Danah Boyd, who studies social networking against the backdrop of sociological theory for Microsoft Research, gave Google Buzz and Facebook the dreaded FAIL designation at the SXSW show in Austin, Texas March 13. Boyd said Buzz, a social networking stream that leverages contacts in users Google Gmail accounts to spur conversations among friends and strangers alike, erred by displaying Gmail contacts by default on users' Google profiles. Facebook, Boyd said, provided another FAIL on the privacy front when it refreshed its social network with a number of privacy-related changes.
A Microsoft researcher called out Google and Facebook for
their recent privacy snafus, criticizing the Internet companies for taking
liberties with users' personal information for new product launches.
Danah Boyd, who studies social networking against the backdrop
of sociological theory for Microsoft Research, gave
Google Buzz the dreaded FAIL designation at the SXSW show in Austin, Texas
March 13.
"What the outrage around Google Buzz showed us is
that people care deeply about privacy and control," said Boyd, who
paraphrased her talk on her
blog here. "Don't get me wrong -- plenty of people will use the service
and it will be extremely popular, but this doesn't mean Google didn't screw up.
They're taking a hit in terms of trust, because not everyone benefited from
what they did."
Boyd said Buzz, a social networking stream that leverages
contacts in users Google Gmail accounts to spur conversations among friends and
strangers alike, erred by displaying Gmail contacts by default on users' Google
profiles. Users could opt out of this, but instructions were initially vague
and users had to delete their Google Profiles to exit Buzz entirely.
Several users took issue with this when Google
launched the service Feb. 9, and Google
responded by making privacy controls more visible, adding additional controls
and
inbox management features to cut down some of the prodigious noise generated in
buzz.
While Boyd said the Google Buzz team, led by Todd
Jackson, created a technologically sound product with several opt-outs, the
product ultimately skewered users' social expectations."
For example, Google made information Gmail users knew to
be private -- their contacts -- and made them public for users who opted into
Buzz.
"Instead of asking new Buzz users if they wanted to see who else
that they know on Google services might be using Buzz, they pre-populated a
list and provided it to them as their default list of friends. This made people
feel downright creeped out," Boyd argued.
"The result? Confused users believed that their e-mails
were being made publicly accessible. While this was never the case, the
integration confused people and gave them the wrong impression about the
service. This created unnecessary panic amongst users, resulting in bad PR for
Google that was technologically inaccurate."
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