The irony is too great...

This is just Google taking a shot at Facebook, their new rival for traffic flow.

There are plenty of reasons to leave FB, but Matt doing and announcing it along with other googlers seems fishy.

Breaking: Pepsi Chairman slams Coke, will drink Pepsi from now on :)

@Reno, Stoutfiles: Matt twittered about it: most Twitter user would tweet about stopping using FB.

It just looks like one Googler decided to stop using Facebook over this, and a water cooler conversation persuaded a few colleagues.

Lots of people will drop Facebook over this. It is very annoying.

Any site that adds Facebook's "like" iframe based button is going to post a picture of your ugly mug on those sites if any of your friends click on the thing. I'd say that's a bit much, you have no control over which site installs that thing or where your picture/name will end up.

Shame on Facebook and a good move by whoever stands against that type of using you to promote facebook.

When I read the title I though Google employees had finally had enough with Facebooks recent "we will beat Google at search, the future is social search" rhetoric. This is actually a great reason to say enough is enough.

"Hey, you're really black!"
"Mr. Pot, shut it!"

This is hilarious when you consider that Google was recently caught indexing your MAC address and combining it with your physical address while doing their Google Street View invasions of privacy.

The Street View service is under fire in Germany for scanning private WLAN networks, and recording users' unique Mac (Media Access Control) addresses, as the car trundles along.

Germany's Federal Commissioner for Data Protection Peter Schaar says he's "horrified" by the discovery.

[edited by: goodroi at 3:22 pm (utc) on Apr 25, 2010]
[edit reason] Quote is from the Register article [/edit]

If they pulled that off in germany, you know it most likely happend here too.

Breaking: Pepsi Chairman slams Coke, will drink Pepsi from now on

Correction: Pepsi Chairman has clarified that he will still take a sip of Coke anytime they reformulate the mix so that he is familiar with his competitor.

I deactivated my FB a few months back. Life has definitely been better without it. It was too creepy having these old girlfriends popping up and trying to friend me every week.

My response about "irony" is in no way any kind of support of FB -- I've never been a member because I DO care about privacy and they strike me as less concerned than I'd like. I just think it's more than a little contradictory for Google (of all companies) to post an objection about data gathering & sharing. I mean, give me a break.

But I also think, as has been posted here, that this is a shot across the bow in that Google is seeing FB (far more than Bing or Yahoo) as their REAL competition. For now they are almost certainly right about that, though as we have repeatedly said, things on the WWW can change in a New York minute. Today's competition is tomorrow's has beens, so a new battle is waged, and if the past is any guide to the future, more privacy will be lost. Some day we may regret it -- at least for those of us that will still remember "privacy".

..........................................

old girlfriends popping up

ROFLMAO

but you are right, information is sometimes getting out of hand and that is a reason to control it. Yet I have still to find out, how to make traffic with facebook - the ads do not convert and when you push your marketing too hard, people start flame wars.

IMHO is facebook just what it is: a social toy for youngsters - i strongly doubt these groups decide from the FB pages where to spend the cash and the demographics are totally flawed!

I recently learned: NONE of the friends of my wife got their real profile on FB - they work with fake names, enter different cities... what is that marketing info good for again?

Google does a great job with their (marketing) press releases and this post is another great example of a storm in a glass of water they turn into stock market money!

Just 2 pennies!

P!

I recently learned: NONE of the friends of my wife got their real profile on FB - they work with fake names, enter different cities.

You had to ask your wife about Facebook? You're not on it?

I have some 400-500 friends on FB. For all of the ones who I know personally (offline, etc.), their information is correct. Name, city, jobs, background, interests, etc.

BTW, many of the senior people in SEO, PPC, or analytics are in FB. I write books and I ran an agency; we all know each other. FB is part of our network. Updates, information, ideas, etc., also gets passed around in FB.

Yes, it's deliciously ironic that Matt Cutts quits FB over privacy. Is he going to quit Google too, or was it just posturing over a competitor?

Those people who refuse to use FB remind me of people in the mid-90s who refused to use computers or email. Get on FB and learn how to use it. It's quite different and has tremendous potential. The Connect/Open Graph idea is as important as the idea of online payments or analytics. It will fundamentally change the web.

. Get on FB and learn how to use it...It will fundamentally change the web.

Thank you for this input -- I keep getting a sinking feeling in my gut that I'm missing an opportunity, but at the same time, I want to tightly control what information is available for public scrutiny. My only reason to use it will be for more targeted traffic, so I must figure out how to do that AND simultaneously not become a target myself, and thus the key word in your quote is "learn"...

...........................

You might note that Google Guy (whoever that was) once fleed WebmasterWorld.

Years ago, a quick view of orkut was really interesting when I figured out how to view friends of key people here on WebmasterWorld.

I felt like I was eavesdropping. I never went back.

I could easily find out who was friends with whom, what their real names were, etc.

The bottom line - if you want privacy in the age of social networking tools - you have to work VERY HARD for it.

Those people who refuse to use FB remind me of people in the mid-90s who refused to use computers or email.

That's one way to look at it. Another way is to say people who refuse to be on Facebook are like those back in the 90's 00's who refused to use Geocities, AOL, Blogspot, Classmates, ICQ, MySpace, services that come and go, and actually spent their precious time on projects like building informational web sites that are providing them a great revenue now.

There is no sharing of private information with a simple email account, and it still does the trick.

Anyone remember Joe South's version of "Games That People Play"? Seems appropriate for this. :)

so, when are FB going to launch their own search engine? Imagine the possibilities..."like" search results, voting up and down, comments on each site, view friends' last searches (all censored and family-friendly of course!).

once FB manages to keep their half billion users on the site ALSO for search, that's when google's market share will get seriously chipped away at....and they'll come fighting back like a banshee.

So, when are FB going to launch their own search engine?

They already have :-) FB's search works in two steps. The second part is Bing: Microsoft powers the search tool that shows results from the web (i.e., not inside FB).

The first part is FB's search. It's different from usual search engines. It searches for names, companies, etc. that are set up in FB.

If you're doing SEO, you must learn how to SEO in FB now. Technical SEO and link-SEO don't work in FB. It's a whole new game.

FB is at 485m users now. It's doubling each year. It could reach a billion by the end of 2010.

1) FB's ad targeting works better. Instead of advertising to 200m people, you address precisely the 14,321 people that match your criteria. You can even advertise directly into a company, i.e., target ONLY sales engineers at HP, SUN, and Oracle. Imagine an ad campaign to only 72 people.

2) FB raids Google for employees. Many senior FB persons are ex-Google: they bring G's experience, knowledge, methods, and client contacts. But Google gets few FB staffers.

3) Google's brand works against it: Google is seen as a search engine. You want social, you go to FB.

Google has indeed been trying to fight. But Buzz was a disaster, Wave went nowhere.

Google's pullout from China was a self-inflicted disaster.

1) By publicly complaining of being hacked, Google admitted their system is hackable. They should have kept their mouth shut. The juggernaut is a paper tiger.

2) Google picked a fight they couldn't win. China is going to back down? Ha. The US State Dept quickly fled the field when they realized the stakes: China OWNS the US debt. If the US annoys China, China just shuts off the money flow. Power flows from the barrel of the banker's pen. The limits of Google's political power became apparent.

3) Google lost $600m in annual revenues from China. They need that money badly.

Google's operating costs are currently $1.84 billion/quarter. They earn $6.77 billion per quarter (Q1/2010). 97% of their revenues comes from advertising. Do the numbers. All of Google's other products (Youtube, gMail, gMaps, etc.) can not even begin to cover the costs of running Google.

As I pointed out last week, Bing's strategy is very clever: they target the 15% of searches that have an ecommerce aspect. Nobody earns money on navigational (25%) or informational search (60%). Users might learn that Bing can deliver better results for flight tickets, consumer electronics, hotel prices, etc. Bing will capture the searches that produce Google's money, and Google will be left with the searches that cost money.

Google must build and release something this year that can reverse the social media trend and produce $2-5b/yr in revenues. And those of you who've worked in large Silicon Valley corps know the likelihood of this.

so, when are FB going to launch their own search engine?

they do, its powered by bing :-)

Yes, it's deliciously ironic that Matt Cutts quits FB over privacy.

Oh please, he quit because he shouldn't be a member of Google's chief rival for traffic flow. He took a passing shot as he left to create some negative Facebook PR.

He took a passing shot as he left to create some negative Facebook PR.

He was there to scope out the competition, and when they "googlized" his privacy out of the blue he ran for the hills. I have a spade, and I know what to call it. :)

Need sincere advice! I posted my family & freinds' pix @FB. Could they use for any purpose & harm me?

Your mother-in-law drinking absinthe with an alien from Venus on a NASA rocket to Jupiter? Nah, no problems. :)

Meanwhile, down to earth, things said on public (or pics) can come back to haunt you. Only you (and your employer, the state or federal government, or your next door neighbor) can make that determination. As an early Cold War kid all I can say is "duck and cover!" :)

Need sincere advice!

Say nothing that can ever be used against you. Post no pictures that can come back to haunt you. Never say when your house will be empty because you are going on vacation. Keep things vague and friendly, and the personal information (where you work, how you vote, etc) to a minimum. Think of it as a billboard on the road leading into your town, because that's what it is. And like anything on the internet, anything that you publish can be retrieved and stored until the person who holds it decides to play that card. I'm not a member but my wife is, and with that cautionary attitude in place, she's enjoying much about FB.

............................

Post no pictures that can come back to haunt you.

With the ability to tag photos with names, people have little control over that. Whether you like it or not you'll be in someone's photo album, and will probably be tagged so everyone knows you're in it.

Well said Eurydice! Wow...

I have some 400-500 friends on FB. For all of the ones who I know personally (offline, etc.), their information is correct.

This is the reason I'm not on Facebook. Am I the only one that sees the irony here?

This is my experience...
I know college students (neices and nephews) that thought having a Facebook account was a MUST three years ago. Then it was opened up to everyone, which took away that "special" feel to these accounts. Who wants to be on Facebook with their mom - Seriously?

Now these same young people are saying "Facebook - yeah, I still check from time to time."

I see it as an ego contest and I refuse to spend time running this race; you win, I lose.

. And like anything on the internet, anything that you publish can be retrieved and stored until the person who holds it decides to play that card.

This.

You know how many times someone checks the internet to check up on you? Every time you apply for a car loan, a mortgage, buy life insurance. Someone reviewing your file is probably going to Google you. It's not rare, it's the norm.