Explaining Social Media`s Friendship Ranks - Haven't We Seen This Before? Well, sort of...
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Facebook ran into industry and member disdain in regard to privacy concerns upon launching its "Beacon" service, used to dig into eBay and Yelp; it was set up so that, when the social site's members used one of these online application services, Beacon would alert friends via their subscribed news feeds. Reaction was so negative that Facebook backtracked to an opt-in only format for members, cutting use dramatically.
In a nutshell, Beacon was publicizing "real-world" commerce and net activity on external sites, to the user's friends. As we all know, the online presence we create for ourselves, and our normal everyday activity, can be two very different and conflicting items.
So, the differences between Beacon and FriendRank are smartly structured, where there is no direct draw of information from third-party sites. FriendRank does use friendship data and "breadth of pull" to initiate their marketing messages. This may or may not be enough to squash this attempt at social networking advertising before it ever gets started.
Truthfully, it's not much different from the historical use of data collection cookies. It's just much more visible. And it's in that visibility where Social Media needs to be careful, as it could make or break their social media advancement.
What was learned from the Beacon semi-fiasco was the need to be very clear about what was happening, and always allow users to opt out of any sort of social networking that involves advertising delivery. Social Media has planned for this argument as well, offering an easy information click button and opt-out link on each social banner shown.
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