Famous For Fifteen People: Is Everyone a 'Facebook Celebrity'?

An anonymous reader writes "In the Stanford Law Review Online, authors Frankel, Brookover & Satterfield discuss an ongoing lawsuit against Facebook where plaintiffs claimed the social network's 'Sponsored Stories,' displaying advertisements on Facebook including 'the names and pictures of users who have "Liked" a product,' violated the law. Facebook responded by asserting that '(1) Plaintiffs are "public figures" to their friends, and (2) "expressions of consumer opinion" are generally newsworthy.' The authors discuss the substantial impact this case might have on online privacy going forward: 'The implications are significant and potentially far-reaching. The notion that every person is famous to his or her "friends" would effectively convert recognizable figures within any community or sphere, however small, into individuals whose lives may be fair game for the ever-expanding (social) media. If courts are willing to find that nontraditional subjects (such as Facebook users) are public figures in novel contexts (such as social media websites), First Amendment and newsworthiness protections likely will become more vigorous as individual privacy rights weaken. Warren and Brandeis's model of privacy rights, intended to prevent media attention to all but the most public figures, will have little application to all but the most private individuals.'"

Comments

Facebook is Public

[rwv]

If you "Like" something on Facebook, Facebook has every right to let your Facebook Friends know you liked that thing. This is crazy to say this specific thing is a privacy invasion. Don't "Like" things that you don't want your Friends knowing you like!

Re:Facebook is Public

[eln]

When you "like" things, you get updates from those things. It is conceivable that someone would want to see updates from some organization while not wanting their friends to know they like that organization.

Having said that, it's been clear from Facebook's inception that your "likes" are public (at least to your friends) information. It would be nice if you could pick and choose who saw your likes similar to how you can pick and choose who sees your statuses, but Facebook isn't under any legal obligation to make that happen.

Re:Facebook is Public

[F'Nok]

You can set it to not display your likes.

On your favourites page you can individually control the visibility settings for the different categories of likes (Music, Book, Movies, etc) and under them is Other pages you like.

So no, your likes don't have to be public at all.
You can limit them to only me or a specific group of friends, through to friends of friends or everyone.

Re:Facebook is Public

[Lunix Nutcase]

Easy. Don't give them your information if you don't want it publicly broadcasted. OMG such a complex solution!

Re:Facebook is Public

[girlintraining]

If you "Like" something on Facebook, Facebook has every right to let your Facebook Friends know you liked that thing.

Perhaps people are finally realizing that the limits placed on corporations regarding the handling of personal data is grossly in favor of the monentization and re-use of their information for purposes which the majority of people would disagree with? If that is so then any government claiming to be "of and by the people" should draft legislation assuring that the traditions and customs of its citizens be upheld.

This case goes to the heart of that, by weighing a legitimate public interest against a private interest which is worth many billions of dollars and built entirely on a misconception by the public of what information may be shared, and what may not be shared. Let's be clear here: Facebook's entire privacy and business model has been under intense scrutiny by privacy advocates because it often intentionally misleads its users, often reverses itself in the face of criticism, and has been a frequent target of high-profile publicity as people became aware of it. All of this strongly indicates that the people using the Facebook service are fully aware (or told) how this information may be used. Now that it is about to become a publicly traded company, it seems essential this matter of law be resolved.

Afterall, once something is on the internet, it doesn't leave. That can be a real problem for anyone searching for a job, should the wrong thing become public. And by real problem, I mean real unemployment and personal hardship. This is not just a matter of "privacy" -- it has fast become a matter of survival.

Re:Facebook is Public

[Lunix Nutcase]

I don't hate Facebook. But it's stupid to voluntarily give out your information to someone who is going to publicly share it and then whine like a bitch about it when they....publicly share it.

Re:Facebook is Public

[ohnocitizen]

Or that they just don't want their name and image being used to actively promote a product or brand. Is wanting to passively support something so wrong?

Re:Facebook is Public

[JasperHW]

Real life example - I (back when I had an FB account) "like"d NewYork RoadRunners. Anyone who has ever talked to me about them knows that I vehemently detest them on multiple grounds, but they happen to be the organizers of the NY Marathon and have a practical monopoly on street permits for all the other smaller races. NYRR started releasing information about when registration opened for popular races (in this case - the Brooklyn Half-Marathon) on FB only and no where else. If you didn't "like" them, you wouldn't know that registration had opened and in that races case, it sold out in 8 hours.
Therefore I liked them just so I could see their newsfeed but I would NEVER EVER want to promote them in any way, shape, or form.
If I had known you could hide your likes back in my FB days, I would have done so happily.

Re:Facebook is Public

[JohnnyMindcrime]

And what's worse is that you (rightfully) feeling that you have to remind people of that fact probably says a lot about the state of our society today.

There used to be a time when parents and teachers educated young people about how to behave in public and that's why old gits like me don't swear in front of other people unless you know them really well, always look over their shoulder when going through a door just to make sure that nobody right behind gets the door slapped in their face, lowers the volume of their voice when speaking on a mobile phone in public, etc.

Yes, it's old fashioned but if I see someone demonstrating those types of behaviours then I know that person understands the concept of what it is to be in a society with other people living in it and, even if I haven't got a clue who they are, they automatically get some respect from me just because they clearly understand that.

The problem these days is that standing out from the crowd and celebrity status seems to be actively encouraged and has given birth to a lot of people who have no concept of anything outside of themselves - and, no, I don't mean self-obsession or arrogance, necessarily, but people who just can't visualise themselves as being part of a crowd where everyone else in that crowd has probably the same motivations and needs that they themselves do.

To describe such people as "rude" doesn't actually work because in order to be classified as rude, you need to be shown as deviating from what is normally acceptable behaviour - and many of these people don't have a clue what acceptable behaviour is because they have never been taught it.

Re:Facebook is Public

[Culture20]

Thank you. When Facebook got rid of groups/interests and converted all of them to likes, I opted to remove all of that information from my profile because I couldn't find that privacy option. Nice to know it exists now.

They removed it to make an end run around the legal system. They could legally sell "public" stuff, so they made any new interests public, and forced everyone to reenter or remove them, thus converting everything to public, and they were able to sell them all.

Re:Facebook is Public

[__aaltlg1547]

Actually Facebook has no means of verifying that the name orange other information you give them is real.

It would in fact be vulnerable to an exploit by bots that randomly ( or purposefully) generate bogus user profiles complete with networks if friend, fake histories, likes, etc. Nobody has any idea how many of Facebook's touted. 800M-odd users are actual persons.

Re:Facebook is Public

[Confusador]

Dude, how many times do we have to say this? If you don't want your parents finding about about something, don't post it to Facebook!

Re:Facebook is Public

[Znork]

There's a greasemonkey script that blocks the 'like' plug-ins. It's a Good Thing.

Re:Facebook is Public

[TheRaven64]

It's not wrong, but if you want to privately support something you don't do it via a third party. Facebook is like the most gossipy person you've ever met. If you agree with something someone says, but you want to do so privately, you tell that person, you don't tell the gossip who is going to tell everyone else. Sadly, some people still seem to be under the impression that Facebook is a private channel, in spite of repeated (mainstream) news stories to the contrary.

Wha?

[residieu]

Why would you Like something on Facebook if you didn't want people to know you liked it? This is like complaining that when you make a comment on a Friend's wall, Facebook shows that comment to your friend.

Re:Wha?

[masternerdguy]

Why would you sign up for something that is designed to push your personal life into a wider audience then complain about any privacy violation?

Re:Wha?

[NeutronCowboy]

Not quite. It's like making a comment on your friend's wall, and then being surprised that that comment shows up in an ad for facebook that is shown to your entire friend list.

It's distorting your intended use of the action.

Yes, FB's TOS says that it can do whatever the heck it wants to your data, but it still is not something that people would expect. I'm wondering if there will be space for a paid version of facebook....

Re:Wha?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because "Like" for Facebook pages doesn't mean what it sounds like. "Follow" (which is what Google+ and Twitter call the same concept) would be more accurate.

If these people care so much about privacy...

[DangerOnTheRanger]

...why in the world are they on Facebook?

Re:If these people care so much about privacy...

[DerekLyons]

The issue goes beyond Facebook. Slashdot could use the same model. So could Amazon. And G+. And Flickr. And... well, you get the point.

Famous?

[tgv]

IANAL, but since when does lawyer mean "someone who reinterprets every word in a new and twisted way, just to make profit"? But hey, If they make this new definition of "famous" stick, then we can redefine "lawyer" to mean whatever we want. I'm proposing to redefine it as "Anser fabalis", given that to me the sound of a lawyer is a loud honking, which has the side-effect that we would be legally entitled to cooking them.

Re:Famous?

[Tom]

IANAL, but since when does lawyer mean "someone who reinterprets every word in a new and twisted way, just to make profit"?

Since ever. It was only when I worked a lot with the lawyers that I realized how geeky (in their own way) they are.

Just like MUST, SHOULD, CAN, etc. have precise, exactly defined meanings in RFCs, so do words in legalese have precise, specific meanings. Apparently, the term "famous" has not yet been defined legally, so it's a proper attack vector.

And lawyers don't just reinterpret words. It is their job to get the interests of their clients seen to, no matter how. The bar associations put limits on what they may and may not do, but playing word-games isn't disallowed - the judge will be, well, the judge on that.

Tl;DR version

[Gideon Wells]

My opinion on this matters on one detail that I am not seeing in the summary, and can't seem to find in the TFA. If they use myself for an advertisement. Is it an advertisement only seen by people I'm friends with or everyone?

If the former, it sets a disgusting precedent, that along Google's new social search, might be just barely ruled legal depending on the judge. This would be a step from going from losing privacy to a creep of losing even control of your own identity to corporations.

If the latter, this isn't just a creep. This is full blown jumping off the ledge. There is no way in hell a Judge could find this legal. At this point FaceBook needs to be slapped down hard, very hard.

Re:Tl;DR version

[Dahamma]

It's even more complicated than the botched summary makes it out to be.

The *plaintiff* was the one to claim that they were famous to their friends (in which case they felt as a celebrity endorsing a product they deserved compensation). Facebook basically argued if they were famous to their friends, then their public expression of a consumer opinion was "newsworthy", in which case the use of their likeness was fair use protected by the First Amendment.

Basically, a bullshit answer to a bullshit lawsuit...

In one word?

[eternaldoctorwho]

No.

Counterview

[sakdoctor]

I know the officially sanctioned slashdot view point is that the user is a stupid worthless victim, or even the product (derp), but I think that when a company acts in a way the majority of users wouldn't expect, despite that they agreed to the incomprehensible terms and conditions, and despite getting the service for "free", then there is something amiss, and buyer beware isn't enough.

Stronger data protection laws are needed to prevent the total rape of people's privacy. In some countries for example, it is illegal to have a box ticked by default to opt into something, and what social networks can do with people's data needs to be ring-fenced.

Matter of degree...

[fahrbot-bot]

There is a difference between liking something, endorsing it and shilling for it. For instance, I like my Honda and the dealer from which I bought it, but I made them remove all the dealer stickers from the vehicle as a condition of the sale. They're not paying me to advertise for them.

Facebook is making money from the advertising they push out to users and, presumably, from the advertising they stick your photo into, but where's your cut for use of your likeness? Yes, one can simply not "like" a product, but that's besides the point. Even though I might actually like a brand of Vodka and want to tell my friends about it, I don't really want a picture of me shilling for it - unless I specifically agree (and get paid) for it.

I'm sure it's all covered in the Facebook "terms of service", but that doesn't make it right. It's actually a moot point for me as I don't have a Facebook (nor Twitter) account - and never will. (Though there's probably a "shadow" Facebook account - bastards.)

Re:Matter of degree...

[s4m7]

I'm sure it's all covered in the Facebook "terms of service", but that doesn't make it right

Why not? Agreeing to TOS is important for a variety of reasons. In most cases agreement to TOS is what permits a service to host your media (writings, photos, videos, etc.) because without it you would retain copyright of the work, and sites would be liable for everything. Take away the viability of TOS agreements, and you take away the ability of most websites to operate in useful ways.

Re:Matter of degree...

[jamesh]

Your "cut" is that you get to use Facebook without paying any money for it.

Re:Matter of degree...

[Cabriel]

Did you remove all Honda branding from your vehicle? I guess, now, it doesn't matter because we all know you drive a Honda. There's you telling everyone on Slashdot what you bought which is the same mechanism for likes on Facebook. FB isn't saying you endorse the thing or are shilling for it. All Facebook is doing is telling your own friends that you clicked a button marked "Like" just like you announce to everyone around you when you drive that you own a Honda.

Re:Matter of degree...

[WillHirsch]

That was exactly my point. They're not entitled to use your car as a carrier of their stickers, but most people don't care if they have a sticker on their car or not, and I doubt you do either; you're just going out of your way to make sure that Honda don't get any bonus value out of your purchase of the car.

The car analogy differs from the Facebook issue in that there is no ongoing license agreement to make the advertising mandatory, but the reason people accept the advertising is the same; the "cost" of being used for this advertising is a tiny fraction of the value delivered by the service, and people are prepared to go along with it. Yes, the provider could provide the same service without advertising, but it's a perfectly valid way to subsidise a transaction whatever that transaction may be.

Re:Matter of degree...

[JohnnyMindcrime]

Social networking is fine provided that you fully understand the concept that nothing is for free. Somebody has to pay vast amounts of money for the servers and data centres that provide all of this stuff, and ultimately that's paid for from advertising revenue and selling your data.

Well, whilst most of us don't like advertising, it came about long before Facebook ever appeared and we accept it as a "necessary evil" and all like to think that it doesn't influence us. And if you filled in and sent off a competition form on the back of a cereal packet 20 years ago then you were probably not giving away any less information then than you do on Facebook now.

It just comes down to having a concept of how to "behave in public" and applying exactly the same principles that you would (hopefully) apply in a room full of strangers on social networking sites - the fact that walking into a roomful of strangers and shouting "I LIKE VODKA!" will automatically make them think you're an alcoholic is no different when applied on Facebook. In other words, if you wouldn't do the former then don't do the latter either.

I've used Facebook for a couple of years, I personally don't think it's anything more than a pleasant waste of time and my friends on Facebook are pretty much confined to actual friends, family and colleagues - so they know what I am like as a human being face-to-face anyway.

As for Twitter, I didn't start using it until a couple of weeks ago and I am the least celebrity-obsessed person that there is - for example, as a big music fan I admire the skills of a lot of musicians but, quite frankly, my life is far too busy and important to me that I could care less what they are doing outside of making nice albums of music for me to listen to. But because I'm a Spanish-learning geek, I follow technical news on there and a few Spanish speakers and find it quite useful.

FB argument seems backword

[softwareGuy1024]

Lawyers please chime in, but as I understood it the right of publicity is for celebrities, who stand to make money from endorsements(advertising). Why would FB want to argue that users are public figures?

Re:easy fix

[ZombieBraintrust]

There is the aspect that I might want to anonymously like something.

There is a button for that. It is invisible and right next to the normal Like button. It has very good security. No information is shared with Facebook or your friends.

Still illegal in Canada and EU data treaties

[WillAffleckUW]

All this misses the point.

The lack of privacy used by FB violates the Privacy rights of Citizens of Canada and the EU who live in the US, under the Data Privacy treaties that the US is signatory to.

No amount of pretending people are public figures will change that basic fact.

Even for those of us who may or may not be infamous on the Net. Not that I'm admitting anything.

You can't make me sign away my Canadian Constitutional Rights.

Companies Use Deceptive Means to get "Likes"

[Fulminata]

One problem with the way things work now is that some companies use deceptive means to get "likes." For example, Duracell sponsors ads saying "Love Star Wars? Click 'like' here!," with "sponsored by Duracell" in small type at the bottom. I'm sure if someone clicks that they'll soon show up on their friends page in ads that imply that they are endorsing Duracell.