[Air-L] and now for *the dark side* of facebook

[Kevin Guidry]

On Feb 20, 2008 9:21 AM, Alexis Turner <subbies at redheadedstepchild.org> wrote:
> I'd actually like to go even further than Alex and ask, do we really believe
> that the only way interested spy agencies can obtain this information is by
> getting it siphoned through companies they have a *friendly* relationship with?

   Well said.

> ...I do believe the entire structure of Facebook and
> ALL business models like it raise serious privacy concerns.  Facebook's
> connections are public knowledge and make it an easy target.  But perhaps we
> should really be asking this question of ALL social networking sites.

   It seems that at least SNSes make the connections in social
networks explicit and transparent.  Many of you know (far better than
I!) that those connections are discoverable and mappable even when
they're not made explicit so at least SNSes level the playing field a
bit.  And transparency seems to be a key virtue when discussing
privacy so that seems like a good thing at first blush.

> I think the Facebook discussion has lost the forest for a single tree.

   That's definitely been the case in my field (American higher
education and student affairs)...


Kevin