The Downsides of The Platform

Much like everything in life, Facebook has downsides too. As stated earlier, the story feed provides a wealth of information regarding people within a member’s network. What does this pose for privacy? Could this not be used as a stalker’s tool? This was the outcry of the original launching of the feature. Within days, groups appeared on Facebook (such as “I HATE THE NEW FACEBOOK (Stalker) LAYOUT”, and “Coalition Against The Mini-Feed”) depicting the “stalker feature” as an attack on the privacy of the users. Developers quickly listened and tightened security by allowing more choices in terms of who can see your news, photos, contact information, and other modules that could be added to your profile.

Companies are also feeling the pressure of Facebook’s influence. As stated earlier in one light this works as a great way for companies to network out and get to know people within the company. Unfortunately, now employees have yet another “tool” to decrease their productivity. This can deeply affect any company’s profits if work cannot be produced at a proper rate. It also poises a threat to potential hires because employers may use Facebook to research an employee even before they step foot into an interview. Considering the wide majority of Facebook’s first users were college students, the various posting of party photos could deeply destroy a graduate’s chances of obtaining a nice job because of a wrong first-impression.

Facebook itself has felt the wrath of some of its very own rules. Members are allowed to post pictures, just as long as they own the images and that they are not of a pornographic matter. Due to this fact, images of breast-feeding mothers were removed from Facebook. With any action follows a result. Since then, a group of activists have sought legal action against the company because of it removing their photos due to “unsuitable” content. The activists (or lactivists as they have called themselves) feel that breastfeeding is very natural and should not be censored. To voice their opinion, a group was created named “Hey Facebook, breastfeeding is not obscene!”. Close to 7000 members had joined the group as of September 7 th, 2007 (Moses, 2007). As of November 10 th, 2007 the group had grown close to 34,000 members as stated on its group page.

Facebook's Case of Deja Vu

One would have thought the Facebook team would have caught on to the idea that releasing new features that involve personal information of its users would start an uproar many moons ago when they launched the "news-feed" feature.

Facebook Users Complain of New Tracking

With the latest addition to Facebook comes outcries from its users regarding privacy. A very intersting article! http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071121/ap_on_hi_te/facebook_ads;_ylt=ArdlimRHqNQLOpVqe5gqVY4jtBAF

Big Brother Realized?

In regards to an article I posted reference to on 11/22, I began to think what this could really mean for the privacy of users. The "Big Brother" conspiracy has lived on for some years now since the book 1984 was published.