June 2010

Are you seriously concerned about privacy on facebook, or you don’t give a damn? Even if you do care, were u one of the 33642 people who pledged to quit facebook on 31st May? Probably not. Yesterday was quit facebook day , where people committed to delete their facebook accounts. This miniscule population comprises about 0.007% of the total 450 million users of the popular social networking site. In India though, hardly any of the 16.8 million users are perturbed by this, either due to lack of knowledge or because people don’t think privacy is such a big deal. Now, the founders of the website said that they didn’t think that this would become such a viral campaign. The main aim was not to quit facebook but to make the makers of facebook realize that there are people out there who want facebook to take notice and act accordingly. The main reason why this campaign didn’t start a global trend is because of one simple reason – deep down, the exhibitionist in us wants to share our interests and make our online presence strong. Privacy is in fact, a simple thing – don’t post something that you don’t want others to see. You may argue that you are more concerned about third party apps. Well, recently facebook has overhauled its privacy control and said that it won’t share information with third party apps like farmville, which makes your online avatar pursue farming. The new privacy settings have been getting mixed reviews. While this is a positive step, more work is pending in this regard. The overall trust that users had has decreased tremendously and it will take more such positive steps by facebook for its users to start trusting it again. This surge in the privacy related issue has only made users aware of the things that they aren’t supposed to do online, but not enough for them to quit using facebook altogether for the sole reason that the advantages and convenience of using facebook far outweigh its disadvantages. On a related note, some of the web based start ups are following a reciprocal approach : Give us your data and get something in return. These companies are pushing to see how much information people are willing to turn over. Some shopping companies mine the shopping habits of the customers and in return are offering them discounts on its products. “You share your information with me and I’ll make your life better”. It really comes down to giving people choice and control. One of Mint’s users said that he is not really concerned about giving them information as long as he is getting some benefit out of it. Now this adds an altogether different dimension to privacy. On one hand, you have people up in arms against facebook for privacy issues and on the other hand, companies are giving incentives to people to give them information. Do you think that privacy has become an over rated thing in today’s world? People have the inborn tendency to share. But do you think this has gone out of control? Related Posts Impact Of Facebook Feature Changes & India Tie Ups Facebook Becomes More Like Twitter In Layout As Well As Openness Google Releases First Brand Zeitgeist For India – Trends & Analysis Banking Through Social Media – Is It Possible? The Lack Of A Strong Early Adopter Community In India Social Media Workshop – Delhi (gurgaon) – On 22nd May. Log on to Social Media Workshop and Register Now!