May 24th, 2010
In my May 15th blog entry, “Privacy, Facebook and the Future of Publishing,” I looked at the recent brouhaha (haven’t used that word in awhile) over Facebook’s info-grab from its “more than 400 million active users” (as Facebook crows on its depressing stats page). Today Facebook Inc.’s founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, published an op-ed column in The Washington Post (whose chairman, Donald E. Graham, happens to be a member of Facebook’s board of directors) called “From Facebook, Answering Privacy Concerns with New Settings.” It’s his mea culpa. The core content of the short piece is:
The biggest message we have heard recently is that people want easier control over their information. Simply put, many of you thought our controls were too complex. Our intention was to give you lots of granular controls; but that may not have been what many of you wanted. We just missed the mark.
We have heard the feedback. There needs to be a simpler way to control your information. In the coming weeks, we will add privacy controls that are much simpler to use. We will also give you an easy way to turn off all third-party services. We are working hard to make these changes available as soon as possible. We hope you’ll be pleased with the result of our work and, as always, we’ll be eager to get your feedback.
Photo copyright Facebook, Inc.
The bell has sounded: end of round.