“If they pay a penie or two pence more for the reddinesse of them..let them looke to that, a foole and his money is soone parted.” - Dr. John Bridges, Defence of the Government of the Church of England, 1587.
I don’t know if that applies to the people who bought stock, or the people who will be making you some money, but I guess the near-future will reveal whom the shoe fits.
You have interesting ideas, and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter… No, I’m being serious, not sarcastic. You seem to know a whole hell of a lot more about ‘Operational Security’, and how easy it is to violate, than the average ‘Internetizen’. You should start a newsletter that shows them how trivially easy it is to a) violate OpSec, and b) what nastiness someone can do to the target, if the evil whim strikes them, when the target has violated it…
I look forward to subscribing to your newsletter.
Despite the talk of Big Brother and effective data collection, the jury’s still out on whether or not FB ads are effective. GM didn’t find them to be and pulled advertising earlier this year.
I can’t say I know anything about this operational security business, I just know how to analyze data to sell people shit they don’t need. For what it’s worth, I felt ambivalent enough about it to leave and find a career that relies a little less on the credulousness of others.
I’d hesitate to pass judgment on ads just because GM couldn’t sell cars on facebook. Anyone might be a little skeptical of that up front.
I hope for a quieter, less ad-ridden world someday. The less permeable people become to merchant’s attempts to “create value,” the more pleasant life will be.
That’s all well and good if the view is something that most civilised people would agree is distasteful (like advocating the destruction of believers of a religion, for example, or posting a string of obscenities about other people), but it’s not really applicable when there are some very real and serious subjects (like having any sort of problem whatsoever with feminism if you’re male, for example) for which it might be considered unwise to voice one’s opinion too loudly, especially with your real name atttached to them. Does that make someone “Chickenshit”? I don’t think it does.
Of course it does. If you’re too afraid to post an opinion under your real name then you don’t really hold that opinion or care enough to have your voice heard in the comments of some random website.
I’m afraid I have to disagree with you there.
Let’s say you work for a company who have publically made statements you disagree with or believe/know to be not quite the full picture - posting your views on that, under your real name, could lead to you losing your job (or finding your career limited), among other things.
Do people in that position “not really hold those opinions”? I don’t think that’s the case at all.
I think the point is that advertising observers have been hesitant to pass judgement one way or the other. The strongest endorsement of FB ads I’ve seen has been that people who “like” a retailer (and, to a lesser extent, their friends) are somewhat likely to buy from that retailer and respond to ads.
Sounds pretty weak to me.
I’m sure you also noticed-- impossible not to-- all the media coverage of how FB’s IPO was a disappointment. I’d say that’s another point against FB being all-knowing. Or even a decent marketing platform.
True. I tend not to join in with workplace griping, although I have a few minor complaints about my employer. It would be easy enough to find an anonymous means to post them if they were important, though.
It would be very weak if facebook had ten users. But it has a lot more than that. When millions of people are somewhat more likely to buy, it’s money.
One of the biggest problems with the fb IPO is that investors did not believe that fb had an adequate strategy to deliver mobile ads. So while fb hasn’t been doing well, it’s not for the reasons you suggest.
Nope. These quotes are factually incorrect. Do either of you see why?
I think it’s not this cut and dried. Of course it’s an exchange; users don’t pay to use facebook. But people reasonably think that they are giving more than they are getting because just what facebook does with the data is so murky. The fact that there is an exchange does not mean that facebook should get carte blanche to exploit user data in ways that aren’t obvious to most people. The only bargaining power users have is to control access to their data. These questions are going to get hashed out in the marketplace and in the regulatory environment. Just because an exchange occurs without coercion does not mean that it is fair.
Users can’t simply inform themselves of what fb (and companies like it) are doing because their techniques are highly proprietary, companies are still innovating rapidly and figuring out how to monetize data, and because it is a technical field with formidable barriers to entry.
Well, that’s true only because “that’s fair” means “I like it” and “that’s not fair” means “I don’t like it.” If you see me sign up for Facebook, you are perfectly free to believe that the exchange I’m making is “not fair” (which only means “I, Maeglin, do not like that exchange”). However, the fact that you hold that opinion has just about zero real-world consequences. That is, nothing out in the real world changes based on the fact that you personally do not like the exchange I made.
My individual opinion doesn’t have huge real-world consequences, but it’s pretty obviously true that when a lot of people think something is unfair, there are consequences. It probably comes as no shock to anyone that Facebook and Google make huge investments in trying to persuade individuals and organizations that their data use and privacy operations are completely benign. Google spent a fortune running a very condescending ad campaign on the subway about why everyone should be happy to let them capture personal and geographic data. You may think that these considerations shouldn’t matter, but like it or not, they do.
Whether or not the exchange itself is “fair” or “unfair” is irrelevant. What’s relevant is whether the terms of the exchange is available to both parties.
If the basic premise is that you get to use Facebook for free because they are selling your information to third parties, that’s fair. If the basic premise is that you get to use Facebook for free because they are selling your information to third parties and not telling you about it, maybe not so much.
For what it’s worth, Facebook’s terms of use are written in pretty basic English, though I had to click about eight times to actually get to their data use policy.
Well, the people who engage in the exchange are happy with the deal they are making or they wouldn’t make it. I fail to see how the opinions of all those who don’t participate in the exchange will have much of a real-world impact on those who do participate in the exchange.
You still seem to be stuck on some cosmic conception of “fair” that you believe you can tap into.
I notice more than one person saying this. You do realize you can turn off those email notifications, right? I have most of them turned off myself. Click the drop down arrow, click the Account Settings, then choose notifications in the left-hand panel. On the right hand side, you’ll see a bunch of apps with envelope icons beside them. Click on them and uncheck the mail you don’t want to get. Or click on the envelope icon to check/uncheck them all.
Or if you’re too lazy for that, and you want to shut them all of, set a filer rule on your email to delete all emails from Facebook.
And in other news, cows go moo.
What I’ve been getting at, and what you seem to be determined to miss, is that it doesn’t take a lot of data analysis to find the few profitable uses for FB found so far. People who like a retailer’s page are more likely to buy from that retailer? Hope they didn’t blow a fuse on the Cray running that scenario.
If the data gathered by FB was as valuable (or, in your words, “very powerful”) as you claim, the company would be more profitable and thus more attractive to investors. And, actually, it so happens that there were and are investors with a problem with the continuing unproven status of FB advertising, not just mobile ads.
“Although Facebook is very promising, it’s an unproven ad model,” said Brian Wieser, analyst at Pivotal Research Group, who has a $30 price target for the stock. “The revenue growth is not assured. There are a lot of risks that were not really reflected in the pricing at the IPO.”
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Facebook-IPO-underscores-shutting-out-the-masses-3575283.php#ixzz2DJJ5RHkd (May 22, 2012)
Looking back over your posts I see that you haven’t actually claimed that FB is doing any of the “very powerful” things that can be done with data analysis, just made out that FB could if it wanted to. Yeah, and ruin its brand while they’re at it. I don’t buy it.
THIS^ I came in to say that people who seem to dislike Facebook aren’t its target demographic. Though I absolutely agree it’s a time black-hole.
If they’re rational actors in possession of all relevant information.
Bingo. (Missed this earlier.)
I’m 35, which I’m pretty sure makes me an “old” by some people’s standards, but I don’t start quivering in terror and rage every time something in my environment changes. Like, people start using cell phones a lot. Or my favorite message board starts using avatars. Or people start using digital social media for communication.
Not an old: “Huh, this new stuff seems interesting. I’ll give it a try.”
Not an old: “This new stuff isn’t really for me.”
Old: "THIS NEW STUFF IS HORRIBLE. IT IS RUINING SOCIETY. I DON’T WANT IT AND IT MAKES ME ANGRY THAT ANYONE DOES WANT IT. Can’t we go back to the old way? I want to go back to the old way. People who like the new way are stupid. 
"