I wrote in January about the faculty Facebook may possess for tracking your browsing history. I made brief mention of the fact that logging out of Facebook may not prevent further tracking. It’s this last point that caused a stir this week as Nik Cubrilovic’s post got picked up by the press.
His follow-up post describes Facebook’s response, but the ‘tracking’ cookie to which I was referring has not been removed. According to Nik’s post, Facebook admit this will remain after logout to track the browser, but for ‘safety and spam purposes’.
According to this WSJ article, ‘not all of the data is logged’. That’s good.
The bottom line for me is that Facebook are so powerful that they need to be as answerable to their populous as a government. That means a certain level of transparency and being clear about their intentions. If they go back on their word, who holds them accountable? Are our laws even adequate? Should Facebook be audited, or should we just trust them?
I don’t expect I’d be too happy about having my servers audited, but I’m not Facebook. When nearly half a billion people log into your site each day to give you their data, you have a serious amount of responsibility on your shoulders.
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I was just starting to think I should shut up about Facebook for a while after my last two posts, but then I enabled the new Timeline profile and saw this:
Wow.
This adds a “Health and Wellness” Life Event to your Timeline.
(Timeline is new Zuckspeak for Wall, and Wellness is American for, erm.. Health)
Why would you tell a company that sells data that you were ill? … seriously, why?
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Immediately following my latest rantings about Facebook, this seems like an appropriate time to answer a question I get asked a lot:
“If you don’t like it, why don’t you quit?”
This morning I read Chris Applegate’s post about quitting Facebook. As much as I sympathise, I’m not quitting. Here’s why.
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or – A feature agnostic look at F8 2011; steps in the same direction
Another F8, another set of powerful new features, and yet I’m not surprised by any of them. I’m not saying I predicted them (I didn’t) but the announcements are typical of what I see as a clear pattern in Facebook’s evolution.
Without discussing specific features, the pattern of Facebook’s ‘progress’ typically adheres to these traits:
- More connections;
- Less friction;
- Deeper integration.
That’s Facebook marketing language. I interpret these traits follows:
- More data;
- Less opportunity for users to think;
- Placing Facebook at the centre of the Web.
Yes, I’m a cynic. Did you not know?
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