Facebook is kind of a mess right now.

Thats the easy take and, honestly, weve experienced this mob response before.

Did you #DeleteFacebookthen?

We think its worth considering a more measured approach.

Theres still some good left in Facebook.

Lets consider all our options before doing anything rash.

Should you really delete Facebook this time?

Retrain your hand to stop typing in www.fa… every time you open a new tab.

Go learn a hobby.

Start a celebrity Instagram account for your planter,maybe not that.

Deactivate your Facebook account

If you cant compel yourself to stop visiting Facebook, the company can help.

Change your mind, and youll have to start the countdown all over again.

The deletion process is fairly extreme, so double-check youve set up your digital life before you depart.

Dont forget tolog out of all Facebook sessionsand remove the apps from your mobile devices.

And dont use Facebooks single-sign-on feature to log into websites anymore, lest you accidentally stop your accounts deletion.

But wait!

you could be both irritated with Facebooks actionsanda regular user of the service.

You just have to be a little better about how you engage with Facebook.

Use a handypassword managerto create and keep track of your logins and passwords instead.

And if an app demands you sign into Facebook to use it, find an alternative.

Open up your favorite calendar service and make a recurring, quarterly appointment to pull upthis page.

Look at the apps and games.

Repeat in three months.

This allows the service to more effectively serve you advertising.

You wont win this cat-and-mouse game, but you might at least offer a little resistance to Facebooks efforts.

you’ve got the option to limit this as follows.

On the same page as before, look for the Apps Others Use section.

This one is a biggie.

messages from people I never interact with the other 364 days of the year.

The same principle can easily apply to data security.

Are you gaining anything by telling Facebook your birthday?

If not, remove it.

Does Facebook really need to know your work email?

The location of every place you visit?

If youre truly unhappy with Facebooks data collection, delete your account… and then make a new one.

Then, as you begin to design your new Facebook account, obfuscate your details.

Makea new dummy email addressthat you only use for Facebook.

Dont share that email address with any other people or apps.

Dont allow people to find your fake information in search engines.

Basically, treat Facebook like a fancier RSS reader (if that).

Fair is fair, right?