Julianna Yau’s blog

Last week, Facebook (seemingly quietly) launched Facebook Pages. I say seemingly quietly because I learned of it not through the tech blogs I read or from my Ma.gnolia contacts or groups, but from MAKE blog’s announcement of their Facebook Page.

According to their help section, Facebook Pages “are distinct presences, separate from users’ profiles, and optimized for these entities’ needs to communicate, distribute information/content, engage their fans, and capture new audiences virally through their fans’ recommendations to their friends.”

My take? This is Facebook taking on MySpace’s music section. The big difference is that Facebook is targeting all creators and businesses, not just musicians, comedians and filmmakers.

The creation of a Facebook Page is scarily easy. You go to their page for creating a Page, and if you are an “Artist, Band, or Public Figure”, you enter your name and the page is created. There are also options for local businesses and brand/products, which I’m guessing are a bit more involved. Because, as a sculptor, I don’t fall into those categories, I didn’t give them a try.

Once an artist’s page is created, it includes a few basic applications:

• Fans (like Friends or Group members)
• Photos
• Videos
• Events
• Mini Feed
• Information
• Reviews
• Discussion Board

Like applications for a Facebook profile, these can be disabled or moved, although they can’t be moved from one column to another. Facebook has also created a Pages category for applications. Although these applications are meant to be specifically for Facebook Pages, a quick survey of them seems to indicate that they are currently mostly bling for your Page.

If you have removed an application, it can be re-added in the Page admin area (which is separate from the Page Edit area, similar to applications for your profile). Other features in the Page admin area includes making the Page public or private, and setting age limits (13+, 18+ and 21+).

When editing your Page info, you can upload a photo, add “basic” information (address and hours of operation) and “detailed” information (website, parking details and public transit information).

Curious? Take a look at my Facebook Page.

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• Privacy, social networking and advertising dollars (1)
• Is Facebook Beacon a Privacy Nightmare? (0)
• How does Facebook Beacon [Technically] Work? (0)
• Office of the Privacy Commissioner on Facebook Apps & Privacy (2)
• Facebook doesn’t exist purely for our entertainment? Gasp! (0)

Yesterday, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner released a short Flash presentation (complete with sound) What does a friend of a friend of a friend need to know about you?.

This presentation is a good introduction/summary to what many already know thanks to the news coverage about Facebook & MySpace’s targeted advertising ventures. As a Facebook addict myself, I know that it’s all too easy to forget about privacy when one is taking quizzes or completing all the fields in profiles. After all, it’s quite seductive to think that someone else might actually be interested enough to read your profile—and maybe even think that you’re cool! The truth is that “someone else” is more likely to be an advertiser than even a friend (I personally rarely even read the profiles of my closest friends… after all, I know them in “real life).

In September, I wrote A Primer On Privacy And Facebook for a friend who was concerned about other Facebookers and how much of her life they could see. I naively forgot to consider what other companies/people could know about her by giving Facebook money to advertise a product or service to her.

The concept of targeted advertising is tricky—after all, we don’t pay any money for our usage of Facebook and they need to have money to maintain their operations. But while we don’t directly give social networks any money, we do have to surrender some privacy and some of our copyrights (most social networking sites demand “worldwide, royalty-free and non-exclusive license(s)” to duplicate and distribute user-generated content; not a problem for most, but people who use social networking sites professionally must take heed).

Will all of this make people back off from social networking sites and return to email? Probably not. Especially because services like Gmail are already providing targeted advertising with the content of your email. But we do need to be smarter and more careful about the information we put out there.

Related posts

• Is Facebook Beacon a Privacy Nightmare? (0)
• How does Facebook Beacon [Technically] Work? (0)
• Facebook Pages…who knew? (2)
• Facebook Beacon Backpedaling (0)
• The New Face of Facebook’s Privacy Controls (0)