10 Things You NEED To Know If You Use Facebook

 1: The offers for air duct cleaning and car detailing generally are not real. Beware of generic service offers or pricing that seems too good to be true.  It is. They are likely scamming you for your payment, or other info.  Same goes for the houses for rent at a low price...if they are being shared, the author is harvesting application fees...similarly, if the house is not rented YET, and has over 400 views and replies...why hasn't it been rented yet?  Red flag, they are scamming applicants.

2: If the post says that "It REALLY works" or"It couldn't hurt to try..." or "just hold down the button and press copy, then paste into a new status", or "...a lawyer said it is true" or "...they said it on the news", or any suggestion of what to do to make your news feed refresh and see more content from lost friends, IT IS NOT REAL...IT IS FALSE. They will then urge you to share it.

3: If the post urges you to share, that is the first red flag that it may be false information. Read any post that urges you to share very carefully, and vet the author and content before you randomly share it. Learn to use GOOGLE IMAGE SEARCH to reverse search images on the internet to see where else they have appeared.

4: FRIEND REQUESTS: If you get a friend request from someone who is already your friend, check with them...simply go to their profile and see if they are active, if so, then contact them to see if they created a new profile.  If they did not, simply report the profile pretending to be them. If the fake profile messages you either from the fake profile or a fake Instagram account, and it feels weird or unfamiliar, DO NOT REPLY.  Also, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ADD FRIENDS IF YOU DO NOT KNOW THEM...yes, strangers will attempt to friend you, you can say no and should.  Why would you want a stranger as a friend...AND you have given them access to your friends only content, so now they can spoof you.  Vet your friends and just add people you know or actually want to interact with. 

5: If someone is pretending to be you with a fake profile, YOU HAVE NOT BEEN HACKED...you are being spoofed. Spoofing is when someone makes a profile to look like yours, then tries to add your friends, and once the fake profile has a network of your friends, they reach out to them...either to scam them, or to get them to click malware or share private info. That is the gimmick. 

6: TO AVOID BEING SPOOFED...go to your privacy settings and set your privacy so that your FRIENDS LIST is only available to you and your friends, NOT PUBLIC.  Spoofers target profiles with public friend lists so that they can contact them from the fake account.  If the fake account cannot SEE your friends, you are a bad target.

7: If you have access to your FB account, you have not necessarily been HACKED.  Hacking is when an outsider has access to your profile, then they usually change your password and lock you out.  If you have access to your account but THINK you may have been "hacked", change your password, and run a virus/malware scanner on your device for safety.

8: BEFORE YOU SHARE THAT HEARTBREAKING POST about the injured dog or lost child, take a second, count to 5, and do a little vetting.  Many to most of these posts are scams/fake/fraudulent.  They often use the same photos in multiple groups...sharing them to community groups, swip swaps, local classified groups...usually at Facebook groups with a decent number of members (and likely, weak moderation teams). THE SCAM IS...they get thousands of people sharing these posts, THEN THEY CHANGE THE CONTENT.  Lately they change it to homes for rent at scary low rates.  Your friends think it is real because you shared it and they trust you, so they contact the person who scams them out of their info, or cash for applications, or has them click on malware.  RED FLAGS FOR THESE POSTS:  they usually hash tag the area they are posting in, they usually turn off commenting so no one can tell anyone it is a scam, and so that when the content changes, people don't wonder why a discussion of a bleeding dog or lost child is under a pic of a house for rent for $800 a month. 

9: If you are not happy with your news feed or are missing content from friends, you can adjust it.  You can ask to see more from certain friends, you can ask to see less...and Facebook works off an algorithm of your interaction, so the more you interact, the more they will guess what you want or like.  SO click LIKE on posts you like, or drop a comment to a friend, or a birthday wish, and you will likely start seeing more content from that person.  Explore your NEWS FEED settings to see how to customize the content you are seeing. If this is an issue for you, it is worth looking into how to do.

10:  You don't have to de-friend people whose posts piss you off, just choose to no longer see their posts in your feed.  You remain friends with them, but you don't see their content in your feed any longer, but you can still visit their page or message them as usual. So, if the politics gets too brutal, or the language too blue for you, etc..., just UNFOLLOW them and you won't be subjected to their posts in your feed.

EDIT: I had to edit the privacy of this post on Facebook to friends only unfortunately, because as soon as I posted it the scammers started flooding the comments... If you would like to share this you'll have to cut and paste it, and I would RECOMMEND making it FRIENDS ONLY so the scammers dont spam your page as well. They seem to have an algorithm that reads certain words and puts up comments with malicious links to recovery options. Beware, and if you repost this, beware of the comments from scammers. 

(THIS was a repost of a post I shared at Facebook originally.  I am publishing it here at my blog as well).

2022 IGUIDB Walkabout: Beach Street and Vicinity - Main To Orange

FEB 2023 Update:  All apologies for taking so long to publish this blog. I hit a couple of snags, first, being incredibly busy, second, having an issue posting pics for some reason. My attempts to post photos and organize them frustrated me to the point of walking away for a bit. Third, much of the content overlaps the info in the blog from 2018...SO, rather than attempt to repost all of that content, I will likely link you the reader to the 2018 blog, and use this blog entry as a companion update to the 2018 blog.  The link appears in the introduction below. 

-  INTRODUCTION

1. STARTING POINT - Brown Bldg N To Michigan

2. FAIRVIEW SOUTH ALONG BEACH ST TO BAY

3. BAY TO ALLEYS BEHIND STORES TO PALMETTO

4. PALMETTO BEHIND STORES TO ORANGE AVE

5. BEACH ST N TO BROWN BLDG  

INTRODUCTION: (CLICK on any of the pictures in the blog to make them larger)

Each year, members of our Facebook group "I Grew Up In Daytona Beach" meet on the Saturday after Thanksgiving to take a walk.  The purpose of the walk is not necessarily a docent led tour of the town, but to get out of our cars and walk through an area of town that you might THINK you know, but to see it as a pedestrian and take in the details of things you would not see driving past.  We take note of the changes, how things used to be, and what will be in the future, and share stories along the way. 

THIS BLOG is an accompanying text covering what we saw, and posting historic info and pictures of what may have been there before.  This is a great read for those who went on the walk or those who missed it entirely but want to know more about the history of the area.  While my historic contexts should be correct, I do not necessarily guarantee the exact accuracy of certain dates, but share this info to the best of my knowledge in an informal vein.

This year we meandered Beach Street from Main Street Bridge approach to Orange Avenue. We deviated to the former alleys between Beach and Palmetto in the area from Bay to Orange. The reasoning for this location, this year, was due to all of the changes happening in that corridor.  Demolition and construction of new structures, impending construction, the ongoing renovation of the park and Esplanade, and the condition of the existing structures in the wake of the recent storms, and streetscape issues.

This walk HEAVILY overlaps a walkabout we did in 2018 along N Beach St and the San Juan area.  I have extensive historic content posted in THAT blog.  As I was composing this blog, I found myself repeating, so instead of repeating, I will reference the 2018 blog, which can be found at this link:

CLICK HERE FOR 2018 BLOG SAN JUAN 

So while I am posting current pics at the start of the blog, I will refer you back to the 2018 blog for historic content.  


1) STARTING POINT: Brown and Brown Office Building and Points North to Michigan

 

Our starting point was at the new, and controversial Brown and Brown headquarters, located at 300 N. Beach St, the former location of the Chrysler dealership, historically, and the anchor lot of all of the car dealers in that block.  The car dealers have been long gone, and the property there had become blighted and abandoned. Our previous walkabouts had illustrated the blight on this block.  Brown's building is controversial in that, many lament that historic structures and trees in the surrounding area fell for this building.  Some feel it is too big, and call it a misplaced monstrosity, while others find it aesthetically pleasing and a welcome bellwether of change to the area. Undoubtedly, the arrival of the Brown building, as well as the Brown family financial contributions to the improvement (?) of the area have sparked a bit of a rebirth of the area, with attention now being paid by developers on how to best utilize and gentrify this area.  It is happening as we speak. 

Historically from this point, depending on your age, you would remember car lots like the Chrysler dealership, Sunrise Olds/Toyota, Lloyd Buick, up to the commercial storefronts running north til you got to the AMC/Jeep dealership at Michigan. All of those structures are gone now.  The dealerships fell long ago, but the retail buildings have been very recently demolished, to make way for a luxury apartment complex being developed by the Framework Group.

 

On the day of our walk (the Sunday after Thanksgiving, 11.27.22) the structures north of the Brown Building had largely fallen.  I had visited a week earlier to scout the walk path and took some pictures just before they were demolished.  There are historic pics at the 2018 blog.  

Here are some snapshots from Michigan to the Brown Bldg a week before the walkabout...

     all of these buildings are gone now, making way for the new apartments... 

...and here are some shots from the day of the walk...

This is the rendering for the proposed project coming to this property:

 

2. FAIRVIEW SOUTH ALONG BEACH STREET BY PROMENADE TO BAY

The Josie Rogers house in its latest permanent location at the southwestern corner of Fairview/Main and Beach, just before the Bridge.

The lot where Sears/County Admin bldg used to be...

3: BAY west to ALLEYS, across 92 to PALMETTO 

The old S&S cafeteria site

4: PALMETTO SOUTH BEHIND STORES TO ORANGE AV

5: BEACH ST north from Orange Ave back to the Brown Bldg

This is the grave for the OTHER Brownie...there was more than one Brownie, from different eras.  

James at Abraxas Books.  He is an old friend of mine since junior high school.