Let's All Blame Facebook!

from the seriously? dept

Thu, Aug 23rd 2007 1:59pm — Mike Masnick

Well, you can tell that Facebook is the hot media darling company of the moment these days based on how many other companies are using it as a press hook for advertising themselves. Earlier this week we wrote about a bogus study claiming that Facebook was killing productivity. That report was based on a study done by a company that just happened to sell filters. It seems that others have quickly caught on. Constantine von Hoffman angrily points us to yet another security company that has put out a questionable poll claiming that half of all employers now completely restrict access to Facebook. This is making headlines all over the place this morning, but as von Hoffman notes, no one seems to be verifying that it's actually true. It's only sourced from the security firm, and some in the press are simply taking the firm's word on which companies block Facebook without actually checking with them to find out if it's true. It's definitely likely that Facebook is being blocked by plenty of firms, especially as it's received a lot of press lately (including this kind of bogus press), but you would think that reporters would at least look for more than a single biased source for confirmation that "half of all employers" are banning Facebook. Also, you would think that reporters would go out and also get quotes from companies who don't ban Facebook (and perhaps from those who have found it to be a useful business networking tool).

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Filed Under: blame
Companies: facebook, sophos

15 Comments

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Buzz, 23 Aug 2007 @ 2:27pm

I didn't do it.
Facebook is fabulous. I blame it for my happiness.
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Sanguine Dream, 23 Aug 2007 @ 3:44pm

43%?
The article in the link says 43% of the companies in their poll block Facebook. Now at my job (the IT department of a bank) the filtering we use blocks and allows sites based on categories (of course while allowing for specific exceptions and exclusions) and Facebook would automatically blocked by simply blocking a category labelled "Social Networks". So I must ask: In their survey how many of that 43% were already blocking all Social Networks and how many had to block them after usage got out of hand?
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GoblinJuice, 23 Aug 2007 @ 3:47pm

Re: 43%?
How about anti-social networks? Are those banned, too, Mr. Gestapo? =P
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Anonymous Coward, 23 Aug 2007 @ 4:09pm

What? Journalists get off their fat backsides and actually do some research? Are you kidding? How are they supposed to write sensationalised stories if they have to include actual facts? What planet are you from?
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Anonymous Coward, 23 Aug 2007 @ 5:26pm

Well, unfortunately for me, just last week I came in and wasn't able to check Facebook, however the week before I was. I was a little disappointed, and wondered what caused it to be added to the block list, and just a couple days later came across that PR stunt, which answered my question.

What's disappointing to me, is seeing that my employee's are able to access a couple different sites, one of which I'm guessing is a bandwidth hog as it allows you to stream music (something that is already blocked). I'm not going to complain to IT, as she does a great job and I doubt in any way it's lowering her productivity, however I am disappointed that I, her manager, who is on salary working another 12+ hours per week more than her cannot check *my* social network of choice. (of course this is not actually true, I remote home to my server when I feel the need).
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Mystified, 23 Aug 2007 @ 5:27pm

Re:
Journalists? I think the last one died a couple of years ago. All we got now is story-tellers, spin-doctors and ratings-generators.

I remember when the news media companies had editorial policies that high-lighted or accented certain attitudes while still reporting all of the facts. Now it seems the media companies have a very simple policy - report only what supports our internal views.
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Anonymous Coward, 23 Aug 2007 @ 5:51pm

Facebook!!!
Facebook is AWESOME. Fuckkkkkk My Space!
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CEO, 23 Aug 2007 @ 7:21pm

Blocking Facebook
I block Facebook and MySpace at the office so none of my employees can spend their workday looking at my kids' pages and all the critical things they say about me and my "stupid company"! Quite useful. I just wish I could block the YouTube video of the company picnic last week where I got so drunk I puked...stupid YouTube.
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Sanguine Dream, 23 Aug 2007 @ 7:38pm

Re: Re: 43%?
Mr. Gestapo? Funny, I never said I was German. Wonder where that came from?

Frankly social network sites don't relate to bank business so we block them.
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mike allen, 24 Aug 2007 @ 12:18am

you what
You guys allow your employer to tell you what sites to visit NO WAY
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GoblinJuice, 24 Aug 2007 @ 3:38am

Re: Re: Re: 43%?
Dude. I was joking around. =)

Gestapo = General slang for a hardass. A killjoy. The dude that calls the cops when you play your stereo too loud.

You're right: there's no reason the cute Asian girls working the bank should be checking their MySpace msgs at work.
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Anonymous Coward, 24 Aug 2007 @ 8:09am

Re: Re: Re: 43%?
if he thought you were, he would have called you Herr Gestapo ;-)
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Anonymous Coward, 24 Aug 2007 @ 2:18pm

This is sadly becoming more and more common: "journalists" simply take some company's press release, maybe rewrite it a bit, and print it. Then they complain that there isn't any respect for traditional journalism, and that bloggers are hurting journalists. BS - journalists are hurting journalists, by letting themselves become increasingly irrelevant.
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Sanguine Dream, 24 Aug 2007 @ 4:06pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: 43%?
It's cool. I know you were. Even all this time I still forget that sarcasm is a little harder to pull off on the net.
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zara nassir, 11 Nov 2007 @ 6:51pm

Facebook is fantastic....
Facebook is fantastic...whomever/ or entity (companies) that blocks it is an utter idiot. It is so much secure and much better than Friendster whereby our Friendster links kept linked by cyber stalkers to other people's websites...
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