ABC News and Facebook recently added the US Politics application which tracks what's happening right now in the world of politics. As the 2008 presentational race is heating up, there are daily polls for capturing the views of Facebook users.On my computer and web browser (Firefox 2 on Ubuntu Linux), the user interface for these polls is so messed up that I cannot vote at all. Determined to participate in the polls, I emailed Facebook support to let them know that they needed to fix the application for Linux users. This was their response:
Hi Ken,This is pathetic for a website like Facebook that would like to, and probably will, sign up everyone in the world eventually. There are millions of Linux users that they are leaving out by having this policy. Also, support for Linux wouldn't be that difficult to achieve. In fact, I have been using Facebook heavily on Linux for the past few months and this has been the very first problem I've experienced.
Unfortunately, Facebook is not meant to work with Linux. Please switch to a different operating system for best results on this website. Let me know if you have any questions, and I'd be happy to help.
Thanks for contacting Facebook,
Maude
User Operations
I wrote another email to Facebook urging them to support Linux users. If you care about the future of Facebook and other large web sites working well on Linux operating systems, I urge you to do the same.
Note: I submitted this "suggestion" just a few moments ago. Thanks for the heads up on this unfortunate brand of ignorance.
ReplyDeleteThe Web is an operating system neutral environment. Requiring users to install a particular operating system in order to use your services is counter to this neutrality. If enough service providers follow your policies, the Internet as a place for commerce will effectively become a feudal system. Interchange will grind to a halt. Everybody suffers.
Linux is not going away. It's installed base is growing faster than you think. You will have to deal with it eventually. Sooner is better than later.
The attitude of some website owners is just shocking!
ReplyDeleteI find that response pretty surprising considering facebook hosts mirrors for the Apache, the Fedora project (http://fedora.mirror.facebook.com/linux/) and other open source software.
ReplyDeleteThis is horrible. Im gunna go shoot some website designers now. Open source and Linux FTW.
ReplyDeleteBTW i used ff3 with facebook and ff2 on mac os x. Neither an issue (so far.) Ads cover up the bar at the bottom but thats a flash implantation bug.
My virtual school SUPPOSIDLY doesn't support linux but it works unless you have a resolution less than 800*600 because its their base render specs. I hate it since I got an asus eee pc.
Either way thats one more site on my naughty list... I'm more powerful than Santa :) (eats some brains)
We MUST stick together.
ReplyDeleteToo many of these sites cater to the "Majority Rules" philosophy.
Ultimately, they don't think there are enough of us to "hurt" them.
They may force us to make our own social network!!
Does this means Facebook requires Windows or Mac OS X?
ReplyDeleteFB seems to be working fine now.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't get Facebook to work in firefox, but it works great in epiphany. It seems to be more of a firefox problem than a facebook problem.
ReplyDeleteI'm running Ubuntu Hardy with latest updates, and I'm unable to get to facebook with either ff3 nor epiphany. Rather disappointing since a half dozen of my family (including my 89 year old father) have asked me to "fried" them. I've e-mailed them that I am, unfortunately a facebook reject. Oh - the shame!
ReplyDeleteHe told you to switch to a different OS... what a fucking douche.
ReplyDeleteSo Facebook recommends running the most insecure operating system...jeez and their servers run on Linux, what a bunch of nobs. I think they got a retarded clown to answer your email.
ReplyDeleteFarcebook works well with Firefox2 and Jaunty here.
ReplyDeleteI'd have no hesitation in dropping it if necessary (Facebook that is).
I have used Facebook for years on my Linux installs with FF2/FF3/FF3.5/Chrome/Opera/Konqueror and never had an issue. Is it possible that you have some setting wrong? I mean - I guarantee that not everything will work - or more accurately look perfect 100% of the time, but most of the time these things are due to browser settings. Maybe try removing any customizations to FF and see if works any better.
ReplyDeleteJared, this post is pretty old now and recently I've had no problems accessing Facebook on Linux.
ReplyDeleteask google to buy facebook..then,linux will fully supported by facebook..hahaha :D
ReplyDeleteSo far, so good. Using Ubuntu 9.10 on my laptop. I sometimes do a reload of a page. Have not tried the voting.
ReplyDeleteI need, except that I'm using Java instead of Ruby to develop my application. I started looking into doing this reverse tunneling myself just using the command line and found out that it is very easy!
ReplyDelete