Here you go. Ross gets italics so you can get a sense of his British accent.
Joel
Yeah, this guy completely misses the point. Suggesting it's naive to worry about these things is to be utterly naive about the process of social constriction. He doesn't mind it? Fine. But he should, and if he doesn't, that says more about his lack of awareness about the intrinsic scariness of the commoditization of modern life as it has to do with... See More facebook and the internet in general than it does with what he supposes is a general whiny nature. It's a conservative angle, and conservatives like to let their moralizing manifest in the "well, you shouldn't have done that thing that you should have known was bad, bad, bad in the first place." The subtext is that anyone who thinks facebook privacy issues are a concern are actually just irresponsible, and he's one of the real adults... who don't have to worry about whether a large company is categorizing him (and everyone else on facebook) systematically, for the purpose of financial gain, because he's "got nothing to worry about". It's the same kind of scary, narrow, self-reassuring crap that makes authority figures say things like, "well, don't do anything wrong and you won't have to worry about being harassed by the Police"... all the while slowly taking away freedoms.
Is facebook voluntary? Of course. But it's also a massive community of people whose privacy needs to be respected. To not understand that is to be a little bit fascist, whether a person knows it or not. This guy doesn't know what real freedom is. He thinks it's reserved for folks like him who are more savvy and "decent". It's not. These concerns about facebook are real, and a piece like that is more dangerous than that dolt could possibly realize.
Facebook is not a fascist regime, but it's certainly not devoid of responsibility. Saying it's not their "fault" utterly misses the point.
Is facebook voluntary? Of course. But it's also a massive community of people whose privacy needs to be respected. To not understand that is to be a little bit fascist, whether a person knows it or not. This guy doesn't know what real freedom is. He thinks it's reserved for folks like him who are more savvy and "decent". It's not. These concerns about facebook are real, and a piece like that is more dangerous than that dolt could possibly realize.
Facebook is not a fascist regime, but it's certainly not devoid of responsibility. Saying it's not their "fault" utterly misses the point.
Ross
I guess in the sense that he's playing the personal responsibility card, it's a traditionally Conservative spin, but at the end of the day, Facebook isn't a charity service. It's a company with employees and it makes money by selling targeted advertising. Their lack of transparency about shifting Privacy Terms SHOULD be condemned, but you do have... See More the freedom to leave or not take part or better yet, vote with your time and traffic--
There's that new social network Diaspora, started altruistically by NYU students promising not to "sell you out," but the cynic in me thinks that'll last about as long as they're students with no need to make a living and someone shows them what a buy-out paycheck looks like. And the same slippery slope will start again. It'll be the same story all over: someone puts in a lot of time and work to make their project a success and then they want to reap the rewards of it.
Facebook is a service with terms, it's not the air that we breathe. I don't know exactly what the "real freedom" is that this guy doesn't know about, but it doesn't sound like huddling on a private encrypted server with my information clutched to my chest.
There's that new social network Diaspora, started altruistically by NYU students promising not to "sell you out," but the cynic in me thinks that'll last about as long as they're students with no need to make a living and someone shows them what a buy-out paycheck looks like. And the same slippery slope will start again. It'll be the same story all over: someone puts in a lot of time and work to make their project a success and then they want to reap the rewards of it.
Facebook is a service with terms, it's not the air that we breathe. I don't know exactly what the "real freedom" is that this guy doesn't know about, but it doesn't sound like huddling on a private encrypted server with my information clutched to my chest.
Joel
The point is that it should not be one or the other. It's facebook's kind of business model that might drive a person to your extreme, though. You seem to suggest that that kind of "freedom" is its own sort of confinement, and you're absolutely right... and it's that direction that facebook might drive a person in who values privacy over whatever ... See Morepositives facebook has (networking, etc.).
Facebook is a business, yes. But the business is utterly non-existent without the 400 million people who facebook makes money from. Do we get a service? Sure. But the winner here is not the user, clearly. What facebook provides ought not give them carte blanche to traffic in all our posted information.
The service of capitalism (they're a business, so they have a right to make as much money as they can, whatever the means, as long as it's not illegal) should not trump the service of civic responsibility. Facebook is a unique business, with much in common with a Nation. "Like it or leave it" is also a rather conservative-style sentiment. We are all citizens of facebook, whether they like it or not. Should we have full control of it? No, as it is a business, too. Primarily a business, for sure. But to traffic in personal information and compromise the privacy of human beings for financial gain is a delicate matter.
Facebook's attitude toward privacy has become more and more free and easy, in direct proportion to the size of its user base. If the company had started out with the terms of service and standards of practice it uses today, it never would have reached this level of success. It's a bait-and-switch. Was it naive to suppose it would ever be anything else, as long as money or potential money is involved? Perhaps... in the same way you mention about Diaspora (I share your cynicism there). As it stands, though, the concerns are real.
It's the attitude and thought process that brings a person to say "you shouldn't do something if you don't want everyone to see it" that concerns me. That sentiment suggests a lack of awareness of the negative effects that our waning personal freedom can potentially have. If the only way to have online freedom is to huddle on a private encrypted server with one's information clutched to one's chest, isn't there an obvious problem? Can a person not hope to not be a subject of constant supervision? If the answer is no, we're in trouble, whether we know it or not.
Facebook is a business, yes. But the business is utterly non-existent without the 400 million people who facebook makes money from. Do we get a service? Sure. But the winner here is not the user, clearly. What facebook provides ought not give them carte blanche to traffic in all our posted information.
The service of capitalism (they're a business, so they have a right to make as much money as they can, whatever the means, as long as it's not illegal) should not trump the service of civic responsibility. Facebook is a unique business, with much in common with a Nation. "Like it or leave it" is also a rather conservative-style sentiment. We are all citizens of facebook, whether they like it or not. Should we have full control of it? No, as it is a business, too. Primarily a business, for sure. But to traffic in personal information and compromise the privacy of human beings for financial gain is a delicate matter.
Facebook's attitude toward privacy has become more and more free and easy, in direct proportion to the size of its user base. If the company had started out with the terms of service and standards of practice it uses today, it never would have reached this level of success. It's a bait-and-switch. Was it naive to suppose it would ever be anything else, as long as money or potential money is involved? Perhaps... in the same way you mention about Diaspora (I share your cynicism there). As it stands, though, the concerns are real.
It's the attitude and thought process that brings a person to say "you shouldn't do something if you don't want everyone to see it" that concerns me. That sentiment suggests a lack of awareness of the negative effects that our waning personal freedom can potentially have. If the only way to have online freedom is to huddle on a private encrypted server with one's information clutched to one's chest, isn't there an obvious problem? Can a person not hope to not be a subject of constant supervision? If the answer is no, we're in trouble, whether we know it or not.
Ross
I don't disagree with your concerns over privacy, and a bait-and-switch is unethical, so I think we probably agree on a lot about this. But I do stick by the personal responsibility angle, regardless of whether it's a conservative-style sentiment or not. The Internet as a medium is still relatively new to our society and the GOOD thing about this... See More Facebook issue is it's bringing into question how we perceive the Internet as a whole.
Its cookies forget nothing. Its anonymity forgives nothing. And I think we need to realize that, for better or worse, it's a public forum. You're broadcasting. Even inside social network sites, what you type is what you're shouting in a crowd at a party. It's not dinner with friends. So we should use our Outside Voice. The commerce is going to be there to try and sell you things because, well, that's the reality of the interplay between economy and culture. And in an economy, you vote with your dollars and attention. "Like it or leave it" sounds crass, but, well, you CAN leave it. By going to someone else that pops up with competing levels of higher privacy, you'll teach Facebook a lesson about what's acceptable and set a precedent moving ahead.
Its cookies forget nothing. Its anonymity forgives nothing. And I think we need to realize that, for better or worse, it's a public forum. You're broadcasting. Even inside social network sites, what you type is what you're shouting in a crowd at a party. It's not dinner with friends. So we should use our Outside Voice. The commerce is going to be there to try and sell you things because, well, that's the reality of the interplay between economy and culture. And in an economy, you vote with your dollars and attention. "Like it or leave it" sounds crass, but, well, you CAN leave it. By going to someone else that pops up with competing levels of higher privacy, you'll teach Facebook a lesson about what's acceptable and set a precedent moving ahead.
Joel
My main concern has to do with the Outside Voice. The Inside Voice is diminishing as a form of expression for human beings at an alarming rate, and plenty of people don't seem concerned by that. Rather, plenty of people seem complicit in destroying it. Sometimes gleefully. Lots of folks, such as the writer of the original piece, seem all too happy ... See Moreto comply with the rules of facebook's game, and seem to consider it odd for a person not to want to... as if that resistance implied a kind of naivete or guilt.
To resign oneself to the current reality of facebook's lack of privacy is to be complicit in a world where policing of this type is more and more the norm. It may be unavoidable. It may be human nature, through the prism of early 21st century online culture, but it's a fascist impulse. It scares me, frankly. Why the human race doesn't fight harder against that impulse and seems to willingly line up for forms of control is disturbing. That's what I meant about real freedom... very few people seem to want it, if it means the Inside Voice goes unchecked. We all seem happier to hear censored thoughts and see censored pictures than really know our "friends'" hearts and souls. A social network, with these sets of rules, only corrals us more thoroughly... just the way most of us want it.
Of course, I'm just saying this because I'm feeling guilty about the dead bodies in my basement.
It's kind of ironic that I re-posted this conversation without their permission, isn't it? Facebook lesson in action.
To resign oneself to the current reality of facebook's lack of privacy is to be complicit in a world where policing of this type is more and more the norm. It may be unavoidable. It may be human nature, through the prism of early 21st century online culture, but it's a fascist impulse. It scares me, frankly. Why the human race doesn't fight harder against that impulse and seems to willingly line up for forms of control is disturbing. That's what I meant about real freedom... very few people seem to want it, if it means the Inside Voice goes unchecked. We all seem happier to hear censored thoughts and see censored pictures than really know our "friends'" hearts and souls. A social network, with these sets of rules, only corrals us more thoroughly... just the way most of us want it.
Of course, I'm just saying this because I'm feeling guilty about the dead bodies in my basement.
It's kind of ironic that I re-posted this conversation without their permission, isn't it? Facebook lesson in action.
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Wow, Lucy, thanks!! It's just for fun but anytime someone says they do read it, it inspires me to write more. Gotta put all these opinions *somewhere*. :)
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