You got your social media in my Pictionary.

April 19, 2012 8:33 AM

Casual/addictive doodle game Draw Something updated earlier today. Now it's not letting me log in without giving it permission to post things on my Facebook (which I very much Do Not Want). Is there any way I can disable or otherwise get around this new "feature" without resetting my account, or is my glorious 49 turn record doomed forever?
posted by fight or flight to computers & internet (12 answers total)

If it's the spam to your friends you're worried about, you could allow posting to your account and set "Who can see posts this app makes for me on my Facebook timeline?" to "Only Me" in Privacy Settings > Apps and websites.
posted by Memo at 8:38 AM on April 19, 2012

I think the easiest work around is to edit your App settings on Facebook (under "privacy settings" then "app settings." On "Draw Something" you can edit "Who can see posts this app makes for me on my Facebook profile?" to "Only Me." It's not perfect but it will allow the app to run but no-one will see any posts.

Also- I think it won't post anything on your wall without you doing something specific within the app (sharing the drawing).
posted by cushie at 8:38 AM on April 19, 2012

You may be able to restore the older version of Draw Something, which still works: Here are instructions for iOS. I'm sure you could find something similar for the android version.
posted by Oktober at 8:39 AM on April 19, 2012

This is only for the "Share this picture!" feature they just added. Welcome to the world of Zynga, this kind of integration will not go away.
posted by Patbon at 8:40 AM on April 19, 2012

Thanks guys. I am mostly concerned with keeping my friends spam-free. I've changed the app settings on my Facebook as Memo and cuchie suggested. Guess I'll keep an eye on it to make sure it sticks.

Boo-urns, Zynga. Boo-urns.
posted by fight or flight at 8:45 AM on April 19, 2012

I log in via e-mail and a password, bypassing Facebook entirely. You might have to allow FB access briefly to set those up, but once they are you could revoke permission entirely.
posted by rewil at 8:49 AM on April 19, 2012 [1 favorite]

Does this mean you can't play Draw Something if you don't have a facebook account?
posted by something something at 8:59 AM on April 19, 2012

I upgraded yesterday and it hasn't been posting anything to Facebook. Just don't click on the "share this picture" thing, and you'll be fine.
posted by chowflap at 9:08 AM on April 19, 2012

And, what rewil said. I never sign into any app using my Facebook account, just for this very reason.
posted by chowflap at 9:09 AM on April 19, 2012 [4 favorites]

I did sign up through FB initially (thought I had to), but when I subsequently went into my account and created an actual Draw Something user name, it removed the FB connection.

I've since learned you can also sign up initially without going through FB -- I've set up several family members this way.
posted by pardonyou? at 1:08 PM on April 19, 2012

My usual way of dealing with things like this is to sign up with my alternate FB account. It's not under my name, has no friends, and I only use if for jerk apps like this. It also lets me do things like "'Like' this game on Facebook for free crap" without a guilty conscience. (This requires you to have a second email address. And yes, it's against FB polices to have more than one account.)
posted by Ookseer at 9:43 PM on April 19, 2012

If you follow cushie's directions to get to Facebook's app settings page, you should also be able to go into Draw Something and revoke its permission to post to your timeline. There will be a section of "This app can," and "Post on my behalf" will be in there. There should be either a clickable X to the right of it, or a "remove" option.

I tested this -- turned off Draw Something's ability to post on my behalf, then fired up the game and told it to share a drawing to Facebook. Nothing posted to my timeline! There was a new photo album (with that picture in it, visible only to me) and a message informing me that it couldn't post that picture publicly until I gave it the OK.
posted by themissy at 4:07 PM on April 21, 2012