I'm not sure if anyone feels the same way I do, but I'm really uncomfortable with the idea of having my baby's picture plastered all over Facebook within hours of her birth. I am trying to come up with a tactful way of asking people not to post pictures of her, at least until DH and I have had the chance to announce the birth to the rest of our friends and family in our own way. Honestly, I would rather not have any pictures of her posted at all, ever. But that is going to be impossible to avoid. Our parents won't be an issue, because while they have Facebook, they barely use it. I'm more concerned about our sisters, cousins, and my crazy aunt who has to look like she is the FIRST to know and announce everything. Are any of you concerned about this or have you dealt with it in the past?
Re: Facebook
We still have that rule. I have a super secret FB account that I use now only for connecting with local moms and I rarely post pics of DD. When I do, I delete them a few days later. No one else is allowed to post pictures of my kids.
Is it a privacy concern, a desire to announce the birth yourself, or more related to the idea that you want to "control" what pics are posted? I think you can try to ask friends/family to please let you & DH make "the big announcement", and hopefully they respect that request, but be prepared for news & pics to leak....in fact, traditionally (before FB), a lot of families would call around to let everyone know that baby had arrived, while Mom & Dad rested.
Edit: I don't find it "creepy" that your family would want to share the news of their new grandchild/niece/nephew/cousin with their friends. A baby touches many people's lives. We can't control other adult's behavior (or their FB privacy setting). I guess I'm not clear on what the main "concern" is here, exactly....what is the fear that's driving the desire to control everyone else's FB? It's 2013, and with 70% of the US on FB, people can & do post pics of events they attend, because its THEIR life...if you are part of their life, you might see yourself of their FB page.
I have friends who are the same way, and I felt the same way...until DH posted a pic while I was recovering from my C-section. I guess we hadn't discussed that...
Just talk to them and tell them no pictures. If you have to, just don't allow them to take pictures. Why do their friends need to see pics of your baby anyway? That's creepy to me.
The only person (besides DH and me) who ever posts pics of DS is my dad, and it's very rare since we don't see them often. In his case, it's just not worth fighting over, so I don't say anything. I did ask him to change his privacy settings, though, since his profile was pretty open, and he at least did that. It's only a couple of pics a year.
When I went into labor I shut my Facebook down so that no one could post on my wall at all. Good thing I did because my brother took it upon himself to announce the birth and the baby's name (!) before I could. I can't control what shows up on his wall but I can make it so I'm not tagged in anything.
You can also just email family members and ask them to remove photos.
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I am more concerned that one of our family will post the news on fb before we get to, and our plan is to wait a few days to do that. So we will be letting them know if they want to visit at the hospital and take pictures, they will have to keep them private.