Last week, we mentioned Breakup Notifier, a Facebook-related service that allowed users to register and then receive updates when someone they’re obsessed with attracted to ended whatever relationship they’re in.

That service has been shut down by Facebook. Because they got 3.6 million users in the ]]>

Last week, we mentioned Breakup Notifier, a Facebook-related service that allowed users to register and then receive updates when someone they’re obsessed with attracted to ended whatever relationship they’re in.

That service has been shut down by Facebook. Because they got 3.6 million users in the span of about seven days.

In the grand scheme of things, that’s actually a fairly small percentage of people who use Facebook. However, it’s an incredibly large amount of folks that would like to immediately know — via email or however — when someone becomes single, even if by doing so they violate their privacy.

Speaking of violation of privacy, Facebook didn’t cite that when they shut down the service. Instead, they let developer Dan Loewenherz know, via TechCrunch, that they were crushing his hopes and dreams because of an API call.

“To ensure positive user experiences on Platform, we run routine automated screens that take user feedback, machine learning and various algorithms into account and remove spammy applications. For example, if an application is making an inordinate number of stream.publish calls and receiving a large number of user reports, it may be removed by our automated systems to protect the user experience and the Platform ecosystem.”

Of course, API calls don’t exactly justify the need to remove Dan’s personal Facebook account.

If you check out Dan’s Twitter feed — or the Breakup Notifier Twitter feed — you’ll notice that they’d love to get things up and running again, but haven’t had much success as of yet, due to Facebook stonewalling them.

Perhaps he should try stalking?

A woman was arrested for “poking” someone on Facebook. You might think that she deserved to be arrested for using that feature, but it was actually because it was a violation of an order of protection. But still, poking sucks.

A Hendersonville woman was arrested for ]]>

A woman was arrested for “poking” someone on Facebook. You might think that she deserved to be arrested for using that feature, but it was actually because it was a violation of an order of protection. But still, poking sucks.

A Hendersonville woman was arrested for virtually “poking” someone on the social networking site Facebook.

Shannon D. Jackson, 36, was arrested Friday, Sept. 25 for allegedly violating an order of protection.

According to the affidavit filed in Sumner County General Sessions Court, Jackson is accused of using the “poke” option on Facebook to contact a Hendersonville woman, thus violating the terms of the order of protection, which stipulates “no telephoning, contacting or otherwise communicating with the petitioner.”

Poking is a feature unique to Facebook that conveys no other message but informing a user they have been “poked” by another user.

Hendersonville police have made copies of the page in which the alleged victim is shown to be “poked,” according to the affidavit.

Waaaaait so this person whom she poked had an order of protection against Jackson, but she said, “Oh, fine, we can stay Facebook friends”? How desperate do you have to be for online validation to do that? “Hey, you stabbed my dog. I am not okay with that. But you can totally check out my results for the quiz, ‘What Is Your Favorite Type of Dog Whom You’d Prefer Not Get Stabbed?’ I would never take that right away from you.”

[Tennesseean]

How can a 53 year-old Miley Cyrus fan get any creepier? By stalking her with great enthusiasm and claiming to be engaged to her. So, job well done.

A 53-year-old man who told police he is secretly engaged to marry Miley Cyrus has been charged with ]]>

How can a 53 year-old Miley Cyrus fan get any creepier? By stalking her with great enthusiasm and claiming to be engaged to her. So, job well done.

A 53-year-old man who told police he is secretly engaged to marry Miley Cyrus has been charged with attempting to stalk the
teenage “Hannah Montana” star, who is filming a movie in Georgia.

Tybee Island Police Chief Jim Price said Wednesday that Mark
McLeod, 53, of Appling was arrested after Walt Disney Pictures
security officers reported he had returned to the beachside movie
set Sunday after police warned him to stay away in June.

“He was asking for Miley and going up and knocking on some
doors” of beach homes near the set, Price said. “The security
guards recognized him. In fact, he went up to the security guards
and asked them ‘Is Miley around?”‘

In March, the New York Daily news shot video of McLeod waiting
in line at a book-signing appearance by Cyrus in Manhattan. “Hold
me up. I’m a little bit nervous,” said McLeod, shivering in a heavy
coat and wool hat.

“It’s the first time I’ve ever, uh, actually been face to face
with her,” McLeod told the newspaper. “I talk to her a lot but it’s
kind of like I talk and she responds with pictures. It’s just the
way we communicate. I’m going to get her some flowers and I’m going
to ask her to marry me.”

I don’t want to generalize too much, but anyone who’ll wait in line for an autograph or a picture who isn’t under 15 years old probably has some sort of social defect. I just don’t get what meeting the celebrity du jour is going to do to really impact your life in any meaningful way. Wow, I smelled Miley Cyrus’s surprisingly odorous armpits, whoop dee doo, let’s throw a parade.

But yeah when you’re a 53 year-old guy and your fixation is some teenage pop star, I don’t think there’s a whole lot of hope for you. In fact, I’d be surprised there weren’t some young boys at a Hannah Montana concert who found their way to a watery grave because, hey Mark McLeod is a reasonable man…until you mess with his special lady who has no clue he exists except when he imagines photos talking to him. No poet could capture a love so beautiful.

[via]

Facebook is probably the most popular thing to ever exist in the history of anything, quickly becoming like The Grid in which every single person must be on it or not actually count as a human being in modern society. So of course, stalkers have found their way to the ]]>

Facebook is probably the most popular thing to ever exist in the history of anything, quickly becoming like The Grid in which every single person must be on it or not actually count as a human being in modern society. So of course, stalkers have found their way to the medium. Anyway I don’t have a good transition, but I found this video on the subject to be pretty funny.

Facebook is weird to me. Like I can post photos of myself doing something really mundane for me like saving a bus full of burning children or eating a cheeseburger and ONE THOUSAND people will see that. Think about that. ONE THOUSAND. That’s amazingly powerful. I could jerk off in the middle of Times Square while doing a headstand and giving everyone tips on how to solve all of the problems of the economy and one thousand people wouldn’t see that. And I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t take my economic policies seriously.

[thanks to Pol for the tip]

Some people are way into Robin Meade, apparently. Including this kid, who stalked her so hard that she had to get a restraining order on him. That’s Robin on the right, with alleged “sexy legs”.

A Maine man showed up outside CNN’s Atlanta ]]>

Some people are way into Robin Meade, apparently. Including this kid, who stalked her so hard that she had to get a restraining order on him. That’s Robin on the right, with alleged “sexy legs”.

A Maine man showed up outside CNN’s Atlanta headquarters earlier this month, claiming anchorwoman Robin Meade used on-air body language to tell him to travel to Atlanta, according to a police report.

Atlanta police have not arrested Gregory Fitzgerald, 32, of Lewiston, Me., but advised Meade to seek a restraining order against him, the police report said.

Apparently, CNN or Meade followed through. Fitzgerald was served with a restraining order before he returned to Maine, said his stepfather, Paul Stufflebeam of Lewiston.

“He’s a good kid,” Stufflebeam said. “He’s never hurt anybody. He doesn’t have an aggressive bone in his body.”

Fitzgerald told Stufflebeam that he was flying to Atlanta to spend time with a woman he met on the Internet and had been chatting with her for a couple years, Stufflebeam said.

I can think of one aggressive bone. It rhymes with “penis”.

I like the way this kid thinks though. Everybody’s stalking sexy Hollywood starlets, maybe you can go for a more achievable stalking of a hostess of a second rate show on a second rate cable news network (Headline News…come on, that’s hardly CNN). That’s why my courtship of Robert Gray is working out so well.