Facebook Is Using You

LAST week, Facebook filed documents with the government that will allow it to sell shares of stock to the public. It is estimated to be worth at least $75 billion. But unlike other big-ticket corporations, it doesn’t have an inventory of widgets or gadgets, cars or phones. Facebook’s inventory consists of personal data — yours and mine.

Facebook makes money by selling ad space to companies that want to reach us. Advertisers choose key words or details — like relationship status, location, activities, favorite books and employment — and then Facebook runs the ads for the targeted subset of its 845 million users. If you indicate that you like cupcakes, live in a certain neighborhood and have invited friends over, expect an ad from a nearby bakery to appear on your page. The magnitude of online information Facebook has available about each of us for targeted marketing is stunning. In Europe, laws give people the right to know what data companies have about them, but that is not the case in the United States.    Full article

Fighting a Clickjack Attack

By J.D. Biersdorfer

Q.  I often see links posted on my friends’ Facebook pages that I know are some sort of virus, even though it says my friend “liked” the page. Can I get infected myself if one of these links shows up on my Facebook News Feed or Wall?

A.  Many of those links promising a look at outrageous videos or photos are part of a “clickjacking” scam. In this situation, the user is typically tricked into clicking on a provocative link, but hidden code within the page posts a copy of the tainted link to the profiles of all the user’s friends.
     According to a post on a Facebook security page, if you or your friends have been clickjacked, you should be able to remove poison posts on your Facebook Wall and News Feed by moving the mouse cursor to the top-right corner of the unwanted item and clicking the X button to get the “Remove and Unlike” option.
     As a further precaution, check the Info page on your profile and remove any unwanted pages from your lists in the Activities and Interests area. As a general rule, do not click on strange links, even if it appears that close friends have shared them on your Facebook page; horrendous grammar or odd phrasing in the post should be an instant tip-off.  Full story     (Wikipedia article on Clickjacking)

Does Facebook Make Someone Social Offline?

THE GIST Facebook makes people more social in their lives offline.

THE SOURCE “Got Facebook? Investigating What’s Social About Social Media,” by S. Craig Watkins and H. Erin Lee, the University of Texas, Austin.

Were you creeped out by the ominous trailer for “The Social Network” (“I want you to notice, when I’m not around …”) and what it may say about you? Does logging on to Facebook for the fourth time today make you feel like a soulless shut-in?

If so, fear not: According to a cheery report out of the University of Texas, Austin, Facebook actually makes us more sociable. Surveying 900 current and recent college graduates nationwide, Craig Watkins and Erin Lee of the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas examined the impact of Facebook on users’ social lives, concluding that “social media afford opportunities for new expressions of friendship, intimacy and community.”

Full story continues here.

A Day in the Life of the Internet

A Day in the Life of the Internet

Collecta, New Search Engine For Realtime Searching of Blogs, Twitter, Flickr, etc.

“As we become inundated with more and more streams of data from Twitter, Facebook, blog, Flickr, and everywhere else, we need better ways to search what is happening right now. Twitter, Facebook, and Google are working on their own real-time search efforts, along with a slew of startups including OneRiot, Scoopler, and CrowdEye (which launched last night). The latest entrant in the real time search wars is Collecta It just launched a few minutes ago, and it scours the Web for real-time information. Results come from Twitter, of course, but also from news feeds, blog posts, comments, and Flickr photos. Status updates on Jaiku and Identica are also captured.”     Story

Microsoft’s Answer to Facebook and Twitter

“With a new product called Vine, Microsoft is tackling the issue that, in the Digital Age, contact management is no longer static–where you are and what you’re doing at a given moment can matter just as much as what your cell phone number is.    Full Story

Facebook Yields to User Outrage

The Users revolt on Facebook has resulted in a reversion to the the old terms of service.  Things happen face in the internet age.  Full Story

Facebook Terms of Service Change

According to The Consumerist, “Now, anything you upload to Facebook can be used by Facebook in any way they deem fit, forever, no matter what you do later.”

Old terms of service stated that rights expired once you removed content, but now once you post, they own it forever.  Here’s an excerpt:

“You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, transferable, worldwide license to use, copy, publish, store, publicly perform or display, transmit, reformat, modify, edit and distribute any User Content you post…”

Is this controversy overblown or should people be worried?  Other services aren’t nearly as bold.  Flickr lets you keep your content rights.   Myspace only uses your content for myspace related services.  Twitter owns no rights.  Youtube rights to your content eventually expire.  Only Facebook has irrevocable, perpetual rights to your content!  Users don’t seem to care, but should they?   Full Story

Social Networking Isn’t Just for Kids

A Pew Research Center analysis released Wednesday reports that 35% of adult Internet users now have a profile on at least one social networking site. And among online adults ages 35-44, 30% have a profile.

So, are you no one if you don’t have a Facebook page??

Read the article