[KSRuff]

It would appear Facebook has disabled my author page. No clue why. This was apparently done a few months ago. I was going to ask for a review of this decision even though I fall outside their 30 day requirement, but they are asking for a photo ID of my driver's license. Has anyone else experienced this? I've had this author page for years, so I'm not sure what the issue is. I'm not posting controversial content. Have any of you experienced this? Any insight you may have would be most appreciated. A little nervous about uploading my driver's license for Facebook.

 

[Becca Mills]

Did you have a page or a profile? My understanding is that profiles are supposed to be only for personal use by real people using their real names, while pages are for businesses and are okay for pen names (though the line between person and business can be pretty blurry).

 

[Decon]

@Becca Mills @KSRuff

Not sure how this works. There must be millions of authors using pen names on social media, including Facebook.

Will they ask these two below for driving licenses for them to have verified blue ticks?

Dean Koontz - author. Facebook - real name. Brian Coffey https://www.facebook.com/search/top?q=dean koontz

Robert Galbraith - author. Facebook. - Real name JK Rowling, https://www.facebook.com/search/top?q=robert galbraith

EDIT: Got it. Here's how you do this to set up an author page from your personal account in your real name.

Create a pen name author page from your personal profile;

 

[KSRuff]

As best I can tell I have both an author page and an author profile on Facebook. The author profile allows me to participate on that author page under my pen name, without revealing my personal identity. Interestingly enough, the problem appears resolved in a round about way. Facebook wouldn't allow me to log in directly to the Facebook account for my author profile. That is when I got the account disabled notice. However, when I log into my personal profile (different name and different e-mail address), I have the option to switch between the two profiles and manage my author page that way. Maybe Facebook is just making me manage it all from one single account now - in other words linking all profiles to the personal account. I don't know. I was experiencing trouble posting links to my blog and pictures on the author page for several weeks (it just kept buffering without posting) when switching over to the author profile from my personal profile page, which is what prompted me to exit out of the personal profile and log in directly to the author profile. That's when I got the disabled notice and the request for a driver's license. When I went back into my personal profile, switched to the author profile and went to the author page, I was then able to post my stuff. Not sure how that buffering problem suddenly resolved as I had been experiencing that for weeks. Now everything seems to be functioning fine. I'm still a little freaked out that I could lose access to my author profile/page at the drop of a dime without any explanation as to why and no real customer service to help me resolve the problem. And, I still don't know if the request for driver's license is now standard operating procedure for them.

 

[Becca Mills]

I'm not sure what was going on with the stuck-in-buffering thing, but I do think you could lose your pen-name profile at any time, as it goes against Fb's rules to have a profile for business use or under an invented name. That's my understanding, anyway.

 

[KSRuff]

I'm not sure what was going on with the stuck-in-buffering thing, but I do think you could lose your pen-name profile at any time, as it goes against Fb's rules to have a profile for business use or under an invented name. That's my understanding, anyway.

Hi Becca, thanks for the heads up on this. Thankfully, my pen name is a variation on my authentic name and should also qualify as a professional name associated with my author page (which is set up as a business page), my website, business license, etc, all of which would seem to comply with this:

Names allowed on Facebook | Facebook Help Center

Facebook is a community where everyone uses the name they go by in everyday life.

www.facebook.com

Facebook prompted me to merge the two profiles last year. They claimed it was easier to manage and switch between the accounts if they were linked, so I clicked "yes." This generated a list of profiles on the right side of my personal Facebook page that I can easily switch between. (When I click on my profile there is an option to "see all profiles" and a handy button that allows me to switch between them. When I click on that button to switch profiles, I get a pop up that says: "You are now acting as K.S. Ruff on Facebook.") That's how I have been accessing the author profile for months. It wasn't until I had trouble with the buffering that I thought to log out of my personal account and log into the author account directly. My guess is they disabled the separate author account when I agreed to merge everything, and I didn't realize that would happen when I merged the accounts. Maybe that prompt to merge everything helped put me in compliance. I also lucked out that my pen name is a variation on my authentic name. It seems odd Facebook would include the "see all profiles" option and the button that allows me to switch between them if they weren't okay with me having multiple profiles. Again, that could just be because the pen name is a variation on my authentic name. It would be interesting to hear whether other authors with pen names have been given this same option so they can manage multiple profiles. It would suck to lose the social media presence/credibility we have spent years building.

 

[Becca Mills]

Ah, so they've made the author profile a sort of alternative persona attached to the personal profile? Interesting!

 

[Lady Runa]

It would appear Facebook has disabled my author page. No clue why. This was apparently done a few months ago. I was going to ask for a review of this decision even though I fall outside their 30 day requirement, but they are asking for a photo ID of my driver's license. Has anyone else experienced this? I've had this author page for years, so I'm not sure what the issue is. I'm not posting controversial content. Have any of you experienced this? Any insight you may have would be most appreciated. A little nervous about uploading my driver's license for Facebook.

Yes, I had a similar problem with Facebook a few years back - at the time when they started banning nicknames. I too had a regular account with my real name and one with my pen name. They too froze my pen name account out of the blue and asked me for an ID to confirm my identity. I was quite shocked, to tell you the truth, but I did that, no problem. I think they do this to make sure everyone complies with their "one real name - one account' policy. A bit Big-Brotherish, if you ask me.

 

[KSRuff]

Ah, so they've made the author profile a sort of alternative persona attached to the personal profile? Interesting!

Yes. Exactly.

 

[cecilia_writer]

What I've found with Facebook is that the Facebook app that I have on my tablet is really flaky, and quite often if I switch from one page to another it crashes or wants me to log into my actual account again. I don't have this problem with accessing FB online. Somehow I've acquired 4 identities there - one is my profile, under my real name and one is my author page under my pen-name. The others are a community centre page for which I am the admin along with someone else for backup, and a page for a loose collection of 5 writers who can each post there under a communal name. I can only log in directly to my own profile and I have to access everything else from there. I'm guessing that having a different email for your author page may be what's caused this problem.

Swapping over from one 'identity' to another usually results in the message described above ('you are now acting as....') so the posts to the community centre page appear under the name of the community centre and so on.
As far as I know this is all according to their guidelines and I haven't yet had a problem with it except for the glitchy app.

 

[AnnaBF]

Yes. Exactly.

Facebook sent me a message asking me if I wanted to set up a new profile "for my interests?" Can't remember the exact wording. I was surprised since I've always been warned not to set up a second profile in my author's name. But I belonged to a bunch of FB groups for sewing, knitting, cooking and have 2 IG profiles which are connected to my FB, one for my sewing interests. Like my IG accounts, the FB profiles are connected, and I can switch between to the two as well.