Facebook at it again!

Is it me? Or is Facebook the king of social media and all the trimmings that come with it?

Some days, especially in the recent past, I feel as if I’m suffering from emerging media fatigue! There is so much information out there, and usually, just as I think I’m getting used to or finally understanding something, something new pops up.

It’s so hard to keep up with the ever evolving aspect of new media. Not sure that there are many like me who share my experience of feeling as if I’m always playing catch up.

And still there are those who excel at keeping abreast of this wonderful new technological era in which we now find ourselves. One such entity that like cream, always seems to rise to the top, is Facebook. Whether it’s good or bad, it’s hard to ignore the amount of Facebook that’s almost out there daily about Facebook.  There is no denying that Facebook’s marketing machinery knows how to keep Facebook top-of-mind. And this time it’s no different. Facebook has developed an app for Windows 8/8.1.

So now I’m left to ponder. Is the phrase ‘give the people what they want’ the premise under which Facebook is operating? Or is Facebook continually producing additives making us believe we can’t do without them.  Whichever you believe, there’s no denying that Facebook has positioned itself as a leader in emerging media, that millions of people do not want to live without.

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Is the age of privacy really over, or merely a frontier yet to be conquered?

Facebook CEO Zuckerberg, declared that the “age of privacy is over”. Yet, when it was reported that users were able to view the ‘live chats’ of their friends, Facebook released a statement which stated the following: “When we received reports of the problem, our engineers promptly diagnosed it and temporarily disabled the chat function.” Read more.

A Tech Crunch blog last month stated that “Facebook will increasingly own social interactions on the web.” Read more. If this is indeed so, then how will this affect the social interactions of individuals on Facebook and the wider web in the future?

There were mixed reviews about this incident. While some persons didn’t seem too bothered, it can be assumed that enough persons did have a problem with it, or it would not have necessitated Facebook turning off ‘live chat’ to fix the problem, and releasing a statement to inform its users of its intent so to do.

So then, with the recent additions by Facebook, to have more user information available across the web, does it mean that privacy is the last frontier that needs to be conquered? Are we too concerned with our privacy? Should a conversation meant for one person be visible to persons other than the intended individual? Truthfully though how much is too much?

This incident may be considered to have given us a glimpse into the future into what things may look like if no one had any privacy and all content was visible at all times to all users. How comfortable does this make you feel? Is it simply a case of if you’re concerned about privacy then don’t use Facebook or the web? Or do you feel you should have the right to use this social media utility and the web and still be in control of your own content?

Until next time…