Exhibitionists will love Facebook’s new Timeline.
Facebook continues to skate on thin privacy ice. Until now, if you posted on Facebook, you posted contemporary information about yourself. Facebook just announced Timeline, which allows you to post your entire personal history as well.
This is great for Facebook. With personal history information from millions of Facebook users, Facebook will be able to charge even more money for access to that information. Facebook’s users won’t see one penny of that revenue.
What’s scarey is that when you place a “Visit my Facebook page” link, you’ll be inviting people to learn all about you.
What do I do with Facebook? Nothing. I don’t trust Facebook because of its continued lack of respect for user privacy. In fact, Facebook’s business model is built upon disrespect for personal privacy.
Russ' space 
Just finished reading the below article. Seems that every time FB announces a new change, there’s more privacy issues — these headlines are getting old!
With new Facebook features, users may share more than they intended
http://www.nj.com/business/index.ssf/2011/10/facebook_timeline_privacy.html
Aside from the very valid concerns you raise, there is this: “This sounds like it’s tailor made for stalking,” wrote one user, in response to Facebook’s recent blog post about the Timeline feature.
When you think about it, it’s terrific market info for the companies paying for it. I’ve chosen not to participate, so I’m not on it either.
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Here’s some interesting data on FB: According to Nielson and Scribbal, Facebook boasts 800 million active users who spend an incredible 53 billion minutes on the site per month. By comparison, Twitter and LinkedIn (LNKD) have a paltry 100 million active users each, who spend a comparatively insignificant amount of time logged in: 565 million and 325 million minutes per month, respectively. Also of note, 400 million Facebook users log in daily, compared to 50 million for Twitter and 11 million for LinkedIn.
So, Facebook already dominates social media in terms of user engagement. And it’s already pulling in more than $4 billion in annual advertising revenue. Why do I think we haven’t seen anything yet? Because Facebook is becoming more than just an extremely engaging website. It’s becoming its own world. A world you must be part of.
Facebook Is Positioned To Take Over The World: Buy The IPO No Matter The Price
http://seekingalpha.com/article/297159-facebook-is-positioned-to-take-over-the-world-buy-the-ipo-no-matter-the-price?source=yahoo
I don’t know about that…I’m not sure why FB is succeeding where AOL failed. Same concept, but perhaps better executed? I’m surprised that FB is doing so well since I thought that there were many more sophisticated users out there, who would not find the price one pays (giving up privacy to corporations mining FB info) worth it.
Also, I wonder if the author foresaw the giant hit Netflix just took as a result of taking advantage of its customer base?
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Here’s a new story: How Facebook Will Die
http://news.yahoo.com/facebook-die-180900490.html
I liked this line: “That’s a lot of power to give to a privately owned, money-seeking company, that has no accountability to the people who use it. ”
Remember the dreaded Christmas letters people used to send? Those were funny in the way that the writers tried to present themselves, and always TMI.
Amazing that so many people will post trivial stuff on a daily basis — and even funnier that some folks actually read it!
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The article’s author makes excellent points, but he’s not entirely correct about what finally broke up AT&T. It was MCI, under the leadership of Bill McGowan, who wished to interface their pip-squeak network with A.T.&T.’s huge network. A.T.&T. said “No”, so MCI sued A.T&T., and Judge Greene and eventually the Department Of Justice took it from there. Forbes wrote a good article about Mr. McGowan recently. The comments make fascinating reading, especially one by richarddugan, which contains a convincing counterpoint. He has a point: Bell Labs invented some amazing stuff!
In September, PBS aired an excellent hour-long documentary about MCI and Bill McGowan. View a preview.
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There’s an interesting post on the WSJ Law Blog today:
“If anyone ever told you to be careful of your activity on Facebook, that’s probably good advice….A man in Texas has pleaded not guilty this week to charge of battery against his estranged wife over his Facebook status update, according to Carlsbad Current-Argus. The man was allegedly upset that his wife had not “liked” his status update, according to the criminal complaint, the Associated Press reports.
In another recent incident, a man in Bowling Green, Ky., is accused of assaulting and pointing a gun at a woman after they fought over his refusal to change his Facebook information from “single” to “in a relationship,” The Bowling Green Daily News reported.”
http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2011/10/07/status-updates-lead-to-real-life-arrests/?mod=WSJBlog&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wsj%2Flaw%2Ffeed+%28WSJ.com%3A+Law+Blog%29&utm_content=My+Yahoo
I also liked the first comment about a “Mafia mobster” who was arrested after detectives found pictures of his girlfriend in front of a Spanish restaurant’s sign that gave the restaurant’s name and location.
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Here’s more suits. And can you translate the last paragraph into English?
La. Woman Sues Facebook Over Wiretap Claims
The Associated Press – October 11, 2011
A Louisiana woman is suing Facebook over allegations that the social networking site collects and stores users’ Internet browsing history without their permission.
The suit claims Facebook violates wiretap laws with a tracking cookie that records users’ online activity even when they aren’t logged into Facebook.
Similar suits have been filed in other states, including Kansas and California.
Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes says the company believes the suit is “without merit” and will “fight it vigorously.”
In an earlier statement on the issue, Facebook said it places cookies on users’ computers “like every site on the internet that personalizes content and tries to provide a secure experience.”
“Three of these cookies on some users’ computers inadvertently included unique identifiers when the user had logged out of Facebook,” the company said. “However, we did not store these identifiers for logged out users. Therefore, we could not have used this information for tracking or any other purpose.”
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202518539520&rss=newswire&slreturn=1
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