More Facebook - Dodging the Issue

It seems that the growing outcry from unhappy Facebookers finally got Mark Zuckerberg's attention. Or maybe he just read my earlier blog post and felt bad. The former sounds more likely, while the latter is me sometimes thinking that people read my blog. Whatever the reason, there has been more news on Facebook's recent bumblings, because Zuckerberg is intent on keeping us all happy, or just doesn't want to look like a colossal chump.

Zuckerberg published a letter in the Washington Post addressing some of the privacy issues that have people in a real huff right now. While Zuckerberg admits to Facebook making some mistakes and dropping the ball on giving users simple and substantial control over their privacy, he fails to acknowledge that Facebook has indeed been giving advertisers, like Google's DoubleClick and Yahoo!'s Right Media, people's personal information. He notes that people are concerned how their private information is being used, but then just lists "the principles under which Facebook operates." The first three are my favorite:

-- You have control over how your information is shared.

-- We do not share your personal information with people or services you don't want.

-- We do not give advertisers access to your personal information.

Yeah, okay, Mark. These principles must work more like guidelines, since lately all three of these have been conveniently overlooked. That the letter fails to admit that user information has in fact been distributed to advertisers and that control of information is hardly in our hands alone seems a gross oversight. Sure, the privacy settings and usage might be confusing for some, but it is manageable. Users really do have some flexibility and control over their privacy, though improvements can and should always be pursued. But using the privacy settings well, is not my primary concern. I wanna know why our information is being beamed out across the web, without our permission, to people who didn't even ask for that information. What made that okay and how does that gel with these principles? An admission of dishonesty and an apology seems a small thing to ask for, but we didn't even get that. It was just more schmoozing corporate blabber that only went halfway, addressing the less important half.

Once again, we've been served poorly, leaving me rather skeptical about the future privacy improvements. Maybe instead of improving user privacy controls, Facebook should first just adhere to the principles they set for themselves.

"You [don't] have control over what you share"

Some comforting news:

Facebook has decided privacy isn't really that important and has been sharing private information with advertising companies, even if those companies don't ask for the information. The reasoning behind this is partially explained by Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg's statement that "privacy was no longer a 'social norm.'" So that makes dishing everyone's info off to advertisers fine, because none of us care about privacy anymore.

Zuckerberg's claim doesn't seem to gel a recent poll which showed that 60% of Facebook users have considered deleting their accounts due to privacy concerns. Course, the poll notes that the bulk of that 60% have most likely bent over and accepted the privacy policy changes as a tolerable inconvenience, rather actually following through with their complaints and shutting down their accounts. Me and mine certainly haven't given up those precious accounts that keep us connected to all the everything happening in anyone's life. So maybe Zuckerberg is right, "People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people."

Even if we have become more open and less private in our online lives, who wants their info handed out to advertisers? And who is Zuckerberg to claim that EVERYONE is more open with their private info. Sure, we're happy to post private, sometimes humiliating pictures and videos of ourselves (which we have at least some privacy control over), but that's hardly the same as someone else deciding - without telling us or getting our permission - to give personal contact info, user names, and other more sensitive material to advertising companies. (Or maybe it is the same. Something to think about . . .) We are told that, "You should have control over what you share." It sounds nice - sounds like Zuckerberg has our interests at heart. But just because we "should" have control, doesn't mean we do have control, and it certainly doesn't mean that Zuckerberg gives a fig about our private lives.

I think that people might be more open about their lives, but we like to think that that openness is on our own terms. We all start our blogs; our Facebook, MySpace, Twitter accounts; our Flickr and Photobucket picture accounts; even our own websites. All of this supposedly gives us more opportunity to stay connected to people we want to be connected with. Or it gives us a chance to "make our voices heard" about things we feel like talking about - the common person now has a voice. Except that common voice gets swallowed up in the digital, ever-expanding universe. This technological explosion sounds pretty nice, except that it eventually just becomes static. Who can actually stay connected to 900+ Facebook friends?

Our use of the technologies is rather naive and bumbling a lot of the time, and we get sucked into the webosphere without correctly and constructively navigating it. Plenty of people (probably myself included) have some techno-anxiety - be it Facebook (like the Anti-Facebook League of Intelligentsia) or just the internet in general. There's substance behind some of these techno-suspicions; the internet, like anything, is a tool to be utilized by the user. If we don't know how to use it right, it won't work for us as well as it could, and might even work against us. Unfortunately, there isn't a real good set of operating instructions that everyone has and reads. We often just kinda jump in and start clicking, which usually results in viruses, porn ads, and stolen identities.

Facebook is a tool, too. But its use value might be nearing its end.

White Noise

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