FaceBook was probably excited to finally start to put the massive Beacon blunder behind them. Though the concept behind Beacon’s capabilities is fantastic, the execution of the launch will forever haunt the social networking giant. They have worked tirelessly for months to repair the damage to their reputation.

In spite of the added privacy controls, the tighter rules, the removal of Beacon immediately after massive amounts of bad reviews started pouring in, Zuckerberg’s crew at FaceBook can’t seem to get away from the colossal launch faux pax. Even month’s later a terrible and confusing new look for the social network can’t distract people from the Beacon fiasco.

For any of you just tuning in from the wilds of Africa, a remote island in the Caribbean or another remote region where social media like Twitter and FaceBook aren’t the be-all end-all of existence, Beacon’s installation completely FUBAR’d any privacy users had for over a month. The concept was actually very cool, revolutionary even, but without privacy options it was doomed to fail.

Problem one was launching it without really letting users know it was coming. Problem two was not having an opt out for it, or even a privacy level toggle. With Beacon active, everyone on your friends list could see everything you did on and off FaceBook on any Beacon activated site for a whole month. Christmas present surprises were ruined. Horrible music tastes were outed. Heck, in some case more than that was ‘outed’ – many users fell victim to huge breaches of confidential data.

“It used to be conventional wisdom that people under 30 don’t care about privacy,” Mike Troiano, CEO of Matchmine, told the E-Commerce Times. “It turned out they definitely care about controlling [their] own data — and in the end that is how Beacon really pissed people off.”

It has taken nearly a year to build back trust in FaceBook again. They irritated users already this month with the silly new design that many hate (I can take it or leave it, myself). Now the Beacon fiasco is dredged up anew for people to remember and FaceBook to handle. A lawsuit was filed recently in San Jose: Lane et al vs FaceBook, Inc.

The law suit is a class action lawsuit. In the end it may help decide exactly how much of our personal data is ours to control online. If you are in the social media sphere, you need to follow this closely, both as a user and a creator of social media and online advertising. Too little controls will drive away the users, killing your social media business. Too many will prevent revenue streams for social media companies. However this shakes out, it will have an impact on both sides of the social sector.

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Entry was posted on Monday, August 18th, 2008 at 12:20 am under Advertising, Legal.

Read more entries by Leslie Poston.
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