Is The Mob Using Your Facebook Profile Against You?

from the nice-profile-you-got-there...-wouldn't-want-anything-to-happen-to-it... dept

Over the years, of course, there have been plenty of stories about potential dates and potential employers reviewing social networking profiles to learn more about someone. Then, we just had a story about some universities reviewing social networking profiles as part of the admissions process. But the latest story is that organized crime may be getting into the game as well. A former FBI agent is claiming that both the Italian and Russian mobs are using social networking profiles to "launch attacks" on individuals and businesses. Of course, the details seem really, really slim. About the only thing the guy says is that if your CV/resume is online, that can be used against you -- but that's hardly a "social networking" problem. Plus, in many cases, that's pretty public information. This sounds like a lot more scare mongering than anything to necessarily worry about right now. In the meantime, though, are we going to start seeing Twitter messages from mobsters? "Nice list of followers you've got here... wouldn't want to see anything happen to them..."

Filed Under: mafia, mob, organized crime, social networks

Rejected From College Because Of Your Facebook Profile?

from the your-new-permanent-record dept

We've all seen the stories about potential dates or employers scanning your social network profiles to decide what they think of you, but what about your potential university? Slashdot points us to a study suggesting that 10% of universities now examine social network profiles as part of their efforts to evaluate applicants. And, in some of those cases, the profiles hurt candidates to the point of having admissions directors change their minds. Other universities claim that they don't think it's right to view such "personal" spaces, but you have to wonder if that view will change over time. Personally, I don't see anything wrong with universities doing this. They're used to just seeing a carefully controlled image of the student, and what's on their social networking sites may reveal a lot more useful info. However, it seems like students should at least be aware that this public display of information is being added to their "permanent record" for consideration at universities.

Filed Under: applications, college, social networks

Is MySpace Music For Big Record Labels Only?

from the that-would-be-a-mistake... dept

We've already questioned the strategy for MySpace Music, and now even more concerns are popping up, as various independent labels claim they're being blocked out of the offering altogether. While it's true that most of the focus for MySpace Music has been with the majors, MySpace's success in the music world came out of its usefulness for independent or unsigned acts, who used the site to build up a community. To ignore that side of the market, or even to treat indies as second-class citizens in the endeavor seems like a huge mistake.

Filed Under: big labels, independent labels, music, record labels, social networks
Companies: myspace

MySpace's Music Offering: Ignoring The Elephant In The Room

from the good-luck dept

MySpace has been prepping its own music offering for quite some time, and Fortune reveals the basic details. They're somewhat... underwhelming. It's basically a scaled up version of that UK startup we wrote about last week, where we noted that you don't beat piracy by being more annoying. Basically, MySpace will let people post streamable music on their sites, and will then sell ads against the music, as well as link to sites like iTunes and Amazon for people who want to actually buy the tracks.

There's nothing wrong with the idea. But, it's unlikely to make much of a difference in the market. To say, as Fortune does, that this "promises to be the most significant rollout of a digital-music service since Apple's iTunes" is either hyperbole or (more likely) a statement on how awful other music services have been in the interim. Yet, it also ignores the elephant in the room (as does the MySpace store) which is that it only focuses on one reason why people download unauthorized music: the free part. Yes, MySpace music will be free. But will it also match the other reasons why people like file sharing systems? The convenience? The fact that it's unencumbered with annoying ads or DRM? The aspect of sharing and helping to promote other artists?

MySpace's offering will have some of that, but there's no downloading. People will be able to create playlists and share them, but that doesn't seem all that different than, say, iMeem. As if to prove that no one involved in this project wants to mention the elephant of file sharing, check out this quote from Luke Wood, executive VP of Universal's Interscope Geffen A&M record label:

"This is how people discover music now. It's not happening through people reading Rolling Stone. It's not happening through the radio. It's happening through social networks online."

Is it really that difficult for folks in the industry to at least admit that many, many people discover new music through file sharing? They don't have to say that it's okay or that it's legal. But if they're going to come up with something that really competes, they should at least be willing to admit what's really happening in the marketplace. This is not to knock MySpace and the labels for trying something different. It's great that they're trying -- but pretending that file sharing doesn't exist isn't how you respond to the market threat. Without being willing to even mention the elephant, it's hard to believe that the response is going to be able to compete with the elephant.

Filed Under: advertising, file sharing, free, music, social networks
Companies: myspace

University Bans Access To Facebook; Claims It's A Security Issue

from the really? dept

We've seen plenty of stories of silly politicians trying to ban access to social networks in high schools, but in colleges especially things like Facebook are basically the way students communicate with each other. So it's rather surprising to find out (via Michael Geist) that Concordia University has banned access to Facebook on any computer connected to the university network via a wired connection. If you're using WiFi, the university allows it. First of all, that seems like a really strange split. Why should it matter whether the connection is wired or wireless? Even odder is the explanation for this:

The university has decided to implement these restrictions because of concerns that the continuing reliability of the Concordia network could be compromised because of spam, viruses and leaks of confidential information related to Facebook use.

There are spam, viruses and leaks of confidential info all over the internet. So why ban Facebook? And those same issues face wireless users as well as wired users. The whole thing sounds like someone who was very confused overreacted to something in the wrong way.

Filed Under: bans, security, social networks, universities
Companies: condordia university, facebook

Synergies? Fox News Skips Fox's Own Social Network For Facebook

from the synergies-don't-mean-much dept

While we do believe that there can be so-called "synergies" in various mergers and acquisitions, it often does seem as though companies over state what those benefits may be. Take, for example, the news that TV channel Fox News has set up shop on Facebook, rather than the social network's main competitor, MySpace. MySpace just so happens to be owned by Fox -- so it may seem odd that Fox News chose to go with Facebook rather than sister company MySpace. Basically, it appears that Fox News recognized that it was more likely to find an audience on Facebook than MySpace. This highlights just how silly some expected "synergies" often turn out to be. While many may have expected that the close relationship between Fox News and MySpace would mean that there's some advantage to both organizations to work together, the truth was the opposite. If Fox News had gone with MySpace instead, due to "synergies," (i.e., management mandates that those two companies work together) the end effect would have been worse. Fox News would have gone with the social network that didn't fit as well -- just to please management. So, rather than a "benefit" the so-called synergy would have been a net negative. In other words, the so-called "synergies" wouldn't actually have been... well... synergistic. The end result shows why so many mergers over so-called "synergies" don't really make much sense. If there's true synergy between the separate organizations, then they can work together as partners, rather than from within the same company. Otherwise, you get a situation where you may be locked in to a partner who is not as good as one outside your organization. (Post updated to clarify).

Filed Under: social networks, synergies
Companies: facebook, fox, fox news, myspace

Do You Own Your Social Networking Friends? Or Does Your Employer?

from the do-you-own-your-rolodex? dept

In the sales world, you're often judged on the size and quality of your "rolodex" of contacts. No one expects a salesperson jumping from one job to another to somehow "forget" everyone they know -- or to cough up their entire list of contacts to the previous company. Yet that seems to be what happened in the UK. Slashdot points us to the news of a court ruling where a guy was forced to give up his LinkedIn contact list to his former employer after he left the company to start his own business. In this case, the original company had actively encouraged its employees to make use of LinkedIn, even though it was under the individual's control, rather than the employer's.

Expect to see plenty more lawsuits like this going forward. For many users of social networks from LinkedIn to MySpace to Facebook, the connections you make blur the lines between professional and personal -- and the questions of who actually "owns" those contacts will become a legal issue that the courts will decide over and over again. Of course, the truth is that this is a silly debate. No one "owns" a contact in the first place. If the company has a rule requiring employees to hand over contacts to the company, then it should employ a CRM system which the company controls. Otherwise, reaching into a personal social networking account seems to go beyond what's reasonable.

Filed Under: contacts, social networks
Companies: linkedin

Internet Used To Keep House Of Reps. Broadcasting After Closure

from the don't-stop-us-now dept

If you watch the way Congress acts some of the time, you could easily mistake them for kindergartners at times, with the way they have petty grievances and blow attacks on each other totally out of proportion. Both parties engage in these silly petty spats from time to time, so this is hardly a partisan thing -- though, fans of each party tend to highlight it when the other party acts this way, and ignore it or brush it off when their own party does. Belonging to neither party, and not liking either party, I have no horse in this race, but do find what happened on Friday in the House interesting. For the sake of keeping this from being a partisan post, I'll leave out the party names, though I'm sure in the comments partisans of either side will be sure to make it clear how evil the other one is.

Anyway, one party wanted to discuss some new energy legislation and the other did not. The party that did not, decided to adjourn and shut down the House for summer "vacation" (which is usually more like "go back to my district and campaign to be re-elected" time). Some members of the other party, though, chose to stick around, even though the lights and microphones were turned off and the C-SPAN broadcast was turned off. Not only that, but they continued making speeches about the energy bill and "broadcasting" what was going on using social media tools like Twitter and Qik. Much of this campaign was led by noted early adopter Rep. John Culberson, who has been fighting hard to make such tools acceptable in the House (though, all too often in a highly partisan manner).

Either way, no matter which party you support (or if you support neither), it is cool to see Representatives learning to make use of these tools to better connect with constituents and (sometimes) to route around some of the petty rules used to shut down debate. Now, if we could just figure out a way to get each side to stop playing silly games, while then getting each side to stop automatically blaming the other for shutting off debate (when they would do the exact same thing if roles were reversed), we might actually get somewhere. Unfortunately, I know of no such technology that's likely to do that any time soon.

Filed Under: congress, house of representatives, john culberson, partisan politics, social networks

As COPA Goes Down, DOPA Comes Back

from the ropa-dopa dept

But think of the children! It never seems to stop. Just as yet another court has ruled that the COPA law is unconstitutional, some folks in Congress are trying to bring back its sister legislation, DOPA. COPA (the Child Online Protection Act) required websites to block objectionable material. DOPA (the Deleting Online Predators Act) is much more narrowly focused, requiring schools and libraries to put in place filters that block access to social networks. Why? Well, politicians are under the false belief that this somehow stops predators.

There are just two big problems with this reasoning. First, studies have shown that the supposed "threat" of online predators has been blown way out of proportion. Most kids are not targeted by online predators on social networks, and the few who are tend to know enough to deal with them. But you won't hear the politicians pushing DOPA say that. Instead, they claim: "as more children flock to social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, we've seen a corresponding increase of online sexual predators." According to whom? Over the past few months we've pointed to three separate reports showing that the reports of the threat have been greatly overstated.

But, more importantly, even if predators are a threat on social networks, isn't it a much better solution to let kids use them in schools and at libraries where there can be reasonable oversight, and where educators can teach the kids how to deal with online threats? Banning access from schools and libraries only guarantees that kids will find other ways to get to those social networks when no one's there to watch them. And, by making it seem like it's somehow underground, it will seem even "cooler" to make use of those sites. And, at the same time, teachers, parents and librarians won't feel compelled to teach kids how to use those sites safely, because the use will be totally hidden from view. How is that possibly a good result?

Filed Under: copa, dopa, filters, libraries, protect the children, schools, social networks

Fun With Statistics: How Many Companies Are Blocking Facebook?

from the depends-on-who-asks dept

Consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas has come out with a study this week claiming that nearly one in four companies blocks employee access to social networks like Facebook and MySpace. It's a good story, which is why you see various news organizations picking up the story and running with it. Of course, if this sounds kind of familiar, that's because less than a year ago, some other company (this time it was a security company) came out with a report claiming that half of all businesses were blocking Facebook. Now, if you assume that both reports are true, then that would suggest that fewer firms are blocking Facebook than were last summer. Of course, chances are neither report is all that accurate. And, to be fair, the "headline" from the press on the second story was inaccurate: the actual study suggested that nearly half of all employees were banned from accessing Facebook. In theory, that could be true if a few large companies banned their employees from using the site. Either way, there are companies who probably ban Facebook at work -- just like in the early days of the telephone there were those that banned telephones at work, and, more recently there were companies that banned email or the internet at work. Eventually, companies recognize that fearing communication tools tends to backfire. Embracing them tends to be a lot more productive.

Filed Under: blocking, employers, social networks, statistics