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Facebook-Deprived Man Sues For $500K
broggyr writes "According to a story from MSNBC: 'For Mustafa Fteja, Facebook is more than just a hobby. It's the main way the 30-year-old Albanian native has stayed in touch with friends and family all over the world for three years, and when he was inexplicably cut off from it, he did what every other person in this country seems to do when they're mad enough: he sued. In seeking $500,000, Fteja is suing Facebook for disabling his account, in which he had about 340 friends and family and had spent "timeless hours creating content and relationships [Facebook] benefited from," the suit contends. He wants it back on, and he wants the company to pay for the damage of alienating him from his family and friends (about $1500 per friend/family).' Must be nice when you can use a free site and expect to get paid when they cut you off."
Considering you are required to give up your rights to any information posted on Facebook, does that not indicate you are in fact paying a fee for using it? It might not be a monetary fee, but a fee none the less.
You still have Telephone, you still have Internet, you still have any number of ways that people can use to keep in touch. No more than 20 years ago, we didn't even have Internet as commonly as we do now. This is not a requirement for you to live. They didn't cut off your power unjustly, or even your phone line. When I read "More than just a hobby" I thought it was going to explain that he makes a living through facebook... maybe then I'd see where he's coming from. As it is, all I see is another facebook addict who feels that it's his god given right to keep up to date with his friends.
This looks like a pretty clear cut cash grab. He says it's for "Justice" but I call bullshit on that. Justice in the amount of five hundred thousand dollars maybe. Too bad for him, I'm pretty sure there is something in the EULA that would state Facebook reserves the right to cancel your account for whatever reason they want. I don't know what this guy is expecting to have happen. In the end, frankly, I hope they counter sue for legal costs. Suing for a ridiculous reason like this shouldn't go unpunished. It's an affront to the legal system to be wasting it's time like this.
Facebook has never been free as in beer. I have never had to give up a ton of personal info to get free beer, it's just handed to me.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Lots of comments about how suing is evil and hope this guy loses blah blah blah. Anyone ask why this guy got booted? The guy basically has not been told why he was booted. Despite repeated emails all he was told was "you violated our terms of service" which is a nice generic cop out for "out automated processes found something and we don't feel like treating you like a human being to give you any more specifics." It seems like suing to find out why is his only option since Facebook isn't cooperating.
Sure it's a free service, sure it's quite possible that it's not a big deal since it's only a social networking site and little of value will truly be lost. However, Facebook offered it's service for free, the guy used it, and then got booted without discussion. The guy deserves at least some answers, any human being would. And it looks like the only way to get answers is to make it relevant to Facebook that they should be providing them or risk this and other lawsuits. It sounds less frivolous and more like the guy just wants some respect and I think he deserves it. Otherwise we risk other people being treated like this. I urge this man to go go go.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
While $500,000 is ridiculous for compensation from a free service, I do feel he has one valid point: if Facebook has disabled his account for any reason, they should provide it to him and give him some avenue to correct the situation. Even though it's a free service, with over 500 million active users, it's a pretty ubiquitous and universal service. It might not be wise to come to depend on it, but it's certainly understandable how someone would. If Google seemingly arbitrarily disabled your Gmail account (insert free but depended on email service here) would you be as dismissive?