Web 2.0 has been revolutionary not because we've been empowered to talk back at the powers that be, but rather because we can now talk to each other. We're connecting. The web is actually becoming a web. And the currency is trust.
What if the trust economy we're building in so many ways in the current internet age becomes the paid endorsement economy? We've had spam and splogs and phishing. Do we really want ads inserted into not just our media but in our relationships?
Facebook has announced a new kind of social network advertising project:
Facebook has become a primary relationship and identity broker for millions of people. Now outsiders can capitalize on that information in a safe way, pulling from users’ expressed interests in their profiles, building on their stated intention to attend events, or simply giving them more dedicated tools for expressing themselves. The outside apps will be woven into a structure that’s already been built and is utilized every day.
Might we call it the "spamwell network", or perhaps "social spamwork"? (No judgment here, folks!)
Let's get to the particulars, such as we can tell at this early stage....
Members can opt out of the behavior tracking ... sort of.
- Can consumers opt out of this?
- If yes, does their data get erased?
- Will the sites for example, Fandango, stop sending all personal and any kind of information to Facebook once the user opts out?
- Why didn’t they make this an opt-in feature, instead of being an opt-out feature?
Their PR spokesperson emailed me this response:
Users can opt-out of Beacon on a per-site basis. They can opt-out for each action, or they can opt-out to never have an affiliated site send stories to Facebook. For instance, a user that buys The Notebook from Blockbuster can stop a story from being published about it, or she can opt-out of having Blockbuster publish any actions she takes on the Blockbuster site.
The response doesn’t seem to answer my questions and basically makes it seem like users have control over this data, when in reality, this is a privacy disaster waiting to happen. The javascript on the Fandango site pops up a little screen which asks if you want to publish the information on Facebook. If you say no, your friends won’t see the information, but apparently Facebook still receives it. This means that if you are a Facebook member, Facebook will know what you are doing on each of their partner sites. And there is no way for you to opt out of that. Or is there? I asked Facebook to clarify and I am still waiting for them to write back.
While there's lots of kool-ade excitement in the blogosphere, there's also a lot of head scratching, nervous giggles and skepticism.
Are Facebookers walking around with signs hawking neighborhood restaurants and pitching the latest Coca-Cola product introduction to every last one of their friends? NO! But Facebookers are now required to do so for Mark Zuckerberg, as quid-pro-quo for the high-priced bandwidth he is shelling out for to keep the vaunted social graph in action.
Forget the penny ante stuff of Facebook employees entertaining themselves by snooping on "private" profiles and browsing habits. This is about following your wallet and broadcasting it -- as if Twitter were tweeting your every purchase.
Is this where things are going in social media? "Infect me. I'm yours"???
Susan Mernit says, "Not without a helluva lot of trust and transparency and control, fellas."
What will Zuckerberg’s 50 million Facebookers think, however, when they know he is giddily boasting to advertisers that Facebook knows “exactly” what they do, where they are, where they work, how they vote…
While Zuckerberg gives an old college try to portray the increasing efforts of Facebook to monetize the private lives of 50 million users as a weighty moment in history, he doesn’t need to try so hard: Facebook’s impressive roster of launch advertising partners speaks to BIG marketer interest.
The real test for Facebook will be user interest, or not, however. After all, social ads, by definition, can not fucntion if they are not socialized with.
So, is Facebook a cat about to cough up a privacy hairball? Or the harbinger of a newly friendly relationship between marketers and web users? It’s probably too soon to tell. But to the extent that Facebook and other such efforts get people paying attention to how their social data is used for commercial purposes, it could be a step forward.
A step forward perhaps. It certainly couldn't hurt for people to get a bit more aware about how what they consider their private lives is being tracked, measured and found wanting (of products, of political correctness, of employability...).
Esther Dyson writes about what privacy policies really should say:
Over the years, marketers have become better and better at collecting data on individuals, recognizing them, classifying them and sending them personalized (you're a segment) and even personal messages (you are member 582930, with 56,784 miles). So why can't they use those same talents and show them personal disclosure statements? For example:
Here's what we know about you:
You have visited these sites.
You entered these search terms.[Of course, these will be very long lists.]
Very very long lists. Oh, and we know you were looking at sites about that rather private medical condition. And we know you read blogs about second amendment rights. And we know that you have been buying that homeopathic herbal compound that treats high blood pressure. Oh, and we share this information with our marketing partners, the identity of whom we won't say. You didn't really want that health insurance now, did you?
When you put it like that....
In my more vulnerable moments, I'm left pondering what if Twitter were tracking your every move, leaving a snail trail....
Laura bought a Red Bull. Get 10% off of Red Bull here!
Laura started her car. Schedule a test-drive with your local Subaru dealer!
Laura passed through the intersection of 28th and Pearl. Putting on extra miles? Remember to upgrade your auto insurance! Get a free online quote from Geiko!
Laura is listening to "Red Red Red," by Fiona Apple. Download it now!
Laura is watching on TiVo "Battlestar Galactica: Razor". Buy the DVD now! [FBI Warning: Federal Law provides several civil and criminal penalties for unauthorized reproduction, distribution or exhibition of copyrighted motion pictures, video tapes, DVDs or video discs. Criminal copyright infringement is investigated by the FBI and may constitute a felony with a maximum penalty of up to five years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine.]
Can we push back? Of course. But only so far. You don't want to do what Chris Anderson did.
On the other hand, what if Radiohead is the true wave of the future? What if the opt-in economy set the standard, rather than the whaddayagonnadoabowdit economy?
This is a deep topic and it's way too early to tell what's going to happen. My brain hurts. These are exciting times. My question is whether they will indeed bring in a new age, a new paradigm for our culture, or whether it will simply become a tool for 20th century systems, structures and thinking. Will the social networks absorb the consumer economy (and even kill advertising?), or will they become tools of a newer consumer economy?
It seems pretty clear that we're still figuring it out. We're still writing the rules. We're still figuring out what makes sense.
Meanwhile we can look at the moon and really see it. Now that's cool!
Laura Scott blogs at rare pattern and has a much neglected Facebook page up there somewhere.
Comments
Does
By: heivilinj Posted: 27 weeks 21 hours agomodern advertising still work?
When was the last time you bought something because of it's ad? I stopped listening to my regular radio station in the morning while I got ready for work because they had so many ads which I thought were so stupid (I find the Taco Bell "talking food" is particularly annoying), now I listen to my local NPR station in the morning to get news.
While watching what TV I still watch (which includes absolutely NO "reality" TV) I mute the volume and read a novel or get up and do chores while commercials are on. One day soon I'll break down and get a dvr and television advertising will disappear entirely for me.
For magazines the volume of ads compared to content is a determining factor. I got a sample copy of a magazine called "Food" the other day and it didn't compare very well to my other cooking magazine (Cooks Illustrated, which has no advertising whatsoever).
For spam, which I get lots of since I'm a systems administrator, my motto is "I know where my delete key is". After two or three with the same topic or from the same source I make a rule to delete it. Sometimes I need to vet them since real mail gets caught and that's annoying but I don't know if what Anderson did is "right" but it certainly is turnabout. And I think many of us have little sympathy for "spammers" of any sort. (however I work for a University which has a major journalism school and have an atypically poor opinion of journalists in general)
Jim Heivilin
This is a very important...
By: Marie D. Posted: 24 weeks 5 days ago...point that Jim has.
Advertising as we have known it is less and less effective and sooner or later, it will not be worth the price companies are paying for them, because us consumers find ways to avoid them.
I work in marketing. I understand what companies see in Facebook, they think that if, instead of randomly advertising to people that do not care about thier products, they are going to be more sucessfull because they will be targeting better. Like pet food companies won't talk to me anymore because I have no pet, and make-up companies will talk to me because I am interested in them.
Except it is not that simple: there are times when I am open to receiving that kind of information, and times where I want to be left alone with my friends, like on Facebook. Also there are companies I don't want to hear about, whatever new fancy make-up product they have.
That is why I love Seth Godin''s theory about permission marketing so much. The message to the industry is: stop bothering people and interrupting their life again and again, you're just upsetting them, they don't want to hear you. Instead, offer intersting product that people will want to hear about (which is a totally different starting point!) and will want to talk about with their friends, the buzz will do the advertising work without disturbing your potential consumers.
Marie D.
That requires a culture
By: Laura Scott Posted: 24 weeks 3 days agoThat requires a culture change in the push-oriented advertising market. Do you really think that will happen to the point of changing the paradigm? And at what point does "targeting" become stalking? Just wondering....
Laura Scott
BlogHer Contributing Editor for Technology & Web
design, snap, blog