I spend a lot of time on Facebook, and don't play any of the games. The organizations I webmaster for all have Facebook pages, and many of my news and information sources do too. Social media require steady upkeep, so Facebook is always open in one of my browser tabs.
The new Facebook "like" button became available to web developers earlier in April. It allows a person to click "like" on a web page rather than going to the page's Facebook site. The button then displays the photos of people who like the page. That's what the latest Facebook privacy hullabaloo is about. Well I added the button to most of my main site pages the day the feature came out. (check http://disciplinethatrestores.org for an example) By the end of the first week 50,000 companies had done the same.
Facebookers have the ability to block this feature so that they are counted as a liker on the button but their picture doesn't show. That news was spread quickly by Facebook and lots of other folks, and many did block it. I decided to block individual applications rather than doing a blanket block.
Privacy on the web is a relative thing. It takes very little effort to find most details about me via Google. Part of the reason is that I have a large web presence, but it has more to do with all the organizations I belong to making bits of their databases public. Zuckerberg is right: the privacy-on-the-web ship has sailed.
I periodically search with Google for my Social Security number, home phone, credit card numbers and other things that shouldn't be out there for a public search. So far so good--meaning that you have to pay to get some of those things. I also restrict most of my Facebook posts to friends only. Of course that doesn't prevent someone from reposting, forwarding, etc. If you don't want people to find something on the web, don't put it there.
Facebook is doing its best to integrate all things web, and they are making good progress. It has already gotten to the point that I am annoyed when someone isn't recognizably on Facebook. I like to see who called me before I return a call to a stranger. All those people with a Facebook profile photo of their cat, or a Facebook page name that isn't their real name interfere with my desire to find out about them. The same goes for my students in online classes.
I'm guessing that people who don't live like the Unabomber aren't going to have much luck keeping personal information private. I will watch what I put online to try keeping those few things that really matter safe, but I'll also keep checking my credit card statements closely. We'll see how that works out.
