Recently there has been much discussion on Facebook’s privacy (or lack thereof depending on what side you are on) policy. There’s been such a negative backlash that some users are forming a campaign to not log into Facebook for a full 24 hours on June 6, 2010.
This debate comes in response to the recent changes made by Facebook to its privacy settings, specifically to the one leaving the default on instead of off. With this update, it became obvious that Facebook is a business, and that “personal” data was monetary.
To economists and investors, this was expected. They assumed Facebook would make a big leap to make money, and what better way than demographic targeted advertising?
But users were surprised. Facebook is experiencing a significant backlash to the recent changes and integration of Facebook across multiple sharing networks. There have been constant tweets and articles written about Facebook’s complete disregard for “personal” data.
From a personal standpoint, I think the claims are valid because unless I change my settings, it’s not just my friends who are viewing my updates and profile, it’s also their friends, strangers and advertisers. Luckily, it’s not difficult to change the settings. I think people are more upset by the idea of the change.
From a marketing perspective, I’m not surprised and it’s obviously quite helpful in targeting specific demographics. I also think it’s easy enough for people to opt-out if they’d like.
What do you think? What side are you on?
We have been using this site for free for a long time. I have no complaints about this action. Facebook is a business with employees. Good luck.
I think Facebook needs to make it very explicit to all users that this is what’s going on. Since you have to login to Facebook to use it (unlike some other social networking sites), you just kind of assume that your data is protected. I’m going to double check my privacy settings right now, though, just to be safe
I find this really interesting. How much information are people sharing on Facebook that isn’t readily available everywhere else? Is it really a big inconvenience to take an extra step to change your privacy? In the cases I have seen where people accidentally released information they thought was private, it was the kind of information that maybe shouldn’t have been on Facebook in the first place.
I think that Facebook does need to be very transparent about this sort of thing and make it as easy for their users to change these settings or else, as we’re already seeing, they’ll begin to see a backlash. I realize they have investors to think about, but they need to tread the line between investor and their users interests as carefully as possible.
I can understand why people are upset by this move, but I think as long as Facebook made its users aware of the change in some way, they’ve done nothing wrong. When it comes to social networking it is the user’s responsibility to be constantly aware of how much they are sharing and who can see it.
Thanks for all of the great feedback! Looks like the debate continues…
From a marketing standpoint, I think that making more data available is very helpful. From a personal perspective, I cringe to think how much information there is about me available online. I took the initiative when they made the change to make my info private, but there is a lot to be said about people’s lack of knowledge on how much is available to the public.
When I think about who will be impacted by the changes in privacy settings, I think about people who don’t really engage with Facebook enough to BE impacted by these changes (my mom and her friends, for instance). I presume there’s not a whole lot they offer up on FB that could negatively impact them should their data be made public. Maybe that’s ageist? Actually, the people who probably are most at risk are those who use facebook a ton, vent their innermost secrets, and have no clue about privacy settings. I guess time will tell.
I think that this is not that big of a deal. Every business needs to make money eventually and I don’t knock them for finding a way to be profitable. It is very easy just to change your settings so I don’t think there is need for a protest.
It is easy to change your settings, but I think there’s a larger issue here…….even though the public can’t view our data, Facebook can, and I think I read recently (in a mainstream magazine) that the government requests data from Facebook……not on individuals, but on group trends. Scary! It would be naive to think that this juicy data was just sitting there and no one would mine it. Marketers and big brother are watching!
I think a huge factor is age- you totally hit on it Mary. Or maybe just ignorance to the way these things work? For instance, while most younger generations grew up online, their immaturity can affect them negatively later on because they don’t realize the nature of their posts (i.e. inappropriate photos)
Heck yeah Mary, if you just look at their ad serving method, they have become masters at creating a juicy environment where marketers can micro-target their specified audience thanks to all of the information we are giving up. I wouldn’t find it hard to believe, that they’re providing information to other sources as well.