Tag Archives | Social Networking

Companies Most Compliant With Big Brother Include Verizon, AT&T, Apple, Microsoft, Foursquare

By JacobSloan on June 13, 2012 in News 3

A report from the Electronic Frontier Foundation compares eighteen major internet companies’ willingness to hand over users’ personal information to authorities. Twitter, Google, and Dropbox are among those who get good marks for resisting Big Brother-type demands from government:

When you use the Internet, you entrust your online conversations, thoughts, experiences, locations, photos, and more to companies like Google, AT&T and Facebook. But what happens when the government demands that these companies to hand over your private information? Will the company stand with you?

… Read the rest

How Facebook Turns You Over To The Police

By JacobSloan on April 9, 2012 in News 10

Ah, the social network. A Boston Phoenix story detailing law enforcement’s hunt for “Craigslist Killer” Philip Markoff reveals what Facebook sends to the cops when they subpoena your profile information (a topic about which Facebook has been very tight-lipped). What do the police receive? All of your wall posts and shares, everyone you’ve ever friended or defriended, every photo you’ve ever been tagged in (even if private or deleted), all of your “likes”, and your entire step-by-step history of activity, including every time you’ve viewed anyone’s profile:

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The Private Social Network For The Extremely Rich and Powerful

By JacobSloan on March 3, 2012 in News 44

An Esquire piece on $4 billion software company Tibco discusses its latest, perhaps most significant project:

TopCom is a private communications platform for the 200 most powerful people in the world. It is being officially launched in late January at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. It is basically a customized, ridiculously secure version of tibbr, a platform developed as a kind of combination Facebook, Twitter, e-mail, texting, and Skype. It is a private social network, essentially — in this case, for world leaders. Because the World Economic Forum has a hierarchy, so does TopCom: The top two hundred WEF members — basically, the people who run the world — can speak to one another on a given subject, and then they can choose to loop in members from lower tiers (experts, academics, etc.) as needed, widening the pool of knowledge on whatever problem is on the table.

Facebook Personal ID Cards

By JacobSloan on February 27, 2012 in News 19

Created by German artist Tobias Leingruber and available via the hypothetical government agency the FB Bureau. Why wait until these become mandatory? Get yours now:

With more than 800 million users Facebook is the dominant identity system on the web. When signing-up for new services around the open web it’s quite common to use Facebook Connect instead of creating a new user account. People stop ranting on blog comments because they only allow comments connected to your “real name” aka “Facebook Identity” (till the end of time).

For the good or bad we are losing anonymity and Facebook Inc. is establishing order in this “world wild web” (for profit, not necessarily for the good of society). A future where a Facebook Identity becomes more important than any governments’ doesn’t seem unrealistic.

… Read the rest

What Google And Facebook Get Wrong About Self Expression And Identity

By JacobSloan on October 20, 2011 in News 16

Google and Facebook would have you believe that you're a mirror, that there is one reflection that you have, this one idea of self. But in fact we're more like diamonds, you can look at people from any angle and see something totally different. 4chan founder Chris Poole discusses the problem with personal identity as conceived by Facebook and Google. Basically, that they expect us to maintain a single, consistent persona throughout life, which is not how we actually exist:

Why “Real Names” Policies Are Wrong

By JacobSloan on August 19, 2011 in News 35

Google Plus‘s decision to kill off accounts that are not “real names” follows a broader online trend of websites requiring users to utilize their birth names rather than “LimpBizkitDude69″. The idea is that this will make people more “responsible”. But in addition to its being a longstanding internet tradition, there are legitimate and important reasons why people use online pseudonyms. Apophenia compiled a bunch:

“I’ve been stalked. I’m a rape survivor. I am a government employee that is prohibited from using my IRL.”

“I am a high school teacher, privacy is of the utmost importance.”

“I have used this name/account in a work context, my entire family know this name and my friends know this name. It enables me to participate online without being subject to harassment that at one point in time lead to my employer having to change their number so that calls could get through.”

“I do not feel safe using my real name online as I have had people track me down from my online presence and had coworkers invade my private life.”

“As a former victim of stalking that impacted my family I’ve used [my nickname] online for about 7 years.”

“[this name] is a pseudonym I use to protect myself.

… Read the rest

Follow The White House On Foursquare

By Pelliciari on August 17, 2011 in News 2

Want to know where Obama is? The White House has joined foursquare. You can now follow the president as he checks in Lower Hannah’s Bend Park, Seed Saver’s Exchange and, most recently, Northeast Iowa Community College. Via Information Week:

The White House has joined the Foursquare location-based social networking service, a move that shows again the Obama administration’s support of a more transparent and tech-savvy federal government.

Users of the service–which allows people to virtually “check in” to various businesses, landmarks, and other locations around the globe–can now use the White House Foursquare page to follow President Obama as he travels and uses the service to let people know where he is, according to a White House blog post.

They also can themselves check in to the White House if they are visiting the presidential home or attending an Obama town hall event. The White House also has elected to use the tips feature, which can recommend places the president has visited and share what he did while he was there.

… Read the rest

UK May Block Facebook And Twitter To Quell Riots

By JacobSloan on August 11, 2011 in News 80

Following another night of disorder in a country beset by deep inequality, corruption in the halls of power, and scant opportunity for young adults, the conservative regime in Bahrain has threatened to cut off access to social networking websites until the unrest subsides. Oh sorry — this is the news from England. Via Raw Story:

In a move that calls to mind the start of the most serious unrest in nations across the Middle East over the last year, David Cameron, Britain’s prime minister, told Parliament Thursday that authorities may shut down social media websites like Facebook and Twitter, in hopes that it would return calm to their streets.

The remarks came one day after British authorities discussed turning off the messaging function on BlackBerry phones, which they suggested may remove a tool protesters and rioters were using.

“Everyone watching these horrific actions will be struck by how they were organized via social media,” Cameron told Parliament.

… Read the rest

Get A Bot To Live As You Online

By JacobSloan on August 2, 2011 in News 42

rep.licants.org enables you to hand over control of your Facebook or Twitter account to a bot that simulates your speech patterns, personality, and interests. Your online friendships and connections will be maintained and even enriched and expanded, while you get to play outside in the sunshine:

rep.licants.org is a web service allowing users to install an artificial intelligence (bot) on their Facebook and/or Twitter account. From keywords, content analysis and activity analysis, the bot attempts to simulate the activity of the user, to improve it by feeding his account and to create new contacts with other users.

Social networks are the first medium showing the social success of a person via a statistical way (eg number of friends on Facebook or followers on Twitter). For many users, reaching the hoped-for success can become a tough and difficult task. Especially when some human factors such as shyness, introversion or personal worth are present.

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Facebook And The Destruction Of Innocence In Computing

By JacobSloan on August 1, 2011 in News 32

The computer history blog ASCII lays out the meaning of Facebook in the grand scheme of things:

Facebook is the third of what is probably a quartet (or quintet) of the destruction of the innocence of computing. First was viruses, second was malware, third is facebook. I suspect fourth will be related to control of networking itself, and fifth will be licensing of high level computer ability. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Facebook is a living computer nightmare. Just as viruses took the advantages of sharing information on floppies and modems and revealed a devastating undercarriage to the whole process, making every computer transaction suspect… and just as spyware/malware took advantage of beautiful advances in computer strength and horsepower to turn your beloved machine of expression into a gatling gun of misery and assholery… Facebook now stands as taking over a decade and a half of the dream of the World Wide Web and turning it into a miserable IT cube farm of pseudo human interaction, a bastardized form of e-mail, of mailing lists, of photo albums, of friendship.

… Read the rest

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