Facebook’s starting a pretty dramatic redesign and refocus on privacy. It’s an interesting strategy: fix the old problems by creating something completely different instead. Here’s a summary from The Verge.
@manton I'll put five bucks on misdirection, smoke, mirrors, and general cynicism that they intend to change their business model of selling our attention to their tracking partners.
Advertising to a "private" conversation rather in a "public" news feed changes nothing for the better.
@SciPhi I agree, it's mostly misdirection. I also think it's convenient for Facebook that by making more posts private, there will be less accountability for hate speech, conspiracy theories, etc.
@manton Interestingly enough, much of what was said made me feel even more excited about Micro.blog and my own project.
@smith It sounds like you will have a good story around private accounts. And of course I hope we can talk more about some compatibility with formats and blogging!
@manton I was in a conversation at IIW about this very topic just today .... some were excited ... but the majority of us primarily had the old tale of the boy who cried wolf on our minds.
@manton @JohnPhilpin I mean, let's be serious and remember that at the exact same conference they also announced Secret Crush. Go ahead and target people for romantic interests... and I here I thought Sorkin was being melodramatic.
@simonwoods Only Zuckerberg would think that the age-old teenage “problem” of two people liking each other but not knowing it was mutual was a problem that needed to be solved. (Whatever happened to passing notes? Do you like me? Check 1: ☐ Yes ☐ No )
Of course, having so decided, he the implemented it in one of the cruelest and creepiest ways imaginable :-P
@manton I thought it was an interesting strategy. But I think one issue is they have lied so much, I don't know that people should ever actually trust them again. I have noticed both with Facebook and Google they have both been starting to beat a "privacy" drum. It's tough to discern the difference between authenticity and marketing.