Facebook’s stance on privacy has upset a lot of people .. this video parody is pretty good:
Facebook Privacy (Parody)
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Tag Archives: Facebook
Zuckerberg Redefines Pretentious
Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has been getting a lot of flak in recent weeks about Facebook’s attitude and handling of privacy for its users.
During a recent interview Zuckerberg was asked several times about privacy. He failed to give a convincing answer.
Watch the entire interview to see how Zuckerberg, yet again, redefines “pretentious” once again.
At the same conference Apple’s Steve Jobs also fielded a question on privacy. Jobs’ reply is so different to the attitude of Zuckerberg that it’s worth quoting:
Silicon Valley is not monolithic….We take privacy very seriously….We do a lot of things to ensure that people understand how their data is being used. That’s why we curate the App Store….Privacy means people know what they’re signing up for–in plain English
Should We Trust Facebook?
In the last few weeks and months Facebook has been receiving a LOT of media attention. While the social networking site would have attracted plenty of media attention related to its growth, the more recent spate of interest has centred around privacy. Or more accurately, the lack of it.
Back in January of this year Facebook’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg, told the world that the social norms and views on privacy had changed:
“When I got started in my dorm room at Harvard, the question a lot of people asked was ‘why would I want to put any information on the Internet at all? Why would I want to have a website?’
“And then in the last 5 or 6 years, blogging has taken off in a huge way and all these different services that have people sharing all this information. People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people. That social norm is just something that has evolved over time.
“We view it as our role in the system to constantly be innovating and be updating what our system is to reflect what the current social norms are.
“A lot of companies would be trapped by the conventions and their legacies of what they’ve built, doing a privacy change – doing a privacy change for 350 million users is not the kind of thing that a lot of companies would do. But we viewed that as a really important thing, to always keep a beginner’s mind and what would we do if we were starting the company now and we decided that these would be the social norms now and we just went for it.
Of course a LOT of people didn’t agree with Zuckerberg’s views – and why would they?
Now, however, he’s claiming that it was all a “mistake”.
Really?
Why do I find that claim so hard to believe?
What’s more likely is that the negative publicity is hurting the social networking site and also it’s coming under a lot of scrutiny from governments.
Fantasy Animals, Pets and Pretzels More Popular Than Businesses
If you frequent the “twittersphere” or Facebook you’ll often come across businesses and their staff trying to market their products and services to you.
There’s nothing wrong with that. Of course, how they actually do it is another matter entirely …
But how successful are most of their attempts to “tap in” to “social media” and “maximise” their “potential”?
You’d have to wonder at times, especially when you look at how few “fans” or “followers” some of them actually have.
Fantasy animals, however, manage to get a reasonably respectable following..
Common Unicorn, for example, has over 1400 followers on Twitter and is listed 50 times:
Twitter Unicorn
The unicorn is eclipsed by a Squirrel, however, who has managed to attract over 13.5k followers – being listed 660 times!
Twitter Squirrel
What about Facebook?
Facebook seems to be a great place to find oddly named “groups” for just about every possible “idea” under the sun, but a Danish pineapple has managed to get over 167k fans! Not to be outdone, Germany has a pretzel with over 379k !
And we shouldn’t forget that even cats, dogs and other pets are also finding a following on Facebook…
Why do I bring this up?
Well to start with it amused me, but also it puts things into perspective. A lot of people seem to be making a lot of money from businesses that want to “tap into” social media as part of their marketing. While there is nothing exactly “wrong” with that you’d have to wonder what kind of metrics they are using to sell their services to their clientele.
If a fruit or a pretzel can get huge following on Facebook without it actually selling anything to anyone, how well can a “normal” business expect to do?
What is a measurement of their “success”?
The reality is that there probably isn’t a simple way to “measure” success. There are a lot of different factors that come into play.
But I digress..
Maybe the real “takeaway” from these rather silly examples is that they all share one thing in common – fun. They’re all frivolous fun. People use and interact with social media sites in their spare time, as well as during office hours. If you look at the kind of links people share, the pictures they post etc., you quickly realise that they don’t go to “social media” to buy or to be “sold to” or “marketed to”.
If you can instill some level of “fun” into your “presence” maybe you’ll find that you are actually more successful, though getting the balance right might not be that as easy for a business as it is for a fantasy animal.
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- The Unicorns Know About Facebook Now Too (mattstratton.com)
- Study: Only A Quarter Of UK Companies Market Their Brand On Twitter (thenextweb.com)
Google Buzz Boosts Buzzword Bingo Industry
- Image via Wikipedia
Social Media gurus rejoiced this week with the launch of Google’s latest service – Google Buzz
Expect to see plenty of “tempting” offers in the next few weeks from “experts” on how to “maximise” your “potential” using the latest Google service.
Google Wave was meant to revolutionise the web, so Google Buzz will, of course, flatten Twitter and takeover Facebook….
Or will it?
Does anyone really care?
Christmas Is A Time For Sharing With Your REAL Friends
Social media networks; Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace etc., etc.
How many of your “friends” are actual friends? How many of them actually care about YOU?
If you’re completely caught up in the “follower count race”, then you’ve probably already entered “social media hell”.
But.
There is light at the end of the tunnel
You can disconnect.
You can reconnect with real people. I know this may sound shocking, but you could try to actually interact with a real person for a change.
Forget about vampires, random farm animals, mafia members or fantasy beasts (Twitter is infested with unicorns.. )
Removing yourself from all the social network sites takes time, so some nice person has actually automated the process – the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine does it all for you
Here’s how it works:
WEB 2.0 Suicide Machine Promotion from moddr_ on Vimeo.
So there you are. You can save yourself from social media. You can get back your REAL life.
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Actions Speak Louder Than Words
Whether it’s Twitter, Facebook or simply a blog people sometimes forget that their audience is fickle.
If you spend too much time and energy “planning” and making grandiose promises of “things to come” will anyone really care or notice?
With Facebook “pages” there is little to be gained from putting up a “holding page” – you can simply choose not to make your page public, so you can tweak settings and layout privately.
With Twitter, however, it’s not that evident. Granted, you could choose to “protect” your updates, but you wouldn’t be able to hide your profile page and if you plan on using Twitter for your business “protection” may seem odd.
There has been plenty written about what Twitter is and isn’t, but ultimately if you don’t actually use it nobody will either notice or care.
Of course, conversely speaking, if you used it badly people would notice and probably criticise you …
However if your business’ Twitter status is frozen with a “coming soon” style tweet, then maybe you’ve really misunderstood the medium completely. A blank account would probably seem saner.
Hype Gone Mad – Facebook Custom URL Madness
- Image via CrunchBase
Earlier today Facebook launched their latest “service” – custom URLs for your profile or page.
Talk about hype gone mad!
While a lot of the other social media hubs have offered people the opportunity to use a short and memorable URL to reach their profile page for ages and done it as if it were “no big deal” (it’s not really!), Facebook has managed to make a simple “feature” appear as if it were “the next big thing”.
Expect to see lots of inane blog posts about in the coming days…
Reality check.
Facebook is, in many respects, a “walled garden”.
If you are not “friends” with someone chances are you either can’t see their profile at all or you can only see a very small and not particularly useful page.
In order to see everything you need to be logged in.
The “pages” are a different matter and have been reachable via relatively “sane” URLs for ages.
So what’s all the fuss about?
Frankly, I can’t understand it, so I had to giggle when I read Anil Dash’s post on the entire thing. One to bookmark!
It’s the summer – maybe people just need to go lie on a beach for a while with a good book instead of worrying about their usernames ….
Don’t Annoy Your Followers
- Image via CrunchBase
Remember all the “wonderful” messages you used to get on Facebook? “You’ve been bitten by a vampire” etc., etc.,
They may have been fun if you were a twelve year old, but if you spend any length of time online these kind of interruptions just become annoying.
Now over on Twitter the same kind of thing happens.
This time round the latest annoyance is called SpyMaster, which is supposedly in “private beta”.
In typical web 2.0 fluffy language they’ve got the worst kept secret in Twitterville. Not only does everyone know about it, but they’ve also setup their application in such a way that it spams thousands of other Twitter users via “direct message”!
End result – not only has the application managed to alienate potential users, but it’s also managed to upset thousands of users who weren’t even playing the game.
You can see all the “tweets” from people playing and people complaining about the game here
Moral of the story – don’t annoy people
Sick Of SnakeOil Salesmen? Self-appointed Experts?
The internet is a wonderful thing. It’s a great leveller. The CEO of a multinational corporation can “talk” to a startup and vice-versa..
Unfortunately it’s also far too easy for people to take advantage of others. The “web” is full of self-appointed “experts” and “gurus” who charge stupid amounts of money.
Enough already!
Just because you’ve read a couple of articles about marketing doesn’t make you a “professional marketer”
So what if you can record your own voice on your laptop. You’re still not a “professional podcaster”
And as for Twitter, Facebook and the plethora of other “social media” sites .. they act as magnets for the vocal yet inept.
Harsh?
Possibly.
The reality is that there are a lot of very talented people out there who know what they are doing. Who really “get” online business, marketing and social media.
Let’s cut through some of the “bull” and the rubbish and help people without assaulting their bank accounts
Want to help? Let us know by sending an email to ninja (at) socialmediaexpert.ie
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