Facing Facebook:
Conversations about Social Networking, Privacy and Self-Representation

Introduction

  We created a non-linear documentary that is a collaboration of various opinions on the major topics surrounding Facebook. These topics include; privacy, self-representation and social networking as a new and widely adopted phenomenon.  Due to the scope of these discussions, it would be ineffective to attempt to cover all these topics in this paper. Therefore we wanted to focus primarily on privacy and the current debate surrounding it.

    It is a common trend at this point in time to jump on the Facebook bandwagon and reap the benefits of how this new technology is allowing us to extend our ability to socialize. However, users are entering into these mediated relations without understanding the consequences of putting such an abundance of their personal information online.  Furthermore, when users sign up for Facebook, many are completely unaware of the contract they are entering into. Most users are focused more on the instant gratification of online social networking, unaware of the other ways in which their information is being used.  Therefore we created this documentary to promote discussion amongst our peers and Facebook users in order to provide people with the information needed to make an educated decision when entering into these mediated relations on Facebook.


Background Research

    Facebook is a pervasive and a continually growing phenomenon. In terms of trafficking, it is the number one site for photos, ahead of public websites such as Flickr, with over six million photos uploaded daily and Facebook is the sixth most visited site in the United States (Facebook website, Inside Facebook Engineering).   As of this February 2007, Facebook had the largest number of registered users among college-based sites with over 17 million members worldwide (Abram, 2007).

    Facebook was originally called thefacebook, and was founded by former Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg in February 2004 (Yadav). Zuckerberg made thefacebook while he was still enrolled at Harvard but eventually left University to continue building Facebooks success. He originally ran it as one of his personal hobby with some financial help from a friend, Eduardo Saverin. Soon after, other Harvard students; Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes joined Zuckerberg to help with the website. Within months, Facebook and its core idea spread across the dorm rooms of Harvard and soon enough, it became popular at Stanford and Yale where it was widely endorsed. As the website's popularity rose, so did the advertising revenue. Zuckerberg and Moskovitz eventually left Harvard to run Facebook fulltime, while Hughes remained at Harvard to work as the site's spokesperson. Zuckerberg and Moskovitz moved to Palo Alto, California in June 2004, established an office and recruited a staff of eight (Yadav).

    In September 2004, Facebook was given approximately $500,000 from Peter Thiel, co-founder of the popular website, PayPal. Then in May 2005, Facebook raised $12.7 million in venture capital from Accel Partners and by late August 2005 the domain name facebook.com was acquired from Aboutface Corporation, and the website moved domains and dropped the "the" from the site name effective August 23, 2005 (Yadav, website). The purchase price for the domain name was $200,000.    When it was first unveiled, Facebook was not available to everyone in the public, unlike its competitors MySpace, Friendster, Xanga, hi5, Bebo, and other online social communities.  On September 11, 2006, it was reported that Facebook would officially become available to all Internet users, 2 weeks later it opened its doors to anyone with a valid email address, a move that would change it's overall security and success forever (Abram, 2006).

    It is difficult not to notice the pervasiveness of Facebook as one roams around the computer labs, or eavesdrops on nearby conversations. For the time being, Facebook has consumed our generation. Facebook is absolutely free to users and generates revenue from advertising (including banner ads and sponsored groups). Users can create personal profiles, generally containing photos and lists of interests, exchange private or public messages, and join groups of friends among other social tools that are added and updated regularly. Viewing other peoples detailed profile data is restricted to users from the same network or confirmed friends (for example the McMaster community would have their own 'McMaster' network if they provide a valid McMaster email address). Most of the sections are self-explanatory, but what makes them unique is that most of them are specific to Facebook. It is an all encompassing website. This is one of the main reasons why Facebook is growing in success compared to other online communities. Whether it is listing the courses you are currently enrolled in, what events you will be attending on the weekend, or even your religious views, Facebook does not fail to incorporate every minor/macro aspect of your life.

    According to TechCrunch survey, "about 85% of students in [previously] supported colleges have a profile on Facebook.  60% log in daily. About 85% log in at least once a week, and 93% log in at least once a month." (Arrington)  According to Chris Hughes, spokesman for Facebook, "People spend an average of 19 minutes a day on Facebook." (Arrington).  Because of its popularity, many larger corporations have realized that they can use Facebook for profit and thus in August 2006 Facebook signed a three year deal with Microsoft to both provide and sell ads on their site in return for a revenue split. Credit Card companies, Apple iTunes and other similar business understand that Facebook's youthful demographic are the number one consumers at the present time (Yadav, website). This not only makes Facebook more popular as a Business venture for larger companies, but becomes more successful in the eyes of its users as it begins to offer more services and opportunities.  Facebook continues to grow and expand new features every couple months. Continually adapting to the needs of its users, even playing an "April Fools" joke on it's users this past April 1st 2007.

    Facebook's future is unknown. Will it be around five years from now? Ten years? Will it still be as successful as our generation grows older and moves out of University and into a career or building a family? Will it continue to be as pervasive with the future generations to come? These are all uncertainties. Overnight, it became a massively successful social networking service that grew in virtually no time. Yet, when people become more aware of the third parties interaction with the site, and how closely monitored they are being, will it continue to grow in popularity? What happens when parents and relatives begin to sign up, and young adults no longer have the privacy they once had on Facebook.  Such instances are beginning to fill the news whereby school administration, parents and even police are utilizing the richness of information available.  Although there have been rumors of an acquisition (estimating that the price will reach into the billions of dollars) (Yadav) Facebook plans to keep trucking along solo, continuing to build one of the world's most successful and lucrative social networks.

Analysis of the Privacy Policy

    Despite the claim "Facebook respects your privacy. We don't distribute your user information to marketers or spammers", a deeper investigation is needed.  According to Facebook's privacy policy:

"Advertisements that appear on Facebook are sometimes delivered (or "served") directly to users by third party advertisers. They automatically receive your IP address when this happens. These third party advertisers may also download cookies to your computer, or use other technologies such as JavaScript and "web beacons" (also known as "1x1 gifs") to measure the effectiveness of their ads and to personalize advertising content."

  The former demonstrates that there is in fact a clear presence of advertisers lurking on Facebook with the intent to obtain valuable demographic and psychographic information.  With this presence of advertisers and the threat of constant surveillance it is important for users to consider the business side involved in these social relations.  While social networks exist for people to socialize, they also exist so corporations can capitalize on the abundance of cultural information that is a product of these mediated relations. In addition, due to the abundance of cultural information that exists, marketers even have the opportunity to go as far as creating personalized ads.  With this in mind, it is no wonder that Facebook has received offers up to a billion dollars (Yadav, website).  Social networks such as Facebook provide marketers with extremely valuable information that they otherwise could not find nor buy anywhere else.  Although Facebook does mention in their privacy policy that third party advertisers are directly advertising to Facebook users, they do not go into detail nor do they explain how this is being done. 

 The re-occurring trend from analyzing their policies was that there is a discrepancy between what they are saying and what they are doing. Furthermore, in our attempt to analyze their privacy policies, we came to the realization that it would be very difficult for normal users to decipher their policies unless a lawyer was present.  Therefore, it is not an easy task for users to gain a thorough understanding of what is being done with their personal information. The policies negate from using everyday language, making it difficult to get through all of the legal jargon.  With this in mind a users ability to clearly understand what kind of contract they are entering into when signing up for this service is compromised.  To further prove this argument consider the following:

"By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing. You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire."

    Trying to make sense of this gibberish is a difficult task therefore it will not be held against you if you gave up half way through!  Unfortunately, this is a very important clause in their Terms Of Use.  Basically Facebook is telling users that they legally own the content they post online and have the option to use that information for any purpose they want that is in connection with Facebook.  Could they be more general if they tried? Therefore, despite the fact that users feel that they have a high level of control over the content they post, in reality this is an illusion.  The privacy settings are providing users with a false sense of security.  Although they have control over who sees their profile within a social context, users need to start concerning themselves with the bigger picture.  Facebook is providing this service for free therefore what are they getting in return?  When considering other services and tools that exist on the site, everything is very user friendly and self explanatory, yet in our opinion two of the most important aspects of the site, the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, is far from user friendly nor is it self explanatory...unless one has a degree in law.  A coincidence?  We don't think so.

     
    Finally, despite the fact that it is difficult to truly understand the contract one enters into, the level of difficulty is taken to a whole new level when considering the following excerpt from their privacy policy:

"We reserve the right to change our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use at any time. Non-material changes and clarifications will take effect immediately, and material changes will take effect within 30 days of their posting on this site. If we make changes, we will post them and will indicate at the top of this page the policy's effective date. We therefore encourage you to refer to this policy on an ongoing basis so that you understand our current privacy policy. Unless stated otherwise, our current privacy policy applies to all information that we have about you and your account."

    Considering that the users we interviewed and fellow Facebook friends do not even attempt to read the privacy policy, what are the chances that people will actually pay attention to the changes taking place in a policy they never actually read? Furthermore, what about those people who are concerned about their privacy and took the time to read the policy?  In this case, they have signed up, read the privacy policy, agreed to it, and then at a later date find out it's changed.  What if they are not in agreement with the new changes? What then?  "… Even after removal, copies of User Content may remain viewable in cached and archived pages or if other Users have copied or stored your User Content, " (Facebook Privacy Policy). In this case, a user has the option to cancel their account, however, once their personal information is in a digital format it is very difficult or even impossible to control what is already out there.

    In addition, throughout the four-month investigation of Facebook, although we do not have concrete evidence, we believe that Facebook has changed their privacy policy without notifying users despite the claim that they do. We believe this to be true because of the multiple times we have done text analysis on the policies and the many discrepancies that we found.  Words/sentences that existed in prior analyses no longer existed at a later date. This includes the paragraph; "We may share your information with third parties, including responsible companies with which we have a relationship."  This quote is no longer present in the current policy, but was in our notes as well as being written on Wikipedia. According to the current privacy policy, it says:

"This policy is effective as of October 23, 2006" which could not be viable, considering we started researching in November 2006 and since then, according to our knowledge, the policy has changed at least once.

"Facebook may use information in your profile without identifying you as an individual to third parties. We do this for purposes such as aggregating how many people in a network like a band or movie and personalizing advertisements and promotions so that we can provide you Facebook. We believe this benefits you. You can know more about the world around you and, where there are advertisements, they're more likely to be interesting to you. "
    
    In contrast to this claim, on their FAQ page under the "Privacy" heading they state "Facebook respects your privacy. We don't distribute your user information to marketers or spammers".  This is one of many contradictions that exist.  By manipulating semantics, Facebook is legally protecting themselves extremely well.  By "aggregating" information this allows facebook to claim that they do not sell information to third parties.  This strategic move should not persuade people in thinking that they are not making a profit off the information posted on their site.
    

 Due to consumer culture we are constantly being bombarded by advertising and marketing. Whether its on a billboard, a TV commercial or an ad on the back of the bathroom stall, we are a generation of thriving consumers and marketers will find anyway to tap into this. Instead of holding focus groups, or collecting information from individuals whereby they are aware and consenting to offering their opinions, third parties makes use of our personal profiles on Facebook to understand what we desire and what kind of consumers we are.  This is done without us knowing or consenting and even more so when people are engaging with the site without an awareness of the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.  The information we put on Facebook isn't just used to socialize, people are making money off of it. It comes down to issues of control, and Facebook lets people have a false sense of control over they're information.  The NewsFeed controversy is a great example of this. On September 5th 2006 Facebook introduced a new controversial feature called the "News Feed". News Feed, appears on every Facebook member's home page, displaying recent Facebook activities of a member's friends. On every member's page, there is also a Mini-Feed, which displays all the most recent news pertaining to the individual. Facebook users may be under the impression that deleting something from one's Mini-Feed deletes it from the News Feed as well. It does not. In fact, there is no way to prevent some forms of updates to one's profile from being broadcast over the News Feed, as Facebook offers only a limited opt-out list. Some information may even be sent over News-Feed without the knowledge of the user. One Facebook user recounts breaking up with her boyfriend on September 5th , only to realize it was being broadcasted all over the news feed as it was the day it was implemented, and she was unaware of this new addition. This further reiterates the false sense of control users have over their information. Ultimately, users do not have full control.

Self-Representation

    Accurately representing oneself online is a difficult task. The individuals who were interviewed had a variety of responses in terms of their self-representation online. Rather than face-to-face first impressions, our generation is now reaching a peak in online first impressions. Whether it is making a new Facebook friend, or lurking on friends of friend's pages, we are immediately given a users personal information and draw our own conclusions about them.  Sometimes if their relationship status is hidden, we wonder if they are single or taken. If they're 'interested in:' field is left blank, we question they're sexual preference. We look at what 'groups' they've joined and what photos they have displayed. Are they as attractive in real life? Does their online sense of humour apply to their real life sense of humour as well?  Psychologist Sam Gosling from the University of Texas, Austin, found that profiles on Facebook present a generally accurate portrait of their owners, yet it is often different than the impression they think they are portraying to others. Sam Gosling and his colleagues studied 133 Facebook profiles. Then, they showed these profiles to strangers and compared their impressions with a personality score derived by combining the way the profiles' owners described themselves with descriptions by five of their friends. (New Scientist)  "They found that strangers' ratings of someone's extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness were a good match to their personality score.  (New Scientist) "In the real world, people are much better at judging the impression they make on strangers" Gosling says. "Maybe they just haven't learned the [online] language yet."

     Self representation is a very important aspect of Facebook as it has become an increasingly common way for people to become acquainted and of course, it is known that employers check job applicant's profiles before offering them an interview. It's a way of getting a basic first impression of someone, and whether you want to befriend or hire them. Likewise, it is easy to judge others based on information on their profile. One drunk photo of a student at a party might label them as un-motivated or a party animal. Releasing ones information to the public is risky in terms of privacy, but equally as risky in terms of accurately representing oneself. More often than not, people really meet you for the first time on your Facebook profile these days.

     In our interviews, a recurring theme was one related to the number of 'friends' one had on Facebook. Many interviewees agreed that the more friends they had on Facebook, the better they felt about themselves. An online confidence boost, as the numerical number of friends on their list increased, so did their self-worth. This could be because when reuniting with friends and family from the past online, one wants to portray they have been successful in making new friends in the past years, and is so called 'popular' at whatever institute they are currently in.

 
    The structure of Facebook encourages self-expression by allowing many portals into ones life. Most users do not choose to leave the fields blank, but rather spend hours updating their favorite bands, movies, Tv shows and even changing their status when they are 'at work' or 'bored'.  Having this excessive amount of information so widely available to the public can really hinder or enhance ones life in terms of socializing and future endeavors. It all depends on how rational and mature one is with what they choose to display. As Professor Mark Cote says in our documentary, "once it's out there, it's out there..." so a message to the viewers of the documentary; use your judgment and common sense to be cautious with information that will always be retrievable once its posted.

Conclusions

    Upon completion, we came to the conclusion that ignorance runs rampant among Facebook users.  Facebook has been around for over three years now, making it relatively aged, yet it is only now that the Facebook population is slowly beginning to realize the consequences that arise through social networking. Although people are very naive to the dangers of Facebook, they are finally beginning to seek out more information on social networking and this is why our documentary couldn't have come at a better time, because the information is in such high demand.

    Moral issues such as invasions of privacy, accurate self-representation, freedom of speech and the like are explored in our documentary. Simply put, what it comes down to is that people are putting digital information online and due to the privacy controls that the users can adjust, this gives them a false sense of security.
  

  At the peak in the digital age, information about everyone is out there. "Facing Facebook: Conversations about social networking, privacy and self-representations" is a documentary that is not meant to convince people into believing Facebook is a positive or negative social utility, but rather, provoke thought and discussion in regards to it. Facebook is continuing to evolve and it is interesting to hear individuals stories, opinions, likes/dislikes with the website as it is so omnipresent in our society.  Ultimately if you want to make something private, do not put it online. What does privacy mean in 2007? Definitely not what it used to be.




Works Cited

Abram, Carolyn. "Welcome to Facebook, Everyone." Facebook. 26 Sept. 2006. 5 Apr.     2007     < http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=2210227130>.

Abram, Carolyn. "Have a Taste ..." Facebook. 23 Feb. 2007. 5 Apr. 2007     <http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=2245132130 >.

Arrington, Michael. "85% of College Students Use Facebook." TechCrunch. 7 Sept.     2005. 5 Apr. 2007
    < http://www.techcrunch.com/2005/09/07/85-of-college-students-use-facebook/>.

"Privacy Policy." Facebook. 23 Oct. 2006. 5 Apr. 2007     <http://mcmaster.facebook.com/policy.php >.

Wikipedia The Free Encylopedia. Facebook. Date accessed: March 20th 2007.
    <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook?

Yadav, Sid. "Facebook - The Complete Biography." Mashable! social networking 2.0.     August 25th 2006. Date accessed: March 20th 2007.
    <http://mashable.com/2006/08/25/facebook-profile/>

"Yourself as Others See You." New Scientist 193 (2007). Factiva. McMaster, Hamilton.     5 Apr. 2007. Keyword: facebook.

Last updated April 2007