Facebook’s Moment of Mass Confusion (Rant)

I like Facebook, I really do. But the whole ordeal over their Terms of Service was a joke. Even worse, Facebook’s response was confusing, and at best, lame.

First off, Facebook runs a service that should pretty much be hands-off. Beyond a few interface changes, I don’t really want to hear from Facebook. A controversial Terms of Service is not something I want to be concerned with. Unless a change is absolutely vital, don’t do it or bother users with it.

Facebook also needs to do a better job of understanding its user base. The new Terms of Service probably made perfect sense to Facebook management, but obviously the user base didn’t understand. If Facebook couldn’t figure that out, what else are they missing?

Finally, the response of pulling the new Terms of Service off and reverting to the old one was confusing. I understand the need to quell a potential user rebellion, but I guess the new terms really weren’t that important. Facebook’s most recent response has been to open their blog up to comments. Big deal. This should have been done from the beginning. Closing off your blog to your own users seems pompous and uncaring. But what’s funny is that when they did open the floodgates, the first post received over 2,000 comments (many of which were puerile and annoying).

So, in the end, Facebook is back on the old terms and now has given the promise to listen to its users by letting them post comments on their blog. Can I really expect someone at Facebook to sift through 2,000 comments? I doubt it. They don’t even read their emails (which is a whole different matter).

User rebellions seem to be a new phenomenon. Social networking services like Facebook are being held hostage by their users. And I must say this is a good thing. Digg has had a few rebellions and I think it served them well. When users are in control, users get what they want. And when users get what they want, the service improves. If only companies like Microsoft were held hostage by their users, it would be a whole different world.