How to Break With Facebook

Annoyed with Facebook or, more precisely, with everyone in your Facebook orbit? Chris Gaylord offers a primer on various ways to make the pain go away, up to and including the "nuclear option" of deleting your account. Gaylord offers step-by-step instructions in the Christian Science Monitor on how to:

• Deactivate temporarily: Your profile info, photos, etc., are all saved but hidden from users. You can sign back in at any time to restore the account. Think of it as a trial separation.

• Shield pests: Sure, you can delete annoying people from your friends list, but you can also take the less awkward steps of hiding their status updates so you never see them—or hiding yours from them.
• Privacy worries: If this is your beef, it's easy to request all the stuff Facebook has collected on you, and it arrives in a "single, giant Zip file."
• Go nuclear: It's also "pretty easy" to delete your account, and Gaylord explains how to find the link under the Help button.

For more. click here. (More Facebook stories.)