Slashdot Mirror
Germany Considers Banning Wild Facebook Parties
An anonymous reader writes "Wild Facebook parties tend to occur when a Facebook Event invitation to a typical small gathering is mistakenly posted publicly, and then goes viral. This results in injuries and arrests as hundreds or even thousands show up for a party meant for a handful of people. A recent wave of these out-of-control Facebook parties has left German officials and politicians trying to figure how to deal with the trend."
....Germany would already have laws in place for out-of-control parties.
I just checked myself: Facebook by default enables the "Anyone can view and RSVP (public event)" option. That should be disabled by default. It is easy enough to forget to untick that one... type your birthday invitation, when you're done mum calls "dinner's ready!", quickly finish up, click "post", off to dinner.
It's just plainly ridiculous that an event is public by default. And I'm sure that's a major part of the cause of these unintended mass parties. Now if Facebook becomes more sensible in these matters, then I'm all for your ideas. Until then, Facebook is definitely one to carry part of the blame.
This is all part of the German silly season ("Sommerloch") - a period in summer when many political institutions are on vacation, so politicians which would normally be ignored can make it into the news - just because nobody important is active.
The statements in the article were all by conservatives in Germany (CDU + CSU). Given that it's interesting that Dorothee Baer - secretary general of the CSU - has asked that "comments about the Internet should be made only by those who are familiar with it". Sound advice.
And no, Germany is not considering banning facebook parties, this is just an attempt by some politicians to get noticed.