[im] 'Bye Bye Facebook'

[allan siegel]

  Widely-watched Dutch comedian says 'Bye Bye Facebook'

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A popular Dutch comedian has urged hundreds of 
thousands of fans to join him in saying “Bye Bye Facebook” in protest at 
the social networking giant’s handling of private data.

     Arjen Lubach, whose widely-watched satirical television show 
“Sunday with Lubach” has more than 400,000 followers on the social media 
site, said the programme would delete its Facebook account on Wednesday, 
joining a string of high-profile entertainers and tech executives who 
have urged users to do the same.

Although it’s impossible to know how many will follow through, 11,000 of 
Lubach’s Facebook followers said on Facebook that they would join Lubach 
by deleting their accounts.

     In recent weeks, the #deletefacebook hashtag has gained prominence 
after the world’s largest social network was shown to have allowed 
personal data to end up in the hands of Cambridge Analytica - a 
political consultancy that worked on U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 
election campaign.

     Silicon Valley entrepreneur Elon Musk’s electric carmaker Tesla and 
rocket company SpaceX have shut their Facebook pages. The call was also 
backed by Brian Acton, co-founder of the messaging service WhatsApp, 
which was sold to Facebook for around $19 billion in 2014, and by 
entertainers including the singer and actor Cher.

     The company itself has said #deletefacebook has not had any 
meaningful impact on users to date and financial analysts say the 
controversy has had little impact on advertising or user engagement on 
the Facebook platform so far.

     In an earlier foray into politics, Lubach helped attract the 
hundreds of thousands of votes needed to trigger a public referendum 
that last month rejected a new Dutch law granting spy agencies the power 
to conduct mass tapping of internet traffic.

     Lubach’s best known skit is a parody of U.S. President Donald 
Trump’s “America First” slogan, “The Netherlands Second” which has been 
viewed more than 26 million times on YouTube, and triggered dozens of 
copycat videos in other countries.