4 ms·

Remember News Feed? People freaked out, started screaming about suing, etc. Just watch: people will get more comfortable sharing their basic information, and yo

by dcurtis 16y ago

Remember News Feed? People freaked out, started screaming about suing, etc. Just watch: people will get more comfortable sharing their basic information, and you will too. This privacy freakout is really amazing to me.

natrius 16y ago
The Instant Personalization stuff has potential to actually be an issue, but everything else seems like an overreaction.
- Lazlo_Nibble 16y ago
  Well, yeah, people are getting kind of twitchy about Facebook privacy issues. It's like Water Torture -- the individual drops of water are basically harmless but they just keep falling and you have no idea when the next one's coming. Most people aren't wired to deal with that very well. I've already had to deal with two stupid surprises in the last week: the expansion of their ability to track your use of other sites, and their mandatory conversion of your likes/interests/employer/etc. information into "likes" on an automatically-generated community page. The former is genuinely intrusive, and while the latter is arguably trivial it creates another entire layer of crap I have to manage. (I also lost most of my likes & interests in the conversion because it wasn't clear that disallowing the "like" would actually delete the entry. Pricks.) When I first joined I was kind of amused at my friends who had registered under pseudonyms -- but the benefits are becoming apparent.
pedalpete 16y ago
Remember Beacon? The News Feed is shared with people you know, and only people you have added as Friends (or sometimes one step removed when somebody you know comments on a photo or something). Beacon was about selling your information to advertisers and 3rd parties whom you had a very loose connection with. The example being the guy who bought his engagement ring and had it broadcast via facebook before he was even engaged. With the news feed, you control the information which is posted (with the exception of being tagged in photos). Now Facebook is sharing your information with 3rd parties whom you have NO connection with. I don't use Docs, Yelp, or Pandora, but they were given access to all my information. Remember, they were 'given' access before Facebook announced what was happening. Before we had the option to opt-out.
- dcurtis 16y ago
  Beacon was great because it showed that Facebook isn't scared to take risks. They later admitted it was a bad idea. I'd rather a company like Facebook err on the side of innovation.
  - seldo 16y ago
    Selling my information to third parties without permission or prior notification is neither innovative nor brave.
    - julio_the_squid 16y ago
      I suppose you could say it's 'brave', though, in the same way that trying to swindle someone and hoping they don't notice is brave.
      - jrockway 16y ago
        That's not what "brave" means.
        bonaldi 16y ago
        /pedant: it is, actually. Definition is "ready to face danger or pain". "Brave" is mostly used approvingly, but it's also completely proper in sentences like "He decided the app should be IE-only, which was a brave move but one he felt was justified by ..." Similarly with "daring" -- you often hear of "daring robberies" and the like.
        orborde 16y ago
        Interesting point. "Brave" is usually considered to be a virtue, and people don't want to attribute virtues to scoundrels.
        jrockway 16y ago
        Ah, the joys of learning English from dictionary definitions instead of literary use.
jayair 16y ago
The demographic is vastly different now. Imagine this sorta thing goes on the 6 o'clock news which parents would interpret as a hazard to their family's privacy. Most of the current demographic will not understand Facebook's privacy settings. And the whole freakout over this is will be blown out of proportion to the point where parents are going to tell each other to "protect" their kids on Facebook or worse demand some sort of legislation that does. One of the biggest reasons I think this might happen is because a vast majority of people still trust what they hear on the TV or radio over some website or online document that says Facebook cares about your privacy.
- Qz 16y ago
  "Most of the current demographic will not understand Facebook's privacy settings." That's because they're intentionally byzantine.
bonaldi 16y ago
This is becoming a FB blindspot. Zuckerburg (and FB in general) now just dismiss all criticism of any changes they make because -- hey! News Feed was criticised. I don't know that betting your business against growing storms of criticism on nothing more than a reverse gambler's fallacy is the best plan, tbh.

by dcurtis 16y ago

natrius 16y ago

The Instant Personalization stuff has potential to actually be an issue, but everything else seems like an overreaction.

Lazlo_Nibble 16y ago
Well, yeah, people are getting kind of twitchy about Facebook privacy issues. It's like Water Torture -- the individual drops of water are basically harmless but they just keep falling and you have no idea when the next one's coming. Most people aren't wired to deal with that very well. I've already had to deal with two stupid surprises in the last week: the expansion of their ability to track your use of other sites, and their mandatory conversion of your likes/interests/employer/etc. information into "likes" on an automatically-generated community page. The former is genuinely intrusive, and while the latter is arguably trivial it creates another entire layer of crap I have to manage. (I also lost most of my likes & interests in the conversion because it wasn't clear that disallowing the "like" would actually delete the entry. Pricks.) When I first joined I was kind of amused at my friends who had registered under pseudonyms -- but the benefits are becoming apparent.

pedalpete 16y ago

Remember Beacon? The News Feed is shared with people you know, and only people you have added as Friends (or sometimes one step removed when somebody you know comments on a photo or something). Beacon was about selling your information to advertisers and 3rd parties whom you had a very loose connection with. The example being the guy who bought his engagement ring and had it broadcast via facebook before he was even engaged. With the news feed, you control the information which is posted (with the exception of being tagged in photos). Now Facebook is sharing your information with 3rd parties whom you have NO connection with. I don't use Docs, Yelp, or Pandora, but they were given access to all my information. Remember, they were 'given' access before Facebook announced what was happening. Before we had the option to opt-out.

dcurtis 16y ago
Beacon was great because it showed that Facebook isn't scared to take risks. They later admitted it was a bad idea. I'd rather a company like Facebook err on the side of innovation.
- seldo 16y ago
  Selling my information to third parties without permission or prior notification is neither innovative nor brave.
  - julio_the_squid 16y ago
    I suppose you could say it's 'brave', though, in the same way that trying to swindle someone and hoping they don't notice is brave.
    - jrockway 16y ago
      That's not what "brave" means.
      - bonaldi 16y ago
        /pedant: it is, actually. Definition is "ready to face danger or pain". "Brave" is mostly used approvingly, but it's also completely proper in sentences like "He decided the app should be IE-only, which was a brave move but one he felt was justified by ..." Similarly with "daring" -- you often hear of "daring robberies" and the like.
        orborde 16y ago
        Interesting point. "Brave" is usually considered to be a virtue, and people don't want to attribute virtues to scoundrels.
        jrockway 16y ago
        Ah, the joys of learning English from dictionary definitions instead of literary use.

jayair 16y ago

The demographic is vastly different now. Imagine this sorta thing goes on the 6 o'clock news which parents would interpret as a hazard to their family's privacy. Most of the current demographic will not understand Facebook's privacy settings. And the whole freakout over this is will be blown out of proportion to the point where parents are going to tell each other to "protect" their kids on Facebook or worse demand some sort of legislation that does. One of the biggest reasons I think this might happen is because a vast majority of people still trust what they hear on the TV or radio over some website or online document that says Facebook cares about your privacy.

Qz 16y ago
"Most of the current demographic will not understand Facebook's privacy settings." That's because they're intentionally byzantine.

bonaldi 16y ago

This is becoming a FB blindspot. Zuckerburg (and FB in general) now just dismiss all criticism of any changes they make because -- hey! News Feed was criticised. I don't know that betting your business against growing storms of criticism on nothing more than a reverse gambler's fallacy is the best plan, tbh.