Fleesboek: Facebook’s Deleted Photo Album

one small seed — Wed, 29 May 2013 07:29:32 +0000

The Internet and social media have created a photographic world in which people constantly express and narrate themselves through visual imagery. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr are just a few platforms on which people can post and share information, likes, hobbies, and interests in order to connect with like-minded revelers. Many credit the Internet with a utopian quality that accepts all, but microblogs like Fleesboek demonstrate discrepancies and deletions that are steering social media to a more exclusive rather than inclusive direction.

Image: ©Jindrich Richter, Fleesboek

The First Principle of Facebook states that:

People should have the freedom to share whatever information they want, in any medium and any format… as long as they both consent to the connection

Despite this democratic disposition, Facebook still has veto power over all the content its users post, and thus has the resources to delete or remove any content. 250 million photos are uploaded to Facebook everyday by over a billion culturally diverse people. Unfortunately, if your content doesn’t sync with Facebook’s approval, you may be asked to remove your photos. Enter Fleesboek, a simple but visually striking Tumblr account that provides a home for all the images Facebook didn’t like.

Image: ©Ruslan Lobanov, Fleesboek

The site contains an array of photos ranging from nude shots, landscape photography, and black and white poses. An image captured by Hunter S. Thompson shows a nude woman turned away from the camera, enjoying a view. A more explicit visual, snapped by Stephan Wurth, juxtaposes a fully-clothed girl alongside a naked girl with a bow-tie collar around her neck. The Internet is often considered to be a space of free association, but with the onslaught of commercialisation, these spaces are becoming increasingly restricted. In April last year, Facebook paid 1 billion dollars to acquire the rights of Instagram – a social media tool that narrates the daily lives of ordinary people in snap shots. Visual elements are vital modes of expression in the digital society, yet independent blogs like Fleesboek highlight social media’s tendency to become less socially inclusive. So if your next upload is too much for Facebook or Instagram, you might consider getting your photos out there through alternative less ‘popular’ but maybe more upfront channels.

Image: ©Hunter S. Thompson, Feesboek

Image: ©Stephan Wurth, Fleesboek

Image: ©Andrey Yakovlev & Lili Aleeva, Fleesboek

Image: Fleesboek

image: via roykahmann.tumblr.com

Images: fleesboek.tumblr.com, roykahmann.tumblr.com

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Fleesboek: Facebook’s Deleted Photo Album