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It is exactly the lack of privacy and the inability to configure Facebook to reflect the circles of friends and acquaintances of my "physical" life that kept me for the longest time from using it. When I first signed up with Facebook several years ago, I envisioned it as a tool allowing me to stay in close touch with family and close friends in other countries (face it, sharing frequent, small day-to-day events in life paints a much fuller picture of your life than writing letters or making phone calls directed to one person). Actually, I have to laugh at comments from people about why anyone would need Facebook or Twitter, if you could just pick up the phone or write a letter. Comments like that clearly identify the speaker as someone whose friends and family are within close geographical vicinity or at least within the same time zone. Not to mention that with a 12-hour workday my days would have to be at least 36 hours long to have sufficient time for writing personal letters and making phone calls on a regular basis! But, aside from the above, at the same time I also wanted to use Facebook as a networking platform to help me stay in touch with former coworkers and other acquaintances, in other words, with people I don't want to indulge in intimate details about my life, but simply stay in touch. In my disappointment with Facebook, I turned to LinkedIn for the latter and didn't use Facebook at all until years later when some former and current coworkers found my name and requested to be my friends. Since then I have started using Facebook, but only to practice "light conversation" by talking about mostly inconsequential events and chit chat. In other words, Facebook did not replace email or phone calls. I had to conform to Facebook, rather than Facebook letting me use it as a tool the manner I intended to. Thanks

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/7660891/

The problem here, however, is that I cannot be in disagreement with Mark Zuckerberg on this issue. Honestly, his service is his service and if people do not like his policies, they should shop for an alternative.

Albeit, however, when I browse other websites in which I don't actually have an opportunity to opt-in/opt-out (e.g., on Facebook your privacy is only diminished after signing up lol), I like to do so through a VPN service which hides my IP and encrypts my connection.

One of the best providers I've found, so far, is Private Internet Access ( http://www.privateinternetaccess.com/ ). I would also, definitely, suggest Tor (http://www.torproject.org/) which is kind of like Private Internet Access but it's free. Of course, it is a lot slower.

GET REAL

i wonder how much brain u have brocade and and im not quite sure if u have achieved anythin in ur life. u r just jealous like the write of this blog. ppl get over it.

any sensible man wud agree tht Mark is one of the greatest inventors of this generation.

now tell me who used whos brain...

LOL

though u dont buy itm 150 million ppl more has bought it making facebook 500 million strong. n for ur kind info there r still privacy option wether to share or not to share.

get some education u old man,

if u say "I don't buy Zuckerberg's argument" then get off facebook.

y r u still an fb member if u dont like it so much.. hypocrite.

A username can't lose its job or be gossiped about or stalked by an ex-husband.

Not all of us want to use our real names on everything and privacy does affect personal safety. Some of us are women with abusive exes, in custody battles, people with sensitive jobs, etc.

Use your brain, Zuckerberg.

The real issue is how this will affect people in the future when they move one with life and decide they no longer want to share their content (life story) with the rest of the world or a prospective employer etc in the future. This is when they will suddenly realize exactly what they have done. But it will of course be too late.

There is an alternative and it is called getting your own server and securely sharing your content. They are free and relatively easy to install these days. There are even cool personal URLs to server from for free.

Come and see the uCentric.org Open Concept project which is helping people understand just how easy it is to become "self-Serving".

Just remember that Freedom is Self-Serving!

In my opinion, I really don't care that much about people being able to be view what groups I have joined, be proud of what you like and believe - if it's that bad then don't join the group!

The only perceivable problem is data and information being mined by users, and people who arn't users.

There are many programs designed to search through sites at an alarming rate recording any data it has been told to look for. For example, there is a program that will search through all of the pages of facebook and store every e-mail address providing it has been displayed on the front page.

It simply recognises the email address by the '@' symbol.

This data is then used, usually sold, for the use of junk email! That's right, 90% of junk email you recieve is most likely due to a similiar program.

The simple fact is, if we lose more and more privacy and have no options to reclaim it then we are just going to suffer more from the bigger corporations....and i do wonder how much Facebook has recieved in order to allow their site to be data mined - i imagine quite a bit.

So here it is, we all have to make second email accounts just for the use of facebook in order to avoid out email being bombarded.

The more email you recieve, and actually read affects bandwidth supported by your ISP; which when becomes too packed requires attention. It will make your net slow, or break!

This means the ISP will need to invest in more bandwidth and thus the cost of your ISP is bumped up.

Now we see that it's not just the privacy of "whats your name" or "what "city do you live in" that is a problem caushed by intentional reduced privacy.

Think about it.

For example, your social security can be found out. If someone has that number they can find out every checking account you have and when they find that out that they can find out every transaction you have ever had. Don't be fooled into believing anything us really private. I know many do not believe this, but I have read about people who get this kind of information, and actually know people who have done it. Even myself, I have accidently found out banking activity for persons who all I had was their bank account number, and I am no genius. If I can do it, then any company or government agency can do it. The banks use clearing houses who can look into any account, or more than one at a time to compare information. With a little social engineering any person can find out what ever they want to know about another person.

I only mentioned this, as an example, because it is typical of everything you do, and from my point of view, I am not sure that it is a bad thing. I feel that keeping things private causes more harm than just being an open honest person, with nothing to hide. If someone is abusing their children or their wife, I think others should know. If corporations are doing illegal things to rip people off, I think the public should know. If a commercial is an out and out lie, or an extreme exaggeration (which most are) I think people should know.

Another thing privacy does is gives a false set of norms to society. Too many people will come out against something, that they do themselves, for votes or peer approval. This sets standards that are unrealistic.

The bottom line is that too much protectionism is far worse than open access to what most people call private information.

One thing to keep in mind too, is that with so much information available no one really knows what is true or not true, because no human can digest all of the information available, to make a rational judgment, even if most people were rational, which they aren't.

Mind you, the people get the service they deserve. There are plenty of privacy conscious social networking websites out there, and none of them do as well as Facebook.

I am agreed with you Peter!

I agree with privacy and I also agree that when I choose to be a member of any site: I read the terms and conditions and also choose what options to share of my personal likes and hobbies etc. The major factor of any issue of privacy would be that I hope that I am not doing anything that I would not want anyone else to know about and that my intentions are of integrity and honesty.

The big question is, if relinquishing our privacy is now a social norm. Why does Facebook have to make that decision for people. Won't they do it on their own?

http://shrinkify.com/1mbp

All the comments saying Facebook will crumble, while people go on continuing to use it, are meaningless otherwise.

Zuckerberg says losing privacy is an evolving social norm. But it's really not. it's being begrudingly thrust upon us because of a "prisoners dilemma" problem where collective actions cause the result that individually we would not like, but we feel we miss out if we don't participate ourselves and everybody else does. This article http://donkasauruspost.com/2010/01/17/boycott-facebook-its-creepy/argues "Boycott Facebook -- It's Creepy"

This would allow people to try FB in a way that was comfortable to them, and then decide as they go along how much information they share and with whom.

But as for the fan pages and other information- that's wrong. I had to remove some of them, because they would look ridiculous to my professional contacts who are only checking me out. The user must be in control of his or her private data. Because the age of the privacy isn't over. Our understanding of privacy might be changing with time, but WE should be the ones in control, not Facebook or anybody else. We must decide what to share and what to keep private. Because otherwise, people will simply delete their accounts in Facebook (or the private information) and that's it.

"I had an account on Facebook. Here are the details.

Name: Michael Cosgrove (maybe John Christopher, my middle names, as well, but I'm not sure)

Email address: This one - ************

Password - ***********

There is a reddish photo of me on it.

I closed that account two/three months ago after much difficulty due to the notoriously and deliberately vague instructions on your site. I received an email from facebook france today saying I had a message from a friend. Thinking that odd, I opened the email, clicked on the link and went directly to a Facebook page which thanked me for "coming back to facebook." My account is now effectively reactivated thanks to this ruse email.

Now listen up here. I want my account closed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LET ME MAKE THIS CLEAR!!

IF YOU DO NOT ACKNOWLEDGE RECEIPT OF THIS EMAIL WITHN 24 HOURS AND CLOSE DOWN MY ACCOUNT AND NOTIFY ME THAT IT HAS BEEN DONE WITHIN FIVE DAYS I WILL OPEN OTHER ACCOUNTS WITH OTHER IP's AND OTHER NAMES AND SPREAD VIRUSES AND PORNOGRAPHY ALL OVER YOUR SITE WHEREVER POSSIBLE AND AS OFTEN AS I CAN, CONCENTRATING ON THOSE MEMBERS WHO ARE MOST LIKELY TO BE OFFENDED BY IT. IF YOU CLOSE DOWN THOSE ACCOUNTS I SHALL OPEN OTHERS AND CONTINUE UNTIL YOU RECOGNISE MY RIGHTS AND CLOSE DOWN MY PAGE.

If I get no answer to this email acknowledging receipt within 24 hours I shall post articles and blogs about this issue on the internet and invite others to pollute my page and others. You are refusing me the right to close down my contact with an internet site.

WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR PROBLEM?"

I have 500 accounts myself (took awhile to do that) so I can have a strong Mafia family without spamming my buds to join fbook.

Fbook is what it is. A game and a big fat advertising engine. Treat it like that and you'll be okay.

How much information do you give to the telemarketer who calls you at home? Do you tell them all your personal information, where you live, your birthdate, the names of your family and friends, where you've gone, what you like to watch and listen to? If you do, then you're a great candidate for a fbook account. If not, then tread lightly and share little.

Peace.

Privacy was only possible here in America during some periods of time in some places (the famed American West of the 1800s and middle America in the 40s and 50s).

For most times, we've lived in small towns and neighborhoods full of watchful housewives and hovering social clubs.

What did you people think when they said "Global Village"?

A village is full of busybodies who know who you are and what you do.

Looks like I did the right thing...

I can't be found. Everything is private except for my friends.

"Facebook Search Results
Who can see your search result on Facebook
Only Friends

Public Search Results
This setting only allows search engines to access your publicly available information and any information you set to Everyone. This does not include anything you've shared with just your friends or friends of friends (see preview). Allow"

The allow is left unchecked. Before being allowed to view the privacy settings, there's this box stating Worried about search engines? Your information is safe.
There have been misleading rumors recently about Facebook indexing all your information on Google. This is not true. Facebook created public search listings in 2007 to enable people to search for your name and see a link to your Facebook profile. They will still only see a basic set of information.

Ask yourself, when you see our current crop of 20-somethings and teenagers constantly fingering and twittering and texting, when was the last time they spent a day all on their own just working on something, solving something, CREATING something? Does it not strike you how catastrophic it is that we are breeding a generation that does not know how to do this?

This notion that privacy isn't important is taking a serious toll on people. In practical terms, people are harmed every day by exploitations of their personal information through identity theft, financial theft, abuse of children, and other ways. But I am talking about a harder-to-quantify effect: This stampede toward global connectedness is robbing people of an essential part of being human. That is something Zuckerberg clearly doesn't understand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgMOOwlOsnM

Privacy settings on Facebook are clear, comprehensive, and flexible. The fact that they have changed in the past reflects the changing nature of the site. The way the message board works is obvious to anyone who uses Facebook and clearly explained upon signup. If Facebook users don't want their private information being shared, they can change their privacy settings and send private messages to their friends, instead of posting on their walls, the internet equivalent of having a loud conversation during a movie. If a user is still paranoid that being photographed drunk will jeopardize his chances of being elected Governor, then he can choose to cancel his account or hope that future voters care about issues.

The idea that companies mine Facebook for targeted advertising in the same way that oil companies ravage third world nations is frankly alarmist and totally misguided. The belief that marketing Coldplay tickets to Coldplay fans (which they can then choose to buy or not buy) is a bad thing basically amounts to a rejection of the underlying tenets of free, technological society.

Facebook has an opt-in system: if you don't want people to know that you have a foot fetish, then don't include that as one of your interests. If you're embarrassed that people may find out you like Insane Clown Posse, then don't include ICP among your favorite music. Your Facebook account is not the same as your house - which is full of ads in newspapers, radio and television - because it wouldn't work if people used the same privacy settings we use in our homes. I wouldn't allow 98% of my Facebook friends to simply wander through my living room and check out my CD collection and photo albums, but I have found it convenient to allow my acquaintances to browse through information I have carefully screened for them. People who overshare on facebook should adjust their real life privacy settings or embrace their exhibitionism rather than blaming Facebook for presenting them with the opportunity to embarrass themselves.

Read more: http://www.theinductive.com/blog/2010/1/13/stop-ranting-about-facebook-privacy-settings.html

What I do in my social life is generally something I want entirely separate from my professional life, and I hate the idea of potential employers etc. searching FB to see how I spend my free time.

On the net is somewhat true because:

1) Lack of clear legislation
It's enough to make a name search on Google or different engines to start finding information on a subject.
This does not relates only to social networks but to any information you can think for.
It's all on net because the current laws have not enforced it enough on global scale.

2) Defected software
Most of the social networks went live with software not fully tested. What that means? Defects?!! As a former tester, I play around with various sites and create mocking profiles just to find defects. Well this is also at the expense of privacy.
Many options that are available were not enough refined and they should be. This would mean high quality software.

Little known fact - FB is dieing. They need to go IPO to fund their continued livelihood. They will push for IPO in Q3.

Zuckerberg is an arrogant prick that is just trying to make more money. Facebook seems to not give a crap about what the users want, if they did, they would let the users control every little detail about what is and what isn't shared with others.

I have now left Facebook and moved to the most secure new networkng site in the world, by invitation only. www.434u.com was designed to keep its users safe and instead of hogging the profits for itself it gives 70% back to its members, just for using the site!!!

I'm with 434u.com ... Have you had your invite yet?

like you created facebook, or even paid for using it or something. f&*% you. if you don't like it, leave it and go invent your own system.

this planet is covered with mindless herds of human sheep rushing to facebook and every new piece of technological garbage some a$$hole with a computer or a soldering iron creates. "what's joe blow tweeting? how about jane blow, what did she say today? what's on TMZ tonight?"

who the f%#& cares? get a life, you loser.

Zuckerberg cites the rise of blogging "and all these different services that have people sharing all this information."

Even in a world of blogs, twitter and social networks we still to have an expectation of privacy and the right to privacy.

Of the 350 million Facebook profiles, over half of them are fake. You never really know who you are talking to. Facebook can never fix their security problems unless they delete all their members and start from scratch by rebuilding their site from the ground up with a heavy moderation process that prevents fake profiles and robots from getting through. This is where 434u fits into the picture. 434u has engineered a security system that Facebook can NEVER have. 434u membership is by invite only and every new member is required to be validated by their crew leader who invited them. Each member invites six crew and they invite their 6 crew. This continues to build a safe and trusted online community - pretty cool stuff. You can have as many friends as you like, however you will only ever have 6 crew. As a result 434u is very closely moderated (policed): 1 moderator per 6 members, as opposed to Facebook or Myspace: 1 moderator per 6 million members. This means that 434u will be the safest online community IN THE WORLD. Due to the heavy moderation process, there can be no fake profiles in 434u, it will remain free of paedophiles, thieves, phishers and fakes found on other networking websites like Facebook which means you can always confidently roam in a safe and secure environment.

This site is by invite only!!!! I am happy to be apart of this amazing network...

That’s the reason why with the Netmino iPhone app you can exchange your different Netmino profiles depending upon the relationship level with your contacts and share only the data you want them to know. You can also set your profiles to public or private to allow – or prevent – your contact from distributing it further.

Until now, Netmino is the only address book to offer these features!

Why? I got no problem hanging out there - I figured out they were shady from like week one, and online social spaces - like empires - all pass, only they do it in a relative few minutes.

If you want a walled garden online, for real, you have to pay for it one way or another. A free one was never anything but a honeypot. Oh, and while they had you in the walled garden, they set pickpockets loose, so...that was pretty great, too.

I actually acted like an old man, this past year, and wrote to everybody I could think of - my fed reps, my state and local reps, the governor, the AG. They've all got a script about it already: "Facebook signed an agreement with all the states in 20XX to make sure monsters didn't eat little kids on Facebook - which is great because we didn't even know there were any little kids there to eat - and because of that, we are not interested in investigating Facebook for any of the massive fraud you've laid out for us here."

Facebook *really* hates you personally and loves holding your mom up and gunpoint and letting a pal get her cell phone # and charge the limit on it. Oh, and then they'll let another guy pay to put up a sign for you that says "YOUR MOM WALKED INTO THIS DARK ALLEY AND LOVED IT AND SHE SAID YOU WERE PROBABLY TOO PUSSY TO DO IT." When are people going to see that?

Just a wretched, wretched company.

I think this is a function of age. He's young, he's rich, and some day he will learn why privacy still is important. But now, like a Tiger Woods or other celebrity, he thinks that because he was in the right place at the right time, had one skill that worked for him and made him rich, that his opinion is golden. Ahh, hubris eventually crashes even the mightiest.

I'm advising all my friends to find a different social network. Never believe that past performance predicts the future, Marky. Can you say MC Hammer? Nothin' lasts forever. (b) And telling your Facebook members that you don't value privacy is just plain stupid. #FAIL (/b)

Information = money = power = money = power

If facebook isnt careful with this and other decisions they will have to make, this will be the beginning of their demise.

Facebook's behavior is that of an arrogant, greedy and juvenile copycat which feeds on the social energy of humankind, maintains it's users through addiction and insecurity, will do anything to make a buck and doesn't care about the human need for tight knit groups of love and support. Zuckergberg is the essential psychopath.

I've been hoping the Social Graph API that Google is working on will allow us to enmesh our content with our existing culture and apply social concepts like sharing and commenting whenever we want, without a central authority like Facebook looming over our children. Our best effort now would be to ensure our culture survives the influence of an ego/ambition/profit/ driven social engineering monster long enough to make it to the day we can all relate without Facebook.

"The Effect of Personality Factors in Predicting Information Disclosure Online"

Privacy is an underdeveloped area, and the role of information disclosure in the negotiation of privacy has not been fully explored. In addition, new technology is changing the way that privacy is experienced, and is changing people's ability to control what information they share and keep private. In previous work, one of the current authors theorized that individual factors affect privacy orientation and that situational factors affect privacy goals. The current research attempted to elucidate which personality factors affect disclosure behavior on the popular social network site, Facebook. In order to explore this, we conducted an online survey with a sample of university undergraduates. Regression analysis showed that the need for popularity predicted likelihood of disclosing on Facebook. However, self-esteem and trust, two factors that have previously been associated with disclosure, did not predict disclosure on Facebook, but they did predict the likelihood that someone would use the Facebook privacy settings. While all of the factors we measured were hypothesized to be individual factors, it could be that the need for popularity makes people more open to situational factors. If the Facebook environment provides cues that indicate that disclosure is expected and safe, and sharing information online is the main way of accessing popularity, then Facebook may be an environment that normalizes disclosure. As such, the nature of the relationship between privacy and disclosure may be different in this environment than in other, less public, environments.

----------

"Frequent Facebook Use: Maladaptive Addiction or Healthy Social Strategy?"

Online social networking tools such as Facebook have become increasingly used by many individuals. Many commentators have extolled the benefits of these social networking sites as a way to connect people with one another. However, others have suggested that frequent Facebook use may be a maladaptive addiction that can actually make people lonelier. We examined these issues using a measure of the need for relatedness (or belongingness), distinguishing between the presence of satisfaction (connectedness; positively worded items) and the absence of satisfaction (loneliness; negatively worded items). Paradoxically, three studies found positive associations between the amount of Facebook use and both loneliness and connectedness, although loneliness and connectedness are negatively associated themselves. We attempted to explicate this pattern via a longitudinal process perspective, finding in Study 2 that loneliness prompts people to cope by using Facebook, rather than suggesting that Facebook use causes loneliness. Study 3 asked users to 'quit' for 48 hours, and found that increased loneliness during this period predicted greater Facebook use upon return, which in turn predicted increased connectedness at the end of the study. These results suggest that Facebook use is an adaptive coping response which can produce enhanced relations with others. Implications for theories of psychological needs are considered, as well as possible moderators that might pinpoint for whom frequent Facebook use really is a problem.

----------

"People or Profiles?: Seeking Out or Warding Off the Perspectives of Others on Facebook"

Traditional face-to-face communication requires a complicated, continual process of mutual mind-reading. Although all normal adults have Theory of Mind (an understanding that others have unique perspectives, different from one's own), individuals may differ in their motivation to understand the thoughts and perspectives of others. We have called this individual difference the Need for Social Cognition (NFSC). Our NFSC scale measures motivations towards Theory of Mind activities along three dimensions: curiosity, engagement, and defensiveness. These dimensions may have different effects on people's use of social networking websites such as Facebook. To examine this question, we created an online survey which included the NSFC scale and questions about Facebook use. Curiosity and defensiveness predicted distinct behavioral and motivational patterns in Facebook usage. For example, those high in curiosity were more likely to use Facebook to find out more information about people they have just met, to browse other people's profiles, and to expect responses to their status updates, suggesting a relationship-seeking strategy integrating Facebook usage with other types of social interaction. Meanwhile, those high in perspective defensiveness used Facebook more often overall, were more likely to have Facebook-only friendships, and were more likely to use Facebook to search for romantic partners, perhaps suggesting that these individuals use Facebook to control the amount of social information they receive. These patterns, which could not be accounted for by extroversion scores, imply two discrete motivations towards Facebook usage: Facebook can be used either as a social or an isolating tool.

----------

"ePersonality: Differential perceptions of personality during online and real-world social interactions"

Although personality perceptions during face-to-face interactions have largely been found to be accurate and reliable, perceptions of personality during online interactions are still being questioned. In online settings, personality perceptions were accurate when raters judged individuals based on their websites and email addresses. However, once participants actively engaged in online interactions, their personality perceptions of each other were found to be inaccurate and deemed flawed. It is plausible that accuracy in interpersonal perceptions may change once individuals become active participants of the virtual world, rather than mere observers who judge from a distance. That is, online interpersonal perceptions may be influenced by important situational and interpersonal factors (e.g., interaction partners' interpersonal style), which may shape self-other perceptions in interesting ways. The present research utilized the framework of interpersonal theory to examine perceptions of affiliation and dominance during online and face-to-face interactions. A total of 40 participants reported on their own interpersonal style and that of their interaction partners for 21 days. Results indicated that participants perceived their own interpersonal behaviors during online and face-to-face interactions to be unrelated. In addition, participants perceived self and other dominance to be higher during same-sex than opposite-sex interactions, whereas they perceived self and other affiliation to be higher during online than face-to-face interactions. Gender differences and similarities in personality perceptions during online and face-to-face interactions are discussed.

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"Who are you on Facebook? The role of personality and gender in online social networking sites"

In the last few years there has been a rapid growth in the use of the Internet as a means of communicating with others socially (Lenhart, January, 2009). Because many popular social networking sites are relatively new, there is still a paucity of psychological research on the ways in which individuals use social such sites. The present study examined whether or not individual differences such as personality and gender influence individuals' use of online social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace. Participants were 238 undergraduate students who completed an online survey about their experiences with and use of social networking sites. All participants reported being members of Facebook, MySpace, or both. Based on prior research in online behavior, we expected to find different patterns of behavior for men and women and that Big 5 personality scores would also moderate behavior. Our results indicated that personality and gender both moderated individuals' use of social networking sites. Additionally, we found significant interactions between personality and gender that predicted how often individuals made blog postings, engaged in live chat/instant messaging, and played games through social networking sites. As such, we conclude that it is important to examine individual differences when examining certain types of online behavior.

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"Using MySpace increases the endorsement of narcissistic personality traits"

Millions of people use social networking sites (SNS), but it is not clear how these sites shape personality traits and identity. Undergraduates were randomly assigned to either spend time on their MySpace page or to complete another online task as a control (looking at Google Maps). Those who edited and wrote about their MySpace page subsequently scored significantly higher on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI) than the control group. The effect was significant for women but not for men. Thus spending time on MySpace caused young women to endorse more narcissistic traits. Consistent with previous research, those with higher NPI scores also reported having more friends and page views and agreed that their pages reflected the image they wished to present. Previous research has shown that narcissism has been rising over the generations, particularly among college women. Thus narcissism may be increasing among women partially due to time spent on SNS, and SNS may play a significant role in shaping identity in a more narcissistic direction.

Kindest Regards.
Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
ardenghifer@gmail.com

Man, I'd love to bitch-slap that Zuckerwanker

I don't need to talk to everyone I've ever known. I have gotten friend requests from people I'd rather not befriend. I'd rather limit friends to people I actually feel like I'd like to talk to. Not everyone needs to be able to find me or see what I'm doing...

Wouldn't it be more arrogant and condescending if Zuckerberg claimed that he was a "major agent of social change" and was pushing society away from personal privacy just because it was good business to do so?

I think social media has enabled people to think about privacy in more granular terms, and I think many people have elected to be less private about certain parts of their lives. It is a different matter for me if people have been tricked or coerced into giving up their privacy, but if they have chosen freely because they perceive some benefit in doing so I really can't object.

My own views on personal privacy continue to evolve, and while I am certainly confused I don't feel coerced. Until recently, I always used a pseudonym when commenting on a blog post, no matter how uncontroversially. Now, like many others, I usually write under my own name. I still keep my FB photos behind the wall but I know lots of people who don't - although most of them don't tag their pics with their kids' names. I know people who are circumspect on FB but let it all hang out on Twitter.

I hope and expect that new social norms will establish themselves at some point. In the meantime, I think we just have to work the issues through for ourselves.

"Pride goes before a fall"

Look around you, with the threat of terrorism everywhere once free societies are fast loosing their right to privacy one law at time.

http://maximumfiction.wordpress.com/2009/08/04/long-on-face-short-on-book/

Mona Nomura makes a good point. People can opt-in or opt-out. But what I think is soon going to happen is an opting-out on the order of millions, if the comments on this forum are any guideline. Or at a minimum a drastic change in behavior for how people use FB. I'm already searching for an alternative.

Privacy is a valuable personal commodity. Be careful. Once you give it away, you can't get it back. And you might not be so open-feeling in the future.

I think Facebook just wants more of that pie.

For now you can still control what information is seen by whom on Facebook and if you are an existing customer you can apply your current privacy settings to the upgrade.

I think privacy is very important and it should be the default and compromised only if you want it that way.

I have circles of friends that really shouldn't intersect. My young nephews and nieces don't have to know what I discuss with my adult friends about pornography, for instance. My engineering friends have absolutely no interest in my discussion with fellow astrologers.

The old term of "renaissance man" was applied to people of multiple interests. Such person by definition has multiple circles of friends who don't necesarily like to interact with each other.

I hope to stay deactivated this third time (sigh).

Am I totally wrong or are these features you can turn on and off in the FB privacy settings? I mean here: http://www.facebook.com/settings/?tab=privacy§ion=search

Um, no the times they are not a changin. There always will be a huge number of people who require privacy and significant control of their privacy who have an equal right to access and use any network or online service. Agreeing to or accepting data rape should not be a requirement to use these systems just as racial criteria should not be used to keep people from buying houses. We're human beings. Our systems must reflect our diversity not, as in this case, the apparent money grubbing needs of this guy. Providers of online services have a duty to respect people who use their services.

I use FB to connect with a small group, my siblings and a few friends. I use LinkedIn for professional contacts. I don't mind ads, even contextual ads. But I, and I suspect a huge number of people, require that my privacy settings be by default set to be private with tools to selectively make my data public.

No matter whether some number of people have become used to letting it all hang out online, the people who don't want to do so should not be banned or go through hoops to exercise their right to operate privately.

There is a MUCH bigger privacy issue with Facebook, however... and few seem to be talking about it. The direct privacy controls are pretty good... pretty clear. What gets exposed through your friends is much less clear... you can learn a lot about a person by just looking at their friend's info. Now consider that your list of friends are forcibly exposed... and their basic info is forcibly exposed... and you have no control over that. And by default your friends' privacy settings are now wide open... so, far more often, your friends actions (such as commenting on an album) will end up exposing you to many more people.

If a competitor wants to take down Facebook, it will be easy:
(1) Build a comparable social site but with rock solid privacy control
(2) Build a tool that scavenges Facebook for info... and then provide a site called "What I learned from Facebook" where you type in a name and it tells you all that it can learn about you from what is exposed on Facebook. Once people see all the obvious conclusions that can be drawn and photos that can be found and so on, people will run.
(3) Provide an easy tool for importing info from Facebook into your social site.

Done... you displace Facebook almost overnight.

My guess is that the venality of human nature will win out over the do-gooder instinct and both companies will cash in big time, to hell with everything else. If the network blows up or continues just as it is, doesn't matter. The owners will have made out like bandits off massive amounts of data they didn't pay for. It's business as usual.

I don't have a Facebook page.

Regarding the MySpace issue, its not really the same thing. MySpace creating an awesome thing and then stagnated and grew behind Facebook on Facebook's achievements - if you look at the delay if functionality. Facebook is all about the network, your connections and what you are saying. MySpace is about - mostly - music and self expression.

I am indifferent about the change, I have public what I think is fine and private what I think should be private.

People are the real value of the FB network and they deserve the right to decide what information is publicly available.

If not an open alternative that has an ethical stance regarding privacy and data ownership that mirrors the FB platform feature set needs to be developed.

I'd pay 1dollar a month to use a social network that allows for real privacy and data ownership.

A FB killer will emerge. Closed platforms with people like Zuckerberg at the helm will die.

I joined Facebook five years ago because IT WAS a secure platform to share information with friends. As I had just graduated college, I wanted somewhere to reconnect and stay connected with friends.

Today, Facebook is a farce. It's turned into a giant roadshow circus that changes the performance at every stop. Privacy is out the door, advertisers are in, privacy is in, microblogging is out, beacon is out, apps are in, etc etc.

Fact is, after using Facebook for five years and being an avid supporter of it to bring even an university in Iceland onto the platform, I'm done. I will no longer endorse Facebook as a means to connect.

Next time I'm in San Francisco, I'll take photos of Zucki making out with someone (or no one) and post those online. I mean, hey, the new generation is open today, isn't it?

So... I don't know. I am not a facebook or twitter fan. This making me even less liking it. Let's see what will happen.
Will we see a new social network that will take the step on Facebook? I wish so.

But after seeing the problems that Facebook has essentially tried to ignore, such as ID theft (my wife and I have been victims twice so far, albeit not yet through Facebook, and we have no wish to incur further occurrences) and privacy and copyright issues, followed by this PR nightmare that is Zuckerberg, I've decided to cancel my Facebook account and place the site into my hosts file so that I don't run the risk of being dragged there by all the sites that Facebook has recently done deals with.

Way to go, Zuckerberg.

http://bit.ly/2TcX9K

Where are Sun today compared to then?

I realize that it has nothing to do with the serious privacy issues, but did anyone else notice that he said 'Um' 27 times in that interview?

The actual quote as it was spoken was this ...
"Um and we view it as our role in the system to constantly be kind of innovating and um updating what our system is to reflect what the current social norms are."

Sounds like a High School kid trying to bullshit his way through a presentation.

1. Making pages you are a fan of visible to the world is HORRIBLE. Big mistake which will screw up with people's lives. Not in the least decent.

2. Doing that and adjusting the default friends visibility setting to showing people's friends is a such a big FUCK YOU to the community that I cannot begin to believe it was intentional in the sense of understanding the implications. Now they are just covering up big time.

Facebook: Fire the PMs in charge of these, and if it was The Man himself who did this, man, you should re-haul your system. Something in your org isn't working right.

Sometimes the friend suggestions i get almost creep me out, there is noway facebook can dig out old contacts the way it does without trying something creepy.

http://lucky-six.blogspot.com/2009/06/creepbook-when-its-time-to-say-enough.html

When my brother creates a photo album and clicks "Share with others (even people who aren't on Facebook)," the link I get in my email doesn't let me see his pictures, it just invites me to sign up for Facebook.

Post-big-privacy-change, when you find someone's Facebook page via Google, you can see their name, location, profile picture, and eight of their friends (top eight!). But you can't browse their social graph (unless everyone only has

I'm not going to join Facebook until marking something "public" means anyone on the Internet can see it.

BTW, your OpenID login is broken. Check your server logs around 5:50 AM UTC.

At some point in the future, the government will make participation in FB (or its successor databases) mandatory. Their argument? Well, you're on it already, so you don't have to change anything.

That is pretty private.
I was spilling out photos, though I have sorted that out by deleting a page I created.

My privacy is very much intact....

It's especially difficult given the tremendous amount of micro-data Facebook can collect, store and analyze on member *behavior*. Even if those data weren't exposed to search, there would still be the data inside Facebook's servers.

On a more positive note, everything I've seen as a free-lance Twitter developer leads me to believe that, at the moment anyhow, Twitter is doing everything possible to protect its user base, establish best practices for security, privacy and especially geotagging, and just in general be good citizens and worthy of user trust.

Thanks again for leading the fight and raising consciousness on the issue of Facebook privacy. You're right - it's a very big deal.

and if this is the mood now ,, why ppl don't go to other networks ?
why every body love FB ? because of its "old" privacy rules
but now ?!!!!! I am thinking of closing my account !!!

many people they don't understand the changes and till now share their pictures and life publicly
but they think it is till privet according to the old rules
I hate you face book
I hate you !!!!!!!!!!!!!

JEss
www.anonymity-tools.ru.tc

Sex will become public, healthy, and normal.

Having sex will be seen as innocuous as any other physical activity, such as playing a sport.

Children will be able to have sex during sex education classes in school.

Human nature will no longer need to be attacked and segmented. We will be able to acknowledge the facts about our "base" drives.

Facebook made a single change in its rules that most users don't catch at first but clicked "Accept" anyway and instantly they had permission to monetize a huge new chunk of data because it is now "public". How many of you have read every line of the new Facebook Privacy Policy?

While I do agree that America's attitude towards data privacy is shifting, the privacy rule changes at Facebook mot likely have much more to do with cashflow than either creating or following a societal privacy trend. Nice cover though.

Last April, Forbes had an analysis of an estimate of what advertising was worth to Facebook http://bit.ly/92yrmL. The article correctly pointed out at that time, Facebook's formula for CPC and CPM didn't seem to be able to generate the type of revenue they needed as their auction rates seemed too low. But once privacy is lifted, Facebook now has the ability to link your ad viewing habits and your personal habits as well.

If you can provide any consumer industry with that level detailed information on the habits of 200 million people, you have entered a very rarified realm. Forget just the Marketing Department, that data could easily be used to specifically tailor and target products and marketing for almost every meaningful demographic out there. CPM and CPC ads are now just more data. They could give them away and still monetize it.

Think of it like this: You only have to find 100 companies worldwide willing to pay $2M a year for significant insight into the current trends and habits of 200m people and you have generated $200M a year. Sign me up for that sales job as its not a hard sell. That type of data in the Fortune 100 realm is worth far more than that.

If Malcolm Gladwell can break the code on Canadian Hockey player success by just knowing their birthday, what else can the right minds do with all the other information latent in Facebook's vast data mines?

Zuckerburg's about-face on privacy just shows that an epiphany has arrived at Facebook's corporate headquarters. Far from the verge of death, I think Facebook is about to take off to new levels not imagined.

As for users really don't want privacy ... well Facebook that is easy enough to test. Publish detailed instructions showing how users how make different pieces of their information visible to friend, public etc. Next lock down all information on Facebook (base security policy is 'deny'). Now let the users decide how they want to handle their data privacy.

-mike.

I will say that I'm completely disappointed with Zuckerberg's views here, and I fear what the future of Facebook will be if they embrace his ideology.

The simple fact is that "privacy", as it relates to our online/interconnected society, is an artificial premise.

Facebook acknowledges that individuals, when they decide to share information about themselves digitally, in fact, do not have a reasonable chance of keeping that information private, especially in perpetuity. There are just too many ways for marketers, or worse, to get at this information.

Essentially, they are simply covering their a**. Instead of pretending that they can keep your info private (and subjecting themselves to complaints, lawsuits etc.), they are just removing that false expectation all together. Regardless of that motivation, however, this is a good thing for all of us.

If we are all painfully aware that our information is public, we will be more judicious with what we decide to share in the first place.

Privacy policy's might make us feel better, but they don't actually protect anyone.

Damn, the only reason I use the thing anymore is because my pals are on there* .. but that is an attitude that is changing for me, slowly perhaps.

*Doubtless an increasingly common sentiment .. the rot has set in.

I agree with the commenter above who says Facebook will be done-dusted in a few years, at least while they continue to move the goal posts and betray loyal subbers.

Remember AOL .. they treated their users like s-h-1-t too.

Nicely written piece. Twitterred, but as usual these days not FB'ed!

Already MIT can tell if you are gay or straight by your facebook page, regardless of whether you say so. How long until someone launches a commercial version? How long before a similar one reveals our IQ's based upon vocabulary and the like in our posts anywhere? How long before a "forced facebook" internet service becomes possible, which aggregates all the available information on you from myriad sources in one standardized page?

Did you notice that when the climate scientists' email was hacked how little of the story centered on the impropriety of the hacking itself? Imagine your Google history being hacked and analyzed. Maybe not next year, but in ten?

My belief is that the world will soon "go live" -- with no expectation of privacy anywhere ever. We will all, for better or worse, become presidential candidates. Whether that leads to a world of clammed-up robots or one where everyone relaxes is anyone's guess, but it's hard to see what's going to stop it.

Well, unless those climate scientists are right and civilization is beaten back to a new candlelight era.

Social Networks sites like Facebook and OrgaSizer exist because people want to share this information with others and I truly believe the Internet is an excellent medium to do this... as long as you still get to decide "when" and "what" to share with "who" :)

At the bottom of this page facebook is being featured with twitter and other services.

Anytime we put ourselves on someone else's servers we run the risk of them using our data in a way that we don't like at some point in the future.

The question isn't whether Facebook has changed the defaults. The question isn't whether the UI for setting up your own privacy settings is difficult to undersand (btw, it's not and the "default" is exactly wat I had _before_ the change).

The question is "What are you sharing?" And what do you believe that something you put on a public site, a site maintained by Someone you DO NOT KNOW, is or could ever be considered "private" information?

My Facebook settings are that only "friends" can see my "Religious and Political" views or "Family and Relationship" or "Education and Work". But what really makes those items private is that _I haven't filled them in_. To anyone other than "Friends" they're absent from the page. To friends, they're _empty_.

The best way to keep something private is to not put it out in public. Someone else's website, whether you like it or not, is public.

1. Anything you say or upload to Facebook should be his property.
2. Mark Zuckerberg wants to profit off the back of your content, and believes that giving you Facebook is ample compensation.

This infuriates me. What you say, what you think, what you do, and those you love are yours. None of this is property of Mark Zuckerberg. He has repeatedly tried to own all content produced and parked on Facebook, and it is clear that he will continue in this quest, despite any grand pronouncements to the contrary.

Personally, I believe that Mark Zuckerberg has been the beneficiary of good fortune, but that he is simply too young and immature to clearly understand what he thinks is his divine right to own. If you value your privacy, and I hope that you do, it is up to all of us to hold Mark Zuckerberg and those around him at Facebook accountable, and to demand that we have options to protect our privacy and ownership of all content posted on their site.

Your option is to vote with your feet. Ask yourself: "would I want this content on the front page of the New York Times?" "Would I want someone to share that I bought an engagement right for my lover without my express permission?" "Do I mind someone profiting from content that I created without any compensation?" It is very important to ask yourself these questions, because this is exactly what Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook want to do. Why? Profit. I have little doubt that the easy days of becoming a billionaire on perceived valuations and eyeballs is drawing to an end for Mark Zuckerberg, and that his venture capital backers want to see hard profits. But to do so off your back is unacceptable.

If you value your privacy and your content, think hard about this. It's time to show Mark Zuckerberg that he should never expect a sense of entitlement. Either we hold him and Facebook accountable, or it's time to pull the plug. There are many ways of staying connected. Facebook does not have to be the only way.

Experian, TransUnion, Equifax, Facebook.

Think about how information is gathered and how it is used by all parties (you and people that "do business" with you, and you start to see stark similarities.

They are the four major credit bureaus, the latter being completely without regulation.

"Didn't get that job because of what Experian, TransUnion, or Equifax said about you? Oh wait, you didn't even get that job interview because of Facebook!"

I don't care how interconnected everything on the internet is, how data mined, etc. etc, if a site wants to keep info private, they have the capacity to do so. Sorry, I'm not going to suck it up and put my life out there for this zurly headed charlatan and his sleazy investors to mine for money.

we need an open-source, peer-to-peer social network, with no centralized server and 100% user control over privacy.

BUT it's important, that every participant of this new transparent society is transparent. That means the government, all companies and all organization have to be 100% forceful transparent!

I have an open blog, but that doesn't mean I want to show EVERYONE my address, phone number, and every single thing that I'm doing.

I wonder what the next big thing will be once Facebook dies out...

We will also be speaking at the upcoming Federal Trade Commission Roundtable on January 28 at Berkeley, where the FTC will be exploring issues about social networking privacy...more to come on that...

Learn more about the Demand your dotRights campaign at http://www.facebook.com/dotrights

And sign the petition to Zuckerberg at https://secure.aclu.org/site/SPageNavigator/CN_Facebook_Privacy_Petition

That, and the maturity of Facebook as a company, is lacking.

Remove your accounts. Starve the beast.

These moves are classic bait and switch. They corralled us in with a mom and pop feel but went predatory as soon as they captured most of America's email addresses to sell to them later.

This country (the United States) is in financial shambles and a lot of people I know are feeling the effects of it and all companies can think to do is sell us their crap, more advertising, more, more, more.

All I wanted to do was chat with family in other states and friends and now I have to deal with games, scam offers and all this other crap. They only see people who live here as consumers and the potential we have for making THEM more money, meanwhile the other 90% is one paycheck away from living in their car. I'm tired of making these people MORE money. $500 million isn't enough??? We are already broke, you want our privacy too?

http://hodges-model.blogspot.com/2010/01/comment-on-paul-roemers-ehr-market-is.html

http://hodges-model.blogspot.com/

The combination of the mass media and celebrity revelations plus the ubiquity of technology in our lives is affecting our notions of 'confidential' and 'personal'.

Peter Jones
Hodges' Health Career - Care Domains - Model
http://www.p-jones.demon.co.uk/
h2cm: help2Cmore - help-2-listen - help-2-care
http://twitter.com/h2cm

Anything that they may say other than that is just a sugar coating to help us swallow the pill and distract us from the truth.

Clearly he doesn't want Everyone to know where he lives, etc. What he really means, of course, is that he'd like to have all of that info about Everyone ELSE.

"the vector around which Facebook operates."
Z said that when the demographic in facebook was 'olding', inexperienced web users had found a way to participate.

"arrogant and condescending"
Z has always been quiet, it's a quiet company, when they opened the software to developers it was very quietly done. When they changed the privacy setting on the other hand there was a press release and a notice when you signed in.

I think facebook's "..pushing our culture away from privacy..." will is a good thing. Twitter exposes you (if you choose to write it), much more than facebook and as a result it creates much more link data which equals money power and influence. That is what is forcing facebook to open up. When you say, "First the company kept user data siloed inside its site alone..." you want your cake and eat it too, now that they're opening up, to get linked in search engines, you accuse them of oppertunism. Change is life, and a growing corporation is no different

"This major reversal, backed-up by superficial explanations, makes me wonder if Facebook's changing philosophies about privacy are just convenient stories to tell while the company shifts its strategy to exert control over the future of the web."

Jezz isn't that a little extreme? We all know a new app will show up tomorrow that will make obsolete the apps of today. Cory Doctorow wrote about this in 2005 in his piece "How Your Creepy Ex-Co-Workers Will Kill Facebook".

Not very many people blog?? "In 2008: 133 million – The number of blogs on the Internet (as tracked by Technorati)"!

I agree that perhaps groups you belong to shouldn't be public knowledge unless you choose that option; it will stifle emerging political movements that aren't sure of themselves yet.

To the point; I am wondering if this preoccupation with the seeming hypocrisy of the facebook group has at it s' root the fear that facebook may be financed through CIA puppet companies. That is arguable - but instead of second guessing the business strategy why not investigate and report the central thread of your piece here, instead of alluding to it sideways. It seems childish to accuse a corporation of lying to us about there social contract with society; soul-less corporations' only goal is make money, and don't appear evil doing it.

Michael Holloway
FilterBlogs

Facebook gave us options yes, but not much and also they made the mistake of pushing the new settings as a default (when everybody knows not many people pay attention to those messages).

Doc Searls posted this blog post yesterday. And I think if we had some sort of creative commons for privacy and Facebook changes it (and we see the different privacy logo) it will be easier and it will set a standard of possible options for all the services of the web.

It's important that this doesn't replicate in other services. Facebook may die and then the next service will do the same. Unless we build something that makes us aware of how they handle our information and unless we establish some guidelines on how to handle our information ethically and with responsibility.

The only reason to abandon privacy is for money period. He has to sell you status in order to profit, really REALLY profit.

Imagine my shock to discover that my information will suddenly be public if I don't opt out, despite my clear intention shown in my initial choices! Fortunately, I'm reasonably aware of these things. FB is banking on the people whose awareness is not acute, or who are naive enough to believe that nothing will happen to them as a result of their personal lives becoming billboard fodder.

So I have deactivated my page, and will resume my old email habits. Sure, I'll miss some things, but I believe that births, deaths, visits and vacations will still be shared with me regardless of my lack of a FB page.

And you know, it takes a while to locate that "Deactivate My Page" link. I'm sure that this is to discourage people from doing so. It takes a lot of effort to "opt out" in more ways than one.

This is why 18-25yr olds DON'T used twitter... it's too public. They like facebook because it's a closed society, it's private.

The problem here is not about privacy, it's not about "changing society"... that's all bullshit. Everyone knows it.

It's about money. Plain and simple.

Opening it up publicly means opening their content to greater page views and thus greater revenues.

This is the opening that another company will have to take over the lead.

I predict someone in the next year will create a new - closed network - social network that will takeover from Facebook. End of story.

I recently philosophized about Facebook, privacy, and what's happening to culture, and oddly enough I too cited the rise of reality tv as laying the groundwork for this shift to public lives. "The domination of reality tv demonstrates our culture enjoys knowing the dirty details, and has paved the way for the 15 seconds of fame that accompany a much-commented status update."

While that cultural shift may indeed be underway, Mr. Zuckerberg is, at the very best, trying to resolve his cognitive dissonance about selling our private lives up the river. At worst, and what seems more likely: the promise and premise on which Facebook was built was (perhaps inadvertently) a mastermind of a scam to secure users and then sell what they were implicitly promised wasn't for sale.

You can't advertise to an empty room. If they push, people will leave. We just have to overcome the inertia of all our parents finally "getting online", and move our social networks elsewhere—a task Facebook is counting on being too difficult.

His claim reflects the fact that, either his programmers are too lazy, or he hasn't hired enough programmers, to face up to modernity.

Some do it for fun, some for profit, some for prestige, most for a longing of some sort.

I have a much more cynical view - "follow the money".

For every day the IPO gets closer, privacy degrades. That says to me that pre-IPO negotiations with potential large investors ( who are assigned priority to buy big blocks of stock during the first few minutes of the IPO ) center around reselling user data ( be it email address, activity, etc. ) to third parties in order to make quarterly revenue goals.

Privacy is so closely tied to freedom. If someone wants to control you and knows everything about you, they can control you and take your freedom away. If someone wants to control you and they have no information about you, it is difficult for them to control you.

In the decades before the internet, Americans had a lot of privacy. I would say that this was not always the norm. When the U.S. was first founded, your neighbor's usually knew everything about you. If you committed adultery, you received a Scarlet Letter. Everyone knew it. It was not until our society started become more mobile that we began to have a high degree of privacy.

Now with information becoming so mobile, we are losing our privacy again. How can we enjoy all this rich, real-time information, and not lose our freedoms?

Agreed with many before that Facebook is trying to play its hand as far as its users will let it. In the end we shall see whether or not the users approve of his move, and I've got a feeling that it will take some time for an angry minority to gain enough ground on this issue.

Zuckerberg seems to think so, I'm skeptical, and I'm keeping my personal data off Facebook for now (which should apply to any web data for now I believe).

I find it very interesting that TechCrunch have been bleating about about privacy being dead for quite a while now, the latest article here:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/30/we-all-live-in-public/

And before that at Le Web, citing products like Blippy. Imagine my surprise when Facebook win the Best Startup or Product of 2009 and the only two major voices on the internet both banging on about privacy being dead are TechCrunch and Facebook. I smell a rat.

Privacy is a basic human right. The only reason Facebook gained its massive money spinning audience was the promise of privacy. Zuckerberg has become arrogant and over rates his thought leadership.

Facebook has seen changes over time in how people operate within social networks, and they're adapting to the shifting of societal norms.

The sharing of information has become dynamic and we leave footprints of our words and actions wherever we are. Facebook is adjusting their policy to the needs of its users, and they'll continue to do so while helping define how humans and technology meld.

Great news for those with what they hope are Facebook-killers, just add Privacy and you could be on a winner.

Facebook only want less Privacy so they can sell your data, it's become one big spam machine.

He really needs a reality check if he thinks the majority of Facebook users would allow most of their personal details to be out their for one and all.

It is exactly the lack of privacy and the inability to configure Facebook to reflect the circles of friends and acquaintances of my "physical" life that kept me for the longest time from using it. When I first signed up with Facebook several years ago, I envisioned it as a tool allowing me to stay in close touch with family and close friends in other countries (face it, sharing frequent, small day-to-day events in life paints a much fuller picture of your life than writing letters or making phone calls directed to one person). Actually, I have to laugh at comments from people about why anyone would need Facebook or Twitter, if you could just pick up the phone or write a letter. Comments like that clearly identify the speaker as someone whose friends and family are within close geographical vicinity or at least within the same time zone. Not to mention that with a 12-hour workday my days would have to be at least 36 hours long to have sufficient time for writing personal letters and making phone calls on a regular basis! But, aside from the above, at the same time I also wanted to use Facebook as a networking platform to help me stay in touch with former coworkers and other acquaintances, in other words, with people I don't want to indulge in intimate details about my life, but simply stay in touch. In my disappointment with Facebook, I turned to LinkedIn for the latter and didn't use Facebook at all until years later when some former and current coworkers found my name and requested to be my friends. Since then I have started using Facebook, but only to practice "light conversation" by talking about mostly inconsequential events and chit chat. In other words, Facebook did not replace email or phone calls. I had to conform to Facebook, rather than Facebook letting me use it as a tool the manner I intended to.

Then, about six months ago Facebook implemented very granular privacy controls that allowed me exactly to specify who can see my profile information and the content I post. The granularity of these privacy controls was such that I could apply them to individuals, lists created by me or one of the default circles (Everyone, Friends of Friends or Friends Only). I could even lock information down completely to be seen only by me (but then, why would I enter it at all on Facebook?) I now have control over the third-party apps and what information of mine they can pull. This change in the privacy settings was exactly what I had been waiting for for years. I now use Facebook to stay in touch with people in my life on my own terms. Having lived in a few different countries over time and worked in different jobs, my Facebook friends are from different phases of my life and different places and I don't really want to connect all of them to each other. I now have that ability in Facebook. While this approach requires a bit of paying attention and extra work, and, as stated elsewhere, mobile clients do not support these options (yet), I finally have the freedom to choose what to post and control who can read it. There is, of course, the excellent point Connie Reece raises in your June 29, 2009 post: What happens to information if the recipient does not have their privacy set to the same degree you have. I have not tested this, but would certainly hope that the author's privacy settings take control.

As you can probably guess, Mark Zuckerberg's statement about the future direction of privacy sets off a million of alarm bells in my head and I think he is completely wrong with saying that 'The Age of Privacy is Over'. To the contrary, people value their privacy even more today and only by allowing and providing for the need of privacy, will those who to date still refuse to use the Internet out of fear of lack of privacy come on board and start using these great tools. And that is what the Internet, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs are: tools to be used by us, the users. They should not the ones controlling us. And anyone, who says differently, should be looked at very critically as to his or her intentions.

Personally, I hope that there are no plans for Facebook to remove what has already been implemented. I can live with newly created accounts being set up for public display - although I completely disagree with this approach - as new users can, and simply will have to, be taught that as part of creating an account, they will have to choose the level of privacy they desire.

Before identity theft became a huge problem, "no one" cared that every tom-dick-and-harry business was using social security numbers as account numbers.

Before 9/11, "no one" cared about terrorism at the deeply personal level.

The fundamental danger is that Mark Z. is completely unprepared for the reality that societies acceptance of what is o.k. can and does shift. Sometimes slowly, some times in one day.

Arrogance and indifference is blinding.

I won't predicate the demise of Facebook. But if I was a facebook investor, this would be a little worrying. I sense a bit of an echo machine within Facebook.

If government law changes to demand privacy will facebook be able to respond?

Before identity theft became a huge problem, "no one" cared that every tom-dick-and-harry business was using social security numbers as account numbers.

Before 9/11, "no one" cared about terrorism at the deeply personal level.

The fundamental danger is that Mark Z. is completely unprepared for the reality that societies acceptance of what is o.k. can and does shift. Sometimes slowly, some times in one day.

Arrogance and indifference is blinding.

I won't predicate the demise of Facebook. But if I was a facebook investor, this would be a little worrying. I sense a bit of an echo machine within Facebook.

As for me, I have learned to never write down something I don't want the entire world to see.

It is exactly the lack of privacy and the inability to configure Facebook to reflect the circles of friends and acquaintances of my "physical" life that kept me for the longest time from using it. When I first signed up with Facebook several years ago, I envisioned it as a tool allowing me to stay in close touch with family and close friends in other countries (face it, sharing frequent, small day-to-day events in life paints a much fuller picture of your life than writing letters or making phone calls directed to one person). Actually, I have to laugh at comments from people about why anyone would need Facebook or Twitter, if you could just pick up the phone or write a letter. Comments like that clearly identify the speaker as someone whose friends and family are within close geographical vicinity or at least within the same time zone. Not to mention that with a 12-hour workday my days would have to be at least 36 hours long to have sufficient time for writing personal letters and making phone calls on a regular basis! But, aside from the above, at the same time I also wanted to use Facebook as a networking platform to help me stay in touch with former coworkers and other acquaintances, in other words, with people I don't want to indulge in intimate details about my life, but simply stay in touch. In my disappointment with Facebook, I turned to LinkedIn for the latter and didn't use Facebook at all until years later when some former and current coworkers found my name and requested to be my friends. Since then I have started using Facebook, but only to practice "light conversation" by talking about mostly inconsequential events and chit chat. In other words, Facebook did not replace email or phone calls. I had to conform to Facebook, rather than Facebook letting me use it as a tool the manner I intended to.

Then, about six months ago Facebook implemented very granular privacy controls that allowed me exactly to specify who can see my profile information and the content I post. The granularity of these privacy controls was such that I could apply them to individuals, lists created by me or one of the default circles (Everyone, Friends of Friends or Friends Only). I could even lock information down completely to be seen only by me (but then, why would I enter it at all on Facebook?) I now have control over the third-party apps and what information of mine they can pull. This change in the privacy settings was exactly what I had been waiting for for years. I now use Facebook to stay in touch with people in my life on my own terms. Having lived in a few different countries over time and worked in different jobs, my Facebook friends are from different phases of my life and different places and I don't really want to connect all of them to each other. I now have that ability in Facebook. While this approach requires a bit of paying attention and extra work, and, as stated elsewhere, mobile clients do not support these options (yet), I finally have the freedom to choose what to post and control who can read it. There is, of course, the excellent point Connie Reece raises in your June 29, 2009 post: What happens to information if the recipient does not have their privacy set to the same degree you have. I have not tested this, but would certainly hope that the author's privacy settings take control.

As you can probably guess, Mark Zuckerberg's statement about the future direction of privacy sets off a million of alarm bells in my head and I think he is completely wrong with saying that 'The Age of Privacy is Over'. To the contrary, people value their privacy even more today and only by allowing and providing for the need of privacy, will those who to date still refuse to use the Internet out of fear of lack of privacy come on board and start using these great tools. And that is what the Internet, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs are: tools to be used by us, the users. They should not the ones controlling us. And anyone, who says differently, should be looked at very critically as to his or her intentions.

Personally, I hope that there are no plans for Facebook to remove what has already been implemented. I can live with newly created accounts being set up for public display - although I completely disagree with this approach - as new users can, and simply will have to, be taught that as part of creating an account, they will have to choose the level of privacy they desire.

"If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place."

As others have suggested, presumably the catalyst for this change is twitter. I think that's a bad model for facebook. facebook's differentiator from twitter was privacy, and in particular, trust. My friends on facebook really are my friends. My "friends" on twitter are mostly people I don't know, or worse, spam bots and "marketers".

Facebook must not dilute the incredible store of trust that they have built over the years. That is what their value is; that is what their competitive advantage is.

Making money on others brain asset is a billion$ biz pattern. Once you reach millions of users. its nature to speak arrogantly. Trust is the one which strongly binds user with online services.

A social norm to share publicly your name? your political views? your religion? your jokes? what you were doing last Saturday night? photos of your kids? their names? and on and on. No way.

The bottom line is Facebook is a collection of indivudals and each one deserved the right to control what happens with their information.

Facebook is pushing people to reveal more and more and playing on their misunderstanding of how their information is being handled. They're designing their pages and structuring their forms to encourage people to reveal everything. They're now allowing people to opt-out where they previous allowed them to opt-in.

Most people don't get it. Put once data is online, it's there forever.

Watch Facebook take all this information people thought was private and make it public.

No one has even mentioned the third party apps -- they're pulling everyons information directly out of facebook, processing it, storing it and in many cases publishing it! Yeah, that's against the terms of service, but most developers don't care.

People really need to wake up.

Aside from the fact that this is a betrayal of trust and an example of the perpetually changing contracts that have contributed to the economic meltdown, Facebook will become a breeding ground for IDENTITY THIEVES because of the sensitive nature of info that it has encouraged people to share on its network.

Let the class action lawsuits begin.

@scientaestubique

You're spot on, privacy is a right in many European countries. In France, even if president Sarkozy is about to make it mandatory to install a gov. powered spyware on every computer to report on netizens' every move (Hadopi law), Facebook will still face legal trouble for this...

You probably heard about Sarkozy's Google tax. Blaming Google for everything, from press failure to lack of digital sales in the music industry, led to mass media bashing it and gov. taxing it (kinda hard to believe but we have a Rep. administration and a socialist regime, weird). Well my guess is that Facebook is next. Facebook is showcased on national TV (gov. controls TV and mass media here, the Italian/Russian way) as a way for kids to buy illicit drugs and to meet pedophiles, and I'm pretty sure this privacy move will have them loose some vital support among the tech crowd here. Very bad move, at least when it comes to facing politicians in France.

On a business and API/social graph/web square point of view, I dont really think they have any choice, this is a vital move for them if they don't want to become a fad within a year or two... but that's another story...

I agree that his description is essentially a brush-off. I agree that making some parts of a user's profile unalterably public is brazen and extremely troubling. I won't grant you that people don't assert control over their privacy settings, and I won't grant you that Facebook must stay forever locked into the model that has existed as it has built it's application.

Instead of fiddling judgements, I'd like to participate in a conscientious discussion of the negative implications of public information - not just the small difficulties that sharing your pages will cause or the phonebook analogy, but the larger implications of abuse that scare me the most, implications that harken back to the way the industrial revolution treated their own technological progression.

Ultimately, like it or not there is a community-reinforced push that people publish content on their web using a valid identity. This very comment conveys substantial information about my personal opinions on this topic, and no doubt the fact that I'm publishing it as anonymously as I can (after providing the required email, of course) will reflect negatively in the mind of most of it's readers.

Just my gut reaction.

It is very obvious Facebook is now hooked in advertising (read: revenue). As they say: "it's NOT about the money, it's ALL about the money."

Anyway, all big-time sites are monsters. Microsoft, FaceBook, Google, etc. They want it all. Google is not a search engine company, it's an advertising company. FaceBook is not a social networking site, it's an advertising company.

Nice post.

I've recently been working on an email privacy tool that lets you get messages in your inbox without giving out your personal email to questionable websites. I call it Disposable Email.

There's always going to be a need, and want for privacy. And where there's a will there's a way.

I think privacy options will become more complex. Specific content can go to specific groups of your friends, family and public. We will choose where and how it's delivered.

The default information that will be openly shared in the public will be similar to the info in these things we used to have called phone books. They have names, addresses, and phone numbers.

With the web addresses aren't just the physical world ones. It's the virtual ones too. Names will include online nicknames as well as real. They will be tied together with SEO variables. Phone numbers cross with addresses as email, text, voice and video merge on the web but remain as separate channels to communicate through. Profile pics are the new edition to the 'phone book' to help with identification. I am sure if printing the paper ones wasn't soo expensive we all could have had our picture in there too.

The things they list as public I see no problem in sharing online. What I want shared back is the statistics that facebook, Google and Microsoft collect on monitoring our activity. I would love analytics on myself and friends. That is what this post should be about. Fighting for the democratization of information. We share, they share!

Did you watch the video? That isn't what he says.

If they start dictating the users what they think is right (for their pockets) they better prepare for a massive user-base loss. It might take sometime but it'll happen.

It's time for another social giant to appear to end the Facebook monopoly, so they might come to their senses.

Now contrast that with a quote by George Orwell on the notion of privacy and social norms (I know this quote well because I used it in my senior dissertation - more than 20 years ago):

"There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment… It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug into your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live – did live, from habit that became instinct – in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and except in darkness, every movement scrutinized (Orwell, 1984, 6-7)"

Just because something is a "social norm", doesn't mean we should accept it. Doesn't mean it is good, or just.

Powerful companies such as Facebook and Google can be agents of change. Will they use their power to continue to increase power (and profit) or to serve their users and strive toward a better society?

on the positive side - just opening up opportunities for others.

Cole

Great news for those with what they hope are Facebook-killers, just add Privacy and you could be on a winner.

Facebook only want less Privacy so they can sell your data, it's become one big spam machine.

The next social revolution is about choosing more properly to whom and what kind of information you are willing to share. Personally I belive that oversharing is only the first step of social networking and the next , more intelligent step is at hand. Millions will limit strongly the information they are ready to give to strangers for free.

I don`t believe that FB-users werw ready to share everything with everybody in the first place, but they didn`t understand that will be the case.

Pauli Aalto-Setälä

I predict (again) that the age of Facebook will be over within a few years. Scoble called me an idiot when I said this a year ago. We'll see.

Critical thinking is key...to all things in life. All this privacy hoopla is all sensationalism and to blame sites and services is a load of crock. Users have options, meaning they are free to opt in and out. Simply, the options are there, learn it. Remember back in the 90s when we learned all the telephone options? i.e. *67 blocks your number, you can unlist yourself from white/yellow pages, etc., etc.,? The way I see it, is, ff you don't educate yourselves, then too bad.

Besides, our education system is garbage so we might as well learn from the Internet.

It appears that they haven't learned from the old-school MySpace debacle. It's only a matter of time before this social empire they've created crumbles now.