Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Changes Provoke Uproar Among Users
coastal984 writes, "Facebook, the college (and now, high school and professional) networking site, launched changes to their web site this morning, provoking a massive and immediate response, and not the one the company had hoped for. Hundreds of protest 'Groups' formed, the largest of which have over 10,000 members, and sites like this student portal sprang up to pour scorn on the recent changes. The biggest gripe is the new "News Feed" on every page that tracks recent changes, activities, and comments made by everyone the user is connected to, such as a change in a user's relationship status." These details were all public previously, but it was only through intentional browsing that they would be discovered. In the words of one user, "Stalking is supposed to be hard."
WHOOSH
I think there's a fundamental misunderstanding of what sites like Facebook are.
That's public information, folks!
The feed isn't showing anything not already public, this is true.
However, it shows things that you might not really feel like broadcasting to the world, even if you don't feel like it needs to be a secret. For example, when a couple splits up, everyone in your network now gets a message saying "John Smith has changed his status from 'In a relationship' to 'Single'." Not really private information, and obviously having that on your profile at all means your comfortable with other people knowing your relationship status, but there's such a lack of respect or discretion for the real world situation that it's just incredibly dehumanizing.
Another example: my friend is vacationing in Europe right now, and she just posted a message to her boyfriend's wall about wishing he was there and related sappy whatnot. Sure the wall was already the most public way someone could post a message, but it was just a message on that person's page, not a message that gets broadcasted to everyone else in either person's network, front and center.
The point here is that there's a big difference between simply not hiding information and blasting that information through a loudspeaker.
If you get nervous, just remember that there are a few billion other people who don't really give a damn.
I'm a new college student, I use Facebook, and I was browsing this morning when the new changes went into effect. I think it's stupid, the information is public but having a detailed log of every change you make to your profile publicly visible makes it a lot easier for people to figure things out. Example: I don't want a list of the people that I added to my friends list in the last few days. That's just a little unnerving. I also don't want a lot of the groups that I decided to leave available. I don't want links to all the forum posts I make or image comments I make right there on my main page. Like the post and article say, it's all public information, and of course I understand this when I sign up for Facebook. But publicly advertising it all on the main profile DOES make it a lot easier to find. There didn't used to be a way to track down all of my forum posts, and I don't like that record being available. It's creepy having this public list of everything you do. Facebook now even highlights in yellow all of the updates to your profile. Not only does this create unnecessary clutter, it blatantly advertises the changes in my life that I feel comfortable documenting, but do not want highlighted. A break up is a good example. It's a big brother thing. I know that there are property records listing my name and address, and that's okay. When my county posts an easily searchable database on the front of their main webpage, it makes me a little more uncomfortable. I know some friends who used these records to find a teacher's house to vandalize. It's a similar concept, people do not want to feel like they're being watched and monitored. It's human instinct, and while it might seem a little hypocritical because you're making the information public, no one wants someone watching their every move. Like AOL releasing the search records, you can learn a lot about someone from those records even though as separate entities they don't mean anything. It's all pieces of a puzzle that leaves me feeling just a little too exposed.
For me, it isn't so much the new 'stalking' potential, it is the fact that the new layout is extremely visually offensive. Seriously, it was so ugly that I logged in and immediately considered cancelling my account. It is so insane busy that I can't seem to decipher any of the information presented. Right now I'm waiting to see if they come to their senses or otherwise I'll kiss facebook goodbye.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
-dave
http://millionnumbers.com/ - own the number of your dreams
I don't agree with you I'm sorry.
When you break up, you tell your friends, eventually. You might ring them and let them know, they might ring you and ask how things are and you tell them.
However, you don't get all your friends on a Telephone conference call and say "My girlfriend and I broke up, thanks!", or take out an ad in the local paper saying "Attn to all my friends: I broke up!"
That's the situation here. Yes, it's public info. People want it to be public (so I don't think your arguement stands up) They would just rather people find things out because they want to find out, not because it's flashed in front of them.
Seriously, this is not that hard of a concept. (Said only because you said it. See how much of it a dick it makes you sound?)
You tell your friends "eventually", but the first thing you do is rush to Facebook and update your status so all the freshmen can start hitting you up? If I was your friend, I might be a little offended to be relegated to "of lower importance than social networking website".
"Then again, in the words of one intelligent facebooker user, "There's a difference between 'publicly available' and 'publicly announced.'" "
That IS funny. Facebook users wanting privacy.
I wonder how the commentator came to the conclusion *this* facebook user is 'intelligent'.
Bahahaha..
You can't make this stuff up.
rick
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Don't give up so easily. You're right that there is still a fundamental difference between the old and new systems. They changed the system, pure and simple, and people are allowed to make a fuss about it if they don't like it. When you used to do X, Y would happen. Now when you do X, Y and Z both happen. Some people want just Y to happen without Z. You can say how similar Y and Z are all you want, but there is *still* a difference. Let's say that you have information you want people to find out but you don't want to tell them. I have plenty of friends who mark Gay on their Orientation. I'm sure they feel perfectly fine with people knowing they are gay if they look (just like they'd be okay letting people know they're gay if they ask.. this is essentially an automated Q&A), but they don't want to just go spam everyone with an update saying, "Hey guys, I'm gay! Just wanted to let you know!" There's simply a difference in the way the information is handled, and that means that people should and will behave differently knowing that. There's nothing wrong if people don't like it.
And yes, we do not want our breakups made public. Don't criticize what you don't understand.
So, just to clarify: you don't want your breakups made public, but you post information about those breakups on a website that's wide open to every person with an .edu email address? I bow before your brilliance in understanding the term "public".
"Stumble before you crawl"
I don't understand either. You document your "being in a relationship" on a website, change it later, and are surprised that anyone notices. Everyone who you would want to know about this would know from real life (or a personal communication), not a website. Anyone who's "stalking" you online would have noticed the change anyway. So what's different?
Putting your romantic life on a website is an extraordinarily bad and naive idea. Put stuff online, the world knows, forever. Learn that now.
I think there is a 3rd category on this subject: casual users of social networking sites.
It doesn't bother me that this information is available. I put it out there, and I have to suffer the consequences of my actions for it. But at the same time, I don't want to be bombarded with information about people on my "friends" list. I would either like to disable the list completely, or create a filter where I see information from specific friends only.
Likewise, I should be able to opt out of other friend's news feed. Let me set the privacy level of my news feed so only specific friends can see certain things. If some people want to see something, they can browse to my profile, and if I want all the people on my list to see something, create a "special notice" option similar to the one in Yahoo Groups.
My Sysadmin Blog
PEOPLE DON'T LIKE IT. That's really all that matters. Either Facebook can listen to a little more than their market droids before making such lame changes, or face the consequences.
You are the webmaster of CyberNexus.
You can be contacted at webmaster@cybernexus.net.
This was all public information. Now it's been announced. See the difference?
Let's say I break up with my girlfriend. Previously, I would simply change my relationship status to "single." Eventually, my closer friends would notice that my relationship status changed.
Now, it is announced to the world as soon as it would happen. There's a difference between publicly available and publicly announced. As an analogy: the former is adding a line in your slashdot personal profile that you had a divorce. The latter is having a story greenlighted on slashdot, that you just had a divorce. Both are public information, but would you really want it announced?
Just because we choose to disclose something does not mean we wish to draw attention to it when the situation changes. Even something as innocuous as an invitation to a party shows up; if I decline the invitation, everyone knows I just declined.
You are not a college student, and you do not live in the same sort of social environment where it is encouraged to share contact information publicly to be included in events and meet new people. We knowingly give up some of our privacy when we do so, but there is a limit.
I'm sure if I dug around your website or google, I could find your (real) email address, so why don't you post it on slashdot? It's public information, after all? What about your phone number? Knowing your name and city, I could easily find it, so why isn't it in your slashdot profile? It's not in your profile because you don't want to call attention to it.
I think that the information overload isn't being addressed as much here on this forum as privacy has been. I agree about the privacy issues, and consider it a dead topic. In my opinion, the new format isn't about privacy at all but about presentation of information. As a regular user of facebook I have liked being able to choose which of my friends' information I access any given time. If there is some kind of social tension or drama, it can be regulated by chosing not to look at that person's information until the tension is resolved one way or another.
By allowing the users to chose the information they look at on a friends' profile allows users control over sorting data relevent to their interest. The reason it feels like a violation of privacy now even though all that information was readily availible before is because the information is being presented in a way that goes against the grain of the way humans socially organize themselves. We naturally create intricate laws governing personal information and the consumption thereof, even in a setting such as Facebook. With profiles we have the illusion of privacy for ourselves in the knowledge that if our friends are interested enough or our own presentations interesting enough they will bother to read things that normal brain functions consider irrelevant and unimportant.
This new format irritates me because it takes user choice and natural cognitive behavior out of consideration, presenting information about a wide variety of very different people and their inconsequential actions and their own networking which does not always include me. This service presumes a networking model of people that simply does not exist within my personal group of friends and by that presumption forces the network I have connected by simple sharing of profiles into a structure that is unnatural for how I interact with them individually or collectively. They should rethink how and when they change their site, presenting ideas to the community before taking action, much like Slashdot did when they redid their site visually.
Then again, I guess most people here would never have that problem...
http://www.policystew.com/
today is an ex's birthday.
i want to wish her. in the past i would not have hesitated to write a short and sweet note on her wall. since we now live halfway across the world from each other, a phone call is unreasonably complicated (especially given our acrimonious breakup). an email is too personal (i don't really want her to respond). so the wall is an ideal private/public combo. A personalized message in a public setting.
unfortunately, the new facebook *news feed* would, without my explicit permission, broadcast my post to EVERYONE we know in common, along with the ENTIRE TEXT. At least half of them would have a chuckle at my expense, or at least that's the way I feel. So, before posting, I hesitate. And send an email instead.
Facebook has lost a significant utility for me. Similar public/private conundrums are going to result when somebody invites me to RSVP for a party via Facebook, wants me to join a group, etc. Updating my profile is now difficult because each change i make will be publicly broadcast to all my Facebook "friends" (some of whom I don't even know). And I don't want that.
The illusion of privacy that facebook gave -- that it was a reasonably intimate network of peers -- is now destroyed.
shooting is not too good for my enemies
You putting that you're "in a relationship" on Fcaebook implies that you wanted everyone on your friend's list to be able to see it.
No, it doesn't. That's like saying that if you do something in public, you want everyone there to see it. This is just false. Facebook only has two options: you're friends with someone or you're not. I'm friends with people that I want to keep track of because I knew them 10 years ago in high school. I'm also friends with, among others, my best friend, my wife, and one of my sisters. You're implying that I want them all to know everything I put on facebook to equal degrees. I don't actually care enough to prevent my old high school buddies from knowing everything I post on Facebook, but I'd really rather not have it broadcast either.
Real name and email address is info you don't want anyone to see. Hence, it's private. It's information I shared with the site, and the site alone. If I wanted people to be able to view it, I'd make it available to people- like those are facebook are doing.
It's not the simple. The claim being made (not necessarily by you) is that publicly available is no different from publicly broadcast. I'm sure that I can get info about you from publicly available sources that you don't want on your Slashdot profile. Do you agree or disagree? It doesn't even have to be internet based. I can hire (if I really want) a P.I. to do a thorough background check on you using only public records. Where you live, if you own, how much you paid if you do own, etc.
But it would cost me money (not to mention time) to dig through all that info. And that's your reason for believing I won't. It takes more trouble than it's worth, so you don't lose sleep over it. I'm not actually going to hire a P.I. 'cause I don't have a lot of extra cash and it's not worth it to prove a point on an internet forum.
Now imagine that Facebook just hired a P.I. for all their members and said "have fun". That's kind of like what is happening here. They've erased the effort it required to dig up info on people's status. Considering that people have 50-100 friends on average, that's a lot of effort (hence a lot of cost) that went into protecting privacy that is now gone.
-stormin
The Southern Baptist Convention has creationism. On Slashdot, we have porn.
"Out of business": that's where Reality 101 intersects with Free-market Econ 100.
People will cope alright. They'll cope right out your front door and leave you twisting in the wind. You sound like people HAVE to use Facebook. Feel free to have this epiphany: they DON'T.