An article from Cnn.com
explains the changes Facebook is making to it's Statement of Rights
and Responsibilities. It was originally assumed that the changes are being made with the intention of
decreasing users' paranoia about how the information and data on their page,
as well as their social connections, is being used.
Although these changes and their
intentions were explicitly mentioned to benefit the end-user, it just
so happens that there are essentially zero changes taking place in
how Facebook actually uses and collects data. It is now clear that
Facebook only announced it was a change to the “Statement of Rights
and Responsibilities” that was occurring, as opposed to a change to
the Privacy policy, which is where the terms of data collection and
usage is contained.
Many people are concerned with Facebook
and how the data could be used, but you must remember that Facebook
is a free service, and where they make their money is advertising.
I'm not suggesting that there doesn't need to be any clear terms or
opt-out as far as the data mining is concerned. I do believe that
internet privacy is a big issue today, and that there needs to be a
consensus among the big corporations AND users about how to deal with
it. However, I do understand that Facebook does require to use your
data for advertising as that is their main revenue source.
Despite Facebook's necessity to use
your data in order to increase their bottom line, I believe that
fundamental changes can be made in order to ensure a more solid
policy of data usage. For example, as opposed to sending data and
trends out to advertising companies, delegate the task of 'figuring
out what ad you are more likely to click on' to the entity it will
appear on.
For example, perhaps Facebook could
simply have a list of “major categories” that percentages of
their users belong to. Instead of broadcasting specifics about each
and every user, give the advertising companies this information, so
that they can have several different ads that target certain
categories. Then, on the Facebook server, it is determined with
random number generators and some algorithm, which advertisement will
be shown based on which categories you belong to and which categories of advertisements are in this week's line-up.
I think a solution much like this could
be extremely successful and also may instill more competition among
advertisers. To me it's like a Pot-Luck dinner. If I am a 'Sports
enthusiast' 'Computer Programmer' 'College Student' and 'Socially
inclined' for example, there will be a random chance of
advertisements that fit these categories being shown on pages I
visit. The advertisers would only need to know about the statistics
of how accurate the system is, which will in-turn be similar to
'prime-time' advertising. Say for example 70% of users that are
“SPORT ENTHUSIASTS” click on 'sport's memorabilia and tickets' advertisements”
This would result in competition in the “sport enthusiast” category
of advertising thus increasing the prices of putting your advertisement into that week/month's line-up to show
these advertisements. Facebook would then have no reason to broadcast your personal data, only statistically analyze it PRIVATELY and make the findings public to advertisers rather than, for example, using tracking cookies.
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