried generating pages (with the www.facebook.com/user1?and=user2 kind of link) of "relationships" between friends of mine who are not themselves "friended" on FB. It generates a mostly blank page. The most specific thing that appeared was "Living in city, state", since they live in the same city. So yes, generated on the fly, and visible by anyone, it seems.

  35. Valeyard
    Big Brother

    a bit shoddy

    Looked at mine. Me and and the wife apparently have a page, but the one post is her posting a link to a geeky t-shirt with the phrase "hint" and a lot of photos of my father's chickens and ducks doing silly things which we were both tagged in (I don't untag these since I prefer to pollute the facial recognition database) beside one solitary photo of our wedding day

    So I would be a bit annoyed at it except that it's been implemented so badly that it's neither here nor there

  36. This post has been deleted by its author

  37. Knowledge
    Thumb Up

    Another way out

    You can break up quietly: Go and update your settings to not show a relationship status.

  38. Winkypop Silver badge
    Facepalm

    That's no lady, that's my wife..

    Oh dear, Facebook has jumped the shark.

  39. djstardust
    WTF?

    Try keeping up .....

    One of my mates' ex girlfriends changes her relationship status (and the people she's in a relationship with) on an hourly basis.

    Server overload !!!!!!!!

  40. Anonymous Custard

    Waiting for the "next Facebook news"

    That membership and associated advertising revenue must be doing very well, as suddenly they have 20% more brand new pages on the site.

    (Figure picked out of the air, but you get the point).

  41. Colin Millar
    Pirate

    Chavbook

    This is the digital equivalent of those "Kev & Shaz" banners at the top of Peugeot 205 windscreens.

    1. TeeCee Gold badge
      Happy

      Re: Chavbook

      I used to work with a woman called Tracey. At one point in conversation she let it be known that, if she had been born a boy, her parents would have called her Wayne. This led to my asking the following question:

      "That's interesting. Your parents, did they own a MkIII Cortina by any chance?"

      "Why yes! How on earth did you know th.........."

      I was already running by the time the penny dropped.

  42. Risky
    FAIL

    I did log into facebook recently to see if there were any more privacy buttons I needed to turn on. Merciffy there noting there - no photos comments etc. If I was sure the would delete everything I'd close it.

  43. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And what about people in group relationships? Isn't this biased against them???

  44. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I've never been on Facebook but I don't like it.

  45. Alistair
    Coat

    Ironic ads.

    Yurp, our page is there.

    Why pray tell would there be ads for "find singles in your area" on my view of this page?

    a) we're married.

    b) I'm looking at "our" page.

    .....................

    OMG. I'l bet there are THOUSANDS of divorce lawyers invested in .....

  46. Amorous Cowherder
    Facepalm

    Me and the Missus are on there

    However we have different online lives to each other, we have a few common family members on the FB friends list but that's where it ends. I have my FB page to showcase some of my photography, she has her genalogy and TV show stuff and never the twain and all that. We have nothing to hide from each other but she wouldn't like me poking my nose into her business and conversations, vice-versa.

    This is a creepy thing for those sickening couples who've only been together for 2 weeks and sit all smugly on trains to work giving off that "We wuv each ovver wery wery wery muchy!" vibe! When you've been together and married for 25 years like me and my Missus that's when you know that person inside and out and you also know how to respect each other's limits and boundaries.

  47. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    If there is hope..

    ..then it lies in the proles^h^h^h^h^h^hAustrian geeks:

    http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/11/how-one-law-student-is-making-facebook-get-serious-about-privacy/

    Pass the popcorn.

  48. Duffaboy
    Happy

    Bothered

    Not

  49. Sarev
    Meh

    Meh

    Not quite sure what all the vitriol is about with this. It's just a search filter. Ooo. Now, if I could only search for any of the other stuff in my timeline...

    My biggest complaint about Facebook is that it's so impossible to search _your own data_. How can you find posts you made four years ago? Even the friend search thing is the crappest search imaginable. That's its most cynical aspect, I find; they are using your data six ways 'til Sunday but they don't seem to want _you_ to be able to use it.

  50. DJ Particle

    If you're on FB...

    All this really is.. is just the "friendship" page for you and your partner. You'll find you have "friendship" pages between you and ALL your friends. If you ever saw a "see friendship" link, that's what it is. This just happens to be the one between you and your partner, is all. I don't see the issue.

  51. The Alpha Klutz
    Facepalm

    Is Zuckerburg a brilliant businessman?

    or just some kinda idiot, I mean, wtf is this shit all about then?

    If I was a shareholder I'd be biting down hard on a towel right now....

  52. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Can someone please explain

    What has Facebook got to do with friendship

  53. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Cancelling my Face Bum account? But, but......

    That is where my millions of friends hang out, that are just waiting for me to contact them.....

    Oh Friends, Glorious Friends - millions of people I have never met till then,

    And when I log into Face Bum - there they are not.....

    "Oh do you remember me? We used to sit at a desk together when we were 7 years old - nearly 50 years ago?"

    "Ohhhhhhhhhh yeah I remember you, I lent you 5c back then and I want it back."

    Ummmm sorry wrong school.

    Arrrggghh the millions of FRIENDS.... on Face Bum

    So the daily Face Bum email goes....

  54. Steady Eddy
    Thumb Up

    Welcome to the Hotel California

    "Welcome to the Hotel California

    Such a lovely place

    Such a lovely place

    You can check-out any time you like,

    But you can never leave..."

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