7 ms·

"As Facebook's privacy policy promised, 'No personal information that you submit to Facebook will be available to any user of the Web Site who does not belong t

by char 16y ago

"As Facebook's privacy policy promised, 'No personal information that you submit to Facebook will be available to any user of the Web Site who does not belong to at least one of the groups specified by you in your privacy settings'." This is STILL true, and it's publicly known how to maintain privacy. You can keep all your information private to everyone who isn't a friend, and you get to control exactly who your friends are. If you become a "Fan" of something or post on someone's comment/Wall, you're sharing some of your information with that page. No shit it's public. Why is a misunderstanding/lack of education about Facebooks policies equivalent to that site being sneaky and/or evil?

jfager 16y ago
You're misunderstanding the issue. Today's change takes previously private or limited exposure profile information and uses it to create ad-hoc groups that people never explicitly acted to join. It's very similar to the Google Buzz fiasco, except with interests being exposed instead of contacts.
- indigoviolet 16y ago
  It's opt-in.
  - jfager 16y ago
    Barely. The explanation of what you're opting into is terse and vague enough that most people won't really understand what's going on, and if you decide not to opt in, FB wipes out almost your entire profile.
    - indigoviolet 16y ago
      How would you support the claim that most people won't understand what is going on? Edit: I guess the point I'm trying to make is that Facebook actually tests the UI and copy in experiments and in the lab before deploying it; so when you make a claim that it's not working, I'd like to see some supporting evidence.
      - jfager 16y ago
        Because I have friends and family who ask me all kinds of crazy questions about how things work, and I'm guessing the experience I had on FB this morning won't be enough to let me dodge those questions. It's a personal opinion, but one I think is pretty well grounded in my own experiences. What isn't opinion is that opting out results in wiping out almost everything from your profile. That's a fairly punitive action to take against someone who doesn't want to opt in to an "opt-in" feature. And saying that "Facebook actually tests the UI" means pretty much nothing to me. Do they publish the tests and the results? How confusing can a feature be before it's scrapped? Does the importance of the business function the feature supports affect that threshold? On top of that, given FB's history of privacy screwups and subsequent rollbacks, why should I have any faith in the company at all in this area? FB has always seemed more than comfortable with the "ask forgiveness rather than permission" model.

by char 16y ago

jfager 16y ago

You're misunderstanding the issue. Today's change takes previously private or limited exposure profile information and uses it to create ad-hoc groups that people never explicitly acted to join. It's very similar to the Google Buzz fiasco, except with interests being exposed instead of contacts.

indigoviolet 16y ago
It's opt-in.
- jfager 16y ago
  Barely. The explanation of what you're opting into is terse and vague enough that most people won't really understand what's going on, and if you decide not to opt in, FB wipes out almost your entire profile.
  - indigoviolet 16y ago
    How would you support the claim that most people won't understand what is going on? Edit: I guess the point I'm trying to make is that Facebook actually tests the UI and copy in experiments and in the lab before deploying it; so when you make a claim that it's not working, I'd like to see some supporting evidence.
    - jfager 16y ago
      Because I have friends and family who ask me all kinds of crazy questions about how things work, and I'm guessing the experience I had on FB this morning won't be enough to let me dodge those questions. It's a personal opinion, but one I think is pretty well grounded in my own experiences. What isn't opinion is that opting out results in wiping out almost everything from your profile. That's a fairly punitive action to take against someone who doesn't want to opt in to an "opt-in" feature. And saying that "Facebook actually tests the UI" means pretty much nothing to me. Do they publish the tests and the results? How confusing can a feature be before it's scrapped? Does the importance of the business function the feature supports affect that threshold? On top of that, given FB's history of privacy screwups and subsequent rollbacks, why should I have any faith in the company at all in this area? FB has always seemed more than comfortable with the "ask forgiveness rather than permission" model.