[kwlug-disc] Scraping Facebook

[Paul Nijjar]

On Tue, Dec 05, 2017 at 04:21:59PM -0500, Darcy Casselman wrote:
> "Scraping" usually refers to getting data out of the HTML UI, not
> necessarily an API. It would be great if Facebook provided a nice API, or
> an RSS feed, but it doesn't and it won't.


It used to provide RSS feeds. It also used to provide API access.
The source of this script is an educational read: 

https://www.jwz.org/hacks/#facebook-rss

But this doesn't really solve the problem. To make Facebook non-creepy
you ought to be able to choose what Facebook shows you, and if you are
scraping HTML/JS then Facebook has already made those decisions for
you, no? How is reproducing the content of your already filtered feed
less creepy than just using Facebook? Is it because you are not being
tracked as heavily?

JWZ's solution to "prevent Facebook from blocking my app" is to
impersonate an iPhone, but I guess that does not work any more?

- Paul