Imagine the world. In the world all people have jobs. Now realize that most of these people working on their jobs have absolutely no idea what they're doing, and just apply a standard stamp on everything. Abandonia case. Reality. Sucks.

The layout changes are so lame, it doesn't make sense.

The forums have always been used by a very small minority among the users of the website, even before AB had a Facebook profile. :/

I deliked it too. Unliked... Bugger these neologisms. Anyway, i like to keep my personal life private <_<

RSS, the Abandonia FB group has provided us with effective real-time communication with users of the site, regarding site content and site events, but more importantly (for me anyway) it allows us to deal with user site issues etc. almost immediately. We have thousands more Abandonians off-site than those who are active on these forums, it (and twitter) are ideal ways to communicate with them, advertise our content and build awareness of what we are and what we do.

The changes with the site front page layout have only just been implemented, and will be evolving. It has already been mentioned that the staff you are addressing here do not have control over these changes, please use the "contact us" form via the navigation links or contact Abovo directly via their website to voice your concerns more effectively.

And finally, as always with the internet, if you don't like something, you are free to not participate as some of you have already chosen to do.

I like it, not the placing but with time I am sure we can get it moved around. Getting our updates and news out to as many people as possible can only help the site. Also everything Lulu said.

The reasoning behind these changes are clearly an attempt to push the social networks in order to increase the traffic esponentially. Looking at our previous statistics the addition of the Facebook panel brought us lot of visibility even if it was added 2 days ago.
Moreover, in this occasion, Abovo employees managed to repair broken parts of the layout, so it's not just a matter o publicity.

The layout is still under developement though, luckily we can do little but significant changes, in fact during these days I've spent several hours repairing placements that covered functional pages of the site and I tried to adapt Drupal blocks to their modifications.

I've learned how this site works and technically speaking I can say without a doubt that the layout works better now.
However, talking about graphics it's impossible that everyone will appreciate the final result. It's always pretty subjective.

Speaking about privacy I find your critics out of place, Facebook is a personal page placed on the internet and your personal informations are always displayed in public. If you find this so irritating I suggest you to adjust your privacy settings because it's not a link on Abandonia that reveals your private details to the world.

This is the kind of innocent thoughts which lead you to wonder how those thieves got away with your credit card so easily.

Anybody can create an app in Facebook and get immediate access to your "so called private" informations. From there, they know your adress, your date of birth... Hell, most people even put their phone number(s) and very sensitive info there, not giving it the slightest shadow of a thought more.

Ever seen apps in which the only purpose is to look into your account and sort all your friends by ranks of whatever? Yeah, those apps are able to see the stupid user friend page just as if they were your own friend because they get access to it for their "review". So even if you are smart and cover your tracks, there is always a dumb one who don't know better who get the job done for you.

Welcome to the real world.

While that may be true, none of that is related to the "like this" link on Abandonia.

Caveat Emptor as always.

EoF, calm down and think for a moment. It's Facebook who requested, stored and and is revealing those details. It's the Facebook users who willingly gave this information away. We don't have anything to do with it.
Abandonia had a Facebook page. Abandonia now also has a Facebook Like button on the front page. That's all we have to do with Facebook.

I really fail to see how that invalid what I just said. Unless people want to hide their head in the sand, as always.

I'm really not angry or anything though. Only as always on a crusade against ignorance. Things like this are either ignored or discarded by a lot of people even though it is the plain truth.

Also, the simple fact that that app on the site shows the members images (or avatar) is enough for me to write this. It is only the tip of the iceberg but I don't see why it should go unheard nevertheless.