Facebook

Today I went to the sign up page for facebook and your first option is to pick what kind of page this will be, i.e., business... or you can just click on the "sign up" button. I clicked on the sign up button. This is where the information gathering process begins. They gather your name, your email address, your gender and your age. At the top of the "terms" page you will find this
1. "Privacy"Your privacy is very important to us. We designed our Privacy Policy to make important disclosures about how you can use Facebook to share with others and how we collect and can use your content and information. We encourage you to read the Privacy Policy, and to use it to help make informed decisions."
It is my understanding that "most" people do not read the terms and conditions on any given page they sign up for; including myself. So, I decided to read it and see what I am agreeing to. By clicking on the Privacy Policy link you are rerouted to a page that has another list of options; one that reads "view the complete Data Use Policy. Lets go there! once there , yet another list of options. The terms and conditions are so lengthy that it would take several hours to read it in its' entirity. So, lets create an account and see what the getting started page looks like.
Signing up takes you to a 3 step process where step one is "find your friends" at the bottom of the screen you can "skip this step" Lets do that. Step 2, fill out your profile information; or skip this step, I will skip it. Step 3 is to upload a picture for your profile, I am skipping this step as well. Now I have to go to my email account and click on the link provided to complete the sign up process.
There is no "getting started page" persay; but there is a help section. Clicking on help takes you to the help center where a list of options is available; the first option is entitled "Basics" with yet another list. Clicking on "About Facebook" gives us their mission statement and company overview in 136 words. Under the manage your account tab there is a list of information tabs on different policies like privacy, account settings & deletion, friends, disabled accounts, account warnings...and others. Lets see what is under the "Keeping your account secure" tab. Surprise, another list of options. Lets start with "Using applications safely." Ok the lists are getting annoying, but again we are faced with several choices under a heading of "Using Games and Apps Safely." One option is to find out how to report an application. My head screams "why are there applications that may need reporting in the first place?!! and the only thing you can do about it is click on the report tab at the bottom of any page within the application on Facebook. http://www.facebook.com/help/?page=174697372585904 here is the link to the help page as I was viewing it. This was a very eventful search into the part of Facebook I have never looked at, the part that everyone probably should; before they sign up.