Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Retreats on Online Tracking
Nrbelex writes "Facebook is reining in some aspects of a controversial new advertising program, after users became extremely upset and threatened various 'protests' over possible privacy infringement issues. 'Late yesterday the company made an important change, saying that it would not send messages about users' Internet activities without getting explicit approval each time ... Facebook executives say the people who are complaining are a marginal minority. With time, Facebook says, users will accept Beacon, which Facebook views as an extension of the type of book and movie recommendations that members routinely volunteer on their profile pages.'"
But too late for me...I already deleted my Facebook profile when they launched this abominable feature.
I don't know about anyone else, but I leave a sparse (read as minimal info) Facebook page up simply to act as another way a person can get in touch with me (I have it set to e-mail me if I get a message).
Facebook Executives wrote: Facebook executives say the people who are complaining are a marginal minority. With time, Facebook says, users will accept Beacon, which Facebook views as an extension of the type of book and movie recommendations that members routinely volunteer on their profile pages.
What they meant: "We're turning it off for now, but we're going to slowly and deliberately swing it back to an on by default system."
As far as the claim that the complainants are a "marginal minority", I think that it's only a "marginal minority" of Facebook users that even knew the system existed, and probably a smaller minority that had any personal experience with it.
And then they will tell there Amazon partiners and next time you check you're email you'll will get a recommendation about a book all about using the correct grammar for writing Englishings.
Next thing, you'll get phone calls offering you fasterinternetserviceprovidings
"With time, Facebook says, users will accept Beacon, which Facebook views as an extension of the type of book and movie recommendations that members routinely volunteer on their profile pages."
Translation: We're not sorry, and in a week we think that everyone will have forgotten about the privacy issues, just like the news feed.
I'm seriously considering closing my Facebook. Free service hemorraging privacy by the day = Mistake. Facebook is definitely past its prime.
Another poster (when the Beacon article was on Slashdot previously) said that the facebook belief was that "it's better to ask forgiveness than permission". Definitely the case here...
Facebook says it is a vocal minority who are complaining. Perhaps it is the same minority who make up a majority of the page hits that the advertisers pay for?
Facebook is no smarter than the record companies. You do not anger the constituents of your revenue stream.
It's a good way to keep up with your newb acquaintences and friends. Besides, it cuts down on the amount of facebook invites I get.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Host my own site? That would imply I'm like, proactive or something.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Well, I'll give Facebook points for once again responding fairly quickly and positively to complaints from their user base. In an age when most corporations treat customers as an irritation rather than a valued client this seems like a good thing.
Hopefully Facebook's example will be noticed by other companies and sites, who will learn to back down when they have done something stupid or unpopular.
Facebook's exec is right though - the vast majority of users just don't care, and likely quite a few of them would have liked having their name and picture popping up all over the place. Facebook could have gone ahead with Beacon quite successfully, but dropped it nonetheless.
Let's give credit where credit is due.
Three Squirrels
Further down, the reason Facebook changed the policy:
Hard to be an ad-supported site if the advertisers won't advertise...
Best Slashdot Co
This isn't a matter of simply not clicking on banner ads or affiliate links. This is collaboration to track your on-line movements and make banner ads out of them.
I found this site: http://www.bspcn.com/2007/11/09/block-facebook-beacon/ with instructions on how to block beacon with firefox. I'm not sure how effective it is.
One day -- maybe -- Facebook users will get together and protest something really important. So much energy, so much potential...
More like "Invade your privacy? (sure) or (yeah)"
-The world would be a better place if everyone had a hoverboard
Does this mean I have to stop buying porn over the internet?
As mentioned here: http://securitymusings.com/article/202/facebook-ruining-christmas:
Not only did Facebook show an ability to ruin the surprise of Christmas presents, it also begs greater questions about purchasing privacy and the first amendment. Rather than the NSA subpoenaing amazon.com to find out what books you like to read, perhaps they could just put up a flash web ad that reads your amazon cookies and finds out your latest "looked at" items?
Be careful out there, kids!
Check out our infosecurity industry blog: http://securitymusings.com/
I have a facebook account and I'm not worried at all. Why? Because I have no friends.
It always amuses me when people dismiss social networking sites by saying, "If I want a presence on the internet, I'll use a site that I built myself". Using a personal site/blog to keep in touch with people only works if all your friends read/write blogs and check their friends personal sites regularly.
To quote one of my roommates, "Blogs? Aren't those something high school kids do?".
But she checks Facebook several times a day. If you want to stay in touch with people you have to use the medium that the people you want to stay in touch with use. Sure there's a pretty bad signal/noise ratio on all of these social networking sites. Not wanting to use a (non special interest based) social networking platform because too many people use it, seems a little self defeating.
Also, the OP has obviously not been in college in the past 5 years. They practically give you a Facebook account with your student ID these days.
Steal my band's record! Seriously,
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Forget when they decide to post about your activities online - their terms and conditions clearly state that if they want to, they can take that photo that you posted of you under a beer funnel at a frat party and sell it to anybody they want. You might end up in a TV commercial and receive no notice, compensation, or even acknowledgment. If you write something interesting in a note, they can publish it and collect profits from it. Scary.