[governance] Facebook customer outreach on privacy policy backfires

[Sivasubramanian M]

On Dec 12, 2012 6:46 AM, "michael gurstein" <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> (lots of implications here for Internet Governance...
>
> M
>
> http://www.itbusiness.ca/it/client/en/home/News.asp?id=69550
>
> Facebook customer outreach on privacy policy backfires
> Facebook's recent attempt at playing democracy are perhaps a good example
of
> a Web site that's gone too far with user engagement and promised more than
> it is able, or willing to deliver.
>
> Facebook held a governance vote that closed yesterday and received more
than
> 650,000 votes from its site users. In that vote 88 per cent voted for
> "Existing Documents: The current SRR and Data Use Policy" while a mere 12
> per cent voted for "Proposed Documents: The proposed SRR and Data Use
> Policy."
>
> If you have no idea what that really means, you can be excused. Facebook's
> use of legal jargon is only one of the layers of confusion the social
> network has created around this issue in an attempt to do what it wants to
> do while also trying to be able to say that it did its best to involve
site
> users in the decision.

Users sign click-through agreements that are long, legally complex and not
at all easy for the average mind to understand. The rare user who patiently
reads through the click-through agreement and  understands what the
agreement implies, would still go ahead and click-through the process
because there is no way one could opt to refuse to sign one or more clauses
/ present alternate text / negotiate. The options are to sign the agreement
as presented or be excluded from the network.

In this situation, it is fair on the part of the user to expect Facebook to
present alongside a paraphrased summary in such language as used in an
advertisement. That would have enabled more users to understand what they
have already agreed for and, in this situation,  what they are asked to
vote for.

Sivasubramanian M

Basically, the vote comes down to a yes or no
> question on whether users wanted to allow Facebook to share their personal
> data with its business partners, such as recent acquisition Instagram.
>
> So despite the opaque language used by Facebook - which was in a poll held
> in the Facebook Site Governance app - 88 per cent of voters still said
"no,
> don't share my personal data." But Facebook is going ahead to do so in any
> case, because the poll didn't reach the 30 per cent required threshold
> imposed by Facebook, so they only have to treat it as a matter of guidance
> (meaning they can ignore it if it doesn't suit their business interests.)
>
>
>
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