Facebook changes its privacy policies

FYI....just in case you didn't know, Facebook is changing its privacy policies. Please see open letter from Founder, Mark Zuckerberg:

An Open Letter from Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg

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by Mark Zuckerberg Yesterday at 9:23pm

It has been a great year for making the world more open and connected. Thanks to your help, more than 350 million people around the world are using Facebook to share their lives online.

To make this possible, we have focused on giving you the tools you need to share and control your information. Starting with the very first version of Facebook five years ago, we've built tools that help you control what you share with which individuals and groups of people. Our work to improve privacy continues today.

Facebook's current privacy model revolves around "networks" — communities for your school, your company or your region. This worked well when Facebook was mostly used by students, since it made sense that a student might want to share content with their fellow students.

Over time people also asked us to add networks for companies and regions as well. Today we even have networks for some entire countries, like India and China.

However, as Facebook has grown, some of these regional networks now have millions of members and we've concluded that this is no longer the best way for you to control your privacy. Almost 50 percent of all Facebook users are members of regional networks, so this is an important issue for us. If we can build a better system, then more than 100 million people will have even more control of their information.

The plan we've come up with is to remove regional networks completely and create a simpler model for privacy control where you can set content to be available to only your friends, friends of your friends, or everyone.

We're adding something that many of you have asked for — the ability to control who sees each individual piece of content you create or upload. In addition, we'll also be fulfilling a request made by many of you to make the privacy settings page simpler by combining some settings. If you want to read more about this, we began discussing this plan back in July.

Since this update will remove regional networks and create some new settings, in the next couple of weeks we'll ask you to review and update your privacy settings. You'll see a message that will explain the changes and take you to a page where you can update your settings. When you're finished, we'll show you a confirmation page so you can make sure you chose the right settings for you. As always, once you're done you'll still be able to change your settings whenever you want.

We've worked hard to build controls that we think will be better for you, but we also understand that everyone's needs are different. We'll suggest settings for you based on your current level of privacy, but the best way for you to find the right settings is to read through all your options and customize them for yourself. I encourage you to do this and consider who you're sharing with online.

Thanks for being a part of making Facebook what it is today, and for helping to make the world more open and connected.

Mark Zuckerberg

Product Recommendations come from friends, not networks?

MediaPost published an article today discussing a survey of 583 moms with kids under 12 conducted by MomConnection entitled "Product Recommendations Come From Friends, Not Networks."

The gist of the the study is that that "despite all of the attention being given to the relationships that moms form online through social media...they do not use social networks as a resource when it comes to product decision-making. Moms are four times more likely to turn to their personal offline network of friends and family than online social networks for product recommendations and buying advice." (Read the MomConnection release here).

I could NOT relate to this story at all because I find myself relying on online recommendations for certain products, especially products related to my daughter. Don't get me wrong, I have not bought products based purely on Twitter entries, but I rely on my "trusted mom" sites/blogs to look for information.

I think the study misses the mark a little because it fails to appreciate that in many instances our online network (especially in the blogosphere) is personal and true friendships are made and that it's not just about being social.

What are your thoughts? Do you rely on social media for information about products or do you view your online relationships as purely social? Is this survey correct?

Follow @SantaClaus on Twitter!

[Actually you really can.] A recent survey found that 17% of adult shoppers will use social media in some aspect of their holiday shopping, and 19% will rely on their mobile phones.

Deloitte's 24th Annual Holiday Survey polled more than 10,000 adults in the U.S, and says that of the nearly one in five who plans to use social media sites, 60% say they will do so to find sales, discounts, and coupons; 53% intend to use sites like MySpace and Facebook to research gift ideas, and 52% say they will check the wish lists of friends and family.

No surprise there right? As social media increasingly becomes a routine part of our everyday experiences, it only makes sense that the trend spills over into traditional activities, such as holiday shopping. As we enter into the wonderful, dreadful holiday season, how does social media factor in to your plans?

Blogalicious on The Chatterbox Show

The Mamalaw ladies (the founders of Blogalicious) will be live on The Chatterbox Show tomorrow, Monday 9/14 at 10am EST. If you have questions or comments about the conference, or just want to call-in and let us know how excited you are, we'd love to talk with you.

The show, hosted by Chatterbox Christie, is called:

Blogalicious 09: Everything You Wanted to Know (but were afraid to ask)

And while we hope that you do call-in with questions for us, we want you to know that we are always accessible to you. We created this conference for you and we've tried our best to listen to your ideas and concerns and incorporate them into our conference planning.

So, we look forward to chatting with you tomorrow. But if you want to reach out to us off-air, please feel free to Tweet or Email us anytime.

On Twitter:
@blogalicious09
@justicefergie
@justicejonesie
@justiceny

Email:
info@blogaliciousweekend.com
contactus@blogaliciousweekend.com

Sincerely,
Justice Fergie, Justice Jonesie & Justice Ny

Facebook privacy

Here is a helpful article for all you (us) social networking gurus out there, especially if you use Facebook. http://www.allfacebook.com/2009/02/facebook-privacy/

Bloggers' identities may be revealed

I stumbled across this article in my internet travel today and wanted to share it with you; of course, this doesn't really apply to any of you because we all blog with integrity! But I wanted to pass it on:

Google reveals blogger's identity after Vogue model's 'skank' insult.

Miss Cohen, 37, went to the Manhattan supreme court to discover who had attacked her so she could sue for defamation. The Skanks in NYC blog featured photos of Miss Cohen and described her in a series of unflattering terms....In what may prove a far-reaching ruling, Joan Madden, a New York supreme court judge, rejected the blogger's claim that the blogs were a "modern day forum for conveying personal opinions, including invective and ranting" and should not be treated as factual assertions. The judge quoted a ruling by a Virginia court in a similar case that said that anonymous online taunters should be held accountable when their derision goes too far. Google said it had complied with the ruling by supplying the blogger's IP and email addresses to Miss Cohen's lawyers. The blog was removed as soon as Miss Cohen took legal action. Read more...

Congrats to Penny Pinching Diva!

Our very own Blogalicious Media Correspondent, and thifty blogger extraordinaire, Shynea Hunter aka Penny Pinching Diva is featured as The Coupon Queen in this month's Essence magazine (you know - the one with a smoldering Idris Elba on the cover!) Shynea offers tips and tricks of the trade on how to get the most for your hard-earned money.

Congratulations Shynea!!

Catch the Penny Pinching Diva in person, live on the purple carpet at Blogalicious 2009.

What the Proposed Blogging Guidelines Mean for You

There has been a lot of buzz lately on how the federal government, i.e. the Federal Trade Commission, is planning to regulate bloggers writing product reviews. Although this topic isn't new, the reason for the recent discussion about it in the press is because the FTC is currently reviewing its existing guidelines for marketers and product endorsers - which were originally written in the 1980's - and the agency plans to include new media in its revised version. While blogging wasn't even a thought on anyone's minds in the 80's (who had time what with things like Cabbage Patch Dolls and Miami Vice?) now blogging has, of course, redefined how marketers promote their brands to consumers.

I'm sure all of us have been approached to try a product and write a review about it on our blog. Perhaps some of us have even been invited on a trip courtesy of a marketer. Others might even participate in one of the many "pay-to-post" programs out there available to bloggers. All of these avenues can be great ways for companies to spread the word about their brands, and a great way for bloggers to get paid (or at least enjoy free stuff!) The question is: are the marketers - and you as a potential product endorser - within the confines of advertising law when it comes to offering and doing these reviews?

The name of the game is transparency. As long as you as the product endorser is being transparent to your readers about your relationship with the marketer of the product, you should be a-ok. A simple disclosure stating that you were given the product/service/trip, etc. for free, that is clear and prominent to those reading the review, should do the trick. The key is for the consumers reading the post to know that you didn't just pick up the box of Banana Cheerios at the grocery, try it, decided you loved it and wrote a post about it. The perception of your review of that cereal might change if the reader knew up front that you were sent that box of Cheerios by General Mills and asked to review it. Getting that cereal for free might arguably be a form of payment, and merits being disclosed. Bottom line: If you are acting as a proxy for an advertiser, then that needs to be disclosed.

Some folks have been saying that mommy bloggers are the focus of the FTC's review, and that just isn't true. The agency is looking at all forms of new media, and it just so happens that mommy bloggers are "hot" right now and are being targeted by PR companies in a major way to review all sorts of things. But whether you're a mom blogger, a travel blogger, a gadget blogger or a food blogger, you most likely won't have anything to worry about as long as you use honesty as your policy.

In fact, Susan Getgood says it best in her recent post on this very issue: The FTC is focused on deceptive practices, not honest reviews.

For specific tips on how you can make sure you're on the right track, read my 2007 post on DCMetroMoms blog called "Blogging for Bucks" and we'll be discussing this topic some more in October. Which reminds me - are you registered yet?

Marketing to Bloggers of Color: The Hot Topic for 2009?

As women bloggers of color, we know first-hand the importance of brands marketing to our demographic and we also see the disparity between the number and types of invitations we get to company-sponsored blogging retreats. Of course, some companies, like Disney, do "get it" and have been leading the pack in terms of recognizing that their brand cannot afford to exclude (intentionally or unintentionally) bloggers or color. That includes women bloggers of color, and an even more important subset of that when it comes to buying power is mom bloggers of color. We applaud those companies and hope that others are paying attention and plan to follow suit.

Some companies, however, are still missing the boat when it comes to including diversity in their marketing campaigns. Most recently, Hallmark has been criticized as not including any women of color in their recent brand retreat. Not only are brands to blame, but also the mom blogging community as a whole has failed to recognize moms of color are powerful consumers worthy of having their voices heard. More than one bloggy friend (white and non-white) has told me just how "lily white" Blissdom '09 was and how it was mid-boggling in this day and age.

I, for one, am glad to see that this issue is gaining national attention and is not lost on other mommy bloggers, including white ones. Popular mom blogger and PR consultant, Kim Moldofsky, just wrote a thought-provoking post on inviting diversity to the mommy blogger marketing discussions, and she has put out a call for all mom bloggers to insist that brands invite a diverse crowd to their events. A bold move and a thoughtful one.

Looks like this is going to be a recurring topic in 2009. We hope that Blogalicious 2009 will play an important role in shaping the discussion!