Facebook’s Gone Rogue; It’s Time for an Open Alternative

[onehandle]

Facebook has gone rogue, drunk on founder Mark Zuckerberg’s dreams of world domination. It’s time the rest of the web ecosystem recognizes this and works to replace it with something open and distributed. Facebook used to be a place to share photos and thoughts with friends and family and maybe play a few stupid games that let you pretend you were a mafia don or a homesteader. It became a very useful way to connect with your friends, long-lost friends and family members. Even if you didn’t really want to keep up with them.

Soon everybody — including your uncle Louie and that guy you hated from your last job — had a profile. And Facebook realized it owned the network. Then Facebook decided to turn “your” profile page into your identity online — figuring, rightly, that there’s money and power in being the place where people define themselves. But to do that, the folks at Facebook had to make sure that the information you give it was public.

So in December, with the help of newly hired Beltway privacy experts, it reneged on its privacy promises and made much of your profile information public by default. That includes the city that you live in, your name, your photo, the names of your friends and the causes you’ve signed onto. This spring Facebook took that even further. All the items you list as things you like must become public and linked to public profile pages. If you don’t want them linked and made public, then you don’t get them — though Facebook nicely hangs onto them in its database in order to let advertisers target you.

This includes your music preferences, employment information, reading preferences, schools, etc. All the things that make up your profile. They all must be public — and linked to public pages for each of those bits of info — or you don’t get them at all. That’s hardly a choice, and the whole system is maddeningly complex.

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/05/facebook-rogue

[Ruby the Liberal]

1. How to delete your facebook account:

http://www.groovypost.com/howto/security/permanently-delete-your-facebook-profile-account/

I am glad I never signed up there.

[IndianaGreen]

2. Google is the answer!

Sad what Facebook has done!

[onehandle]

3. I dunno. The whole 'Buzz' fiasco wounded their credibility. Also, my wife and I lose emails.

And will we have a choice? So many websites are tying their interactivity to Facebook.

Do that and you lose me.

[Atman]

4. I still don't see a major problem

My FB account, for instance, doesn't tell you shit about me, but it's probably still too much. People who actually fill in the profile information are just nuts...hardly any of it is "mandatory." You can enter your name and practically nothing else. If you're silly enough to post your employer, your address, your phone number...WTF? What do you expect? The internet is still the internet, and anything out there will be captured -- by the Google! Facebook just gives you one more place to be stupid about your privacy.

.

[smoogatz]

9. True dat, Atman.

I'm going low profile on FB from here on out. It's a shame, though, because you really could use it in interesting ways if it wasn't just a giant data trap.

[left coaster]

14. Same here, Atman. I don't share too much info on ANY internet site.

It's just common sense.

[nickinSTL]

15. I'd never put my phone number

or my home address.

My employer, though, is easily publicly available if anyone wants to know.

Google my name and it'll become obvious very quickly. So I don't see the point of not posting it.

Some things are definitely better left not entered though, IMO.

[Ms. Toad]

16. You are correct in your last comment.

I do have profile information stored - but with each and every new iteration of "privacy," I've gone through and set my preferences to limit access to my information strictly to friends. In addition, I don't post information I'm not ultimatly willing to have discovered by anyone searching diligently. I treat anything I post on facebook (or here, for that matter) like anything I keep behind locked doors in my car. The lock is to discourage the casual intruder. Anyone intent on getting in is going to, so I don't store anything online (or in a car) that I'm not willing to lose control over.

Given the general inability to keep anything posted online secure, I'm surprised at some of wired.com's statements about facebook (in particular). Generally I have a lot of respect for their articles, but this one seemed alarmist (specifically toward facebook) - and ignores the controls you do have over your information on facebook, assuming you bother to care about that control. For example - making information public to friends, but private to you boss - simple - strictly limit access to your information to your friends (excluding friends of friends), and don't accept a friend invitation from your boss.

[mod mom]

19. Question, until about a month ago I had my college info, favorite music, books

and hobbies. I also gave my birthdate, although only month & day were shown. I have since deleted info and since I couldn't change my birthdate to be under 18 (FB doesn't allow) I changed the year to 1920.

My question is since I originally had the info displayed, is it saved by FB forever?

[slay]

22. I never used my real name

fuck facebook - anyone who spent the last 10 years online knows you don't use your real name. not on IRC, not on message boards - you just don't do it if you value your privacy. i'm known here as slay - something totally different on facebook, something else on IRC, but none of you know my real name. well maybe one or two.. ;) i guess my whole late night rambling point is - don't use your real name on the internet unless you plan to give up your privacy.

that said - facebook is horribly wrong to do this and there are indeed privacy issues - foremost being that people did not sign up to share this info! it doesn't hurt me when n00bies get caught using their real names online - but yall should realize - the internet will always have an "underground" feel and scene to it - as it should - otherwise it will be run by the corporations and nobody wants that. so yeah - either admit your total loss of privacy and continue to use facebook - or don't - pick various usernames - and join the rest of us in the internet underground - just like you don't use your real name when you play WOW or when you use DU either lol. regardless i'm not worried since the real me is not on facebook.

[canetoad]

24. +1000

Wish I could kick and rec this post to the front page.

Truest words I've read in a long time. :thumbsup:

[Liberal_in_LA]

5. I had no idea. thanks for posting this

[Initech]

6. Facebook was great until advertisers decided to take a huge dump on it.

[digitaln3rd]

7. So..

So because YOU don't know how to properly set privacy information that means it's time for EVERYONE to ditch Facebook completely?

[onehandle]

10. Yes, please defend Facebook while articles on its serious problems are growing exponentially...

...and the even the federal government and politicians are taking notice.

Be my guest.

[smoogatz]

8. I just did this.

Facebook has now also started what are called "Community Pages," which, if there's one with your name on it, makes public a lot of your "friends only" status posts, etc. I guess I have one because I'm a writer, I really don't know--I had nothing to do with creating it, and wouldn't have given my permission had I known. I'm weighing this invasion of my privacy against the obvious benefits of Facebook membership--I do get to "talk" to old friends I otherwise probably wouldn't hear from, but I'm less and less inclined to use it for anything but very minimal communications, and plan to do everything else through private email. It really is creepy, what they're doing--and users have no choice in the matter, really.

[cynatnite]

11. Best thing I ever did was dump Facebook. n/t

[azmouse]

12. I never signed up and I never will.

Fuck 'em.

[endless october]

13. if it bugs you, delete your profle.

as long as i keep finding it mildly entertaining, i'll post pics and shit there. if not, i won't.

sure, i think they have fucked up privacy-wise, but come on : if you're posting pics and telling the facebooks everything you do, how much privacy do you really expect?

[KonaKane]

17. People, don't post ANYTHING online that you don't want public.

I'm sorry to tell you this but there is no silver bullet internet privacy. If you really do not want some information out there at some point, simply do not post it.

That is all.

[cynatnite]

18. Well, for me this wasn't about privacy...

I had friends and family members that were fine in person, but on Facebook they would post every religious, rw, conservative, and palin-loving thing that entered their brains. It got to the point that I dreaded going to Facebook and defriending would have just caused more problems. I just deleted my account and when I had questions I said that I didn't have time for Facebook.

[Odin2005]

20. Facebook has jumped the shark.

:(

[LWolf]

21. Mine has none of that.

It doesn't even use my whole name, and offers nothing BUT my name.

I have it to keep up with my oldest son, who lives 1100 miles away. Being obsessive about privacy, there are no photos, no personal info whatsoever, and the only "friends" I have are about 8 people that I know in real life, who also live out of state.

[Hippo_Tron]

23. So basically advertisers know where I went to college, what my hometown is, and some crap I post

There's plenty of other ways they can get this (and even more information). I consider this a small cost for using facebook free of charge.

[moriah]

25. You can add those things into your "About Me" and leave the rest empty...

... which is what I've done.

and my "About Me" is only viewable to some.