When Facebook got my Mom fuming with anger...AT ME
In the real world, you have different circles of friends. You have friends you talk crap with. You have friends you talk nerd with. You have friends you talk both nerd AND crap with.
In the real world, when you talk crap with your friends, you do so in your own little corner whlie you are hanging out. You don't generally have friends throwing shit while in your living room in the presence of your mom and dad or family. This way, in the normal world, your crap or your friend's crap conversations never make it into your parents' home.
So why does facebook insert your or even worse--your friends'--crap conversations into your parents' newsfeed?
I got a call about an hour ago from my Mom. A friend of mine had posted a profile picture. I commented on the picture, a pretty innocent one even if you ask my mom. My mom, who recently joined facebook, saw my comment on my friend's picture in her newsfeed. She proceeded to click on it. And then click next. And next. And BOOM. Before she knew it, she was staring at a picture of a half-naked American Idol winner, a former profile picture my friend had set.
Though there are many ways to slice this one, such as educating my mom to not confuse my own pictures with my friends, there is a very specific flaw here: facebook should not show your comments on your friends' posts to your other friends--unless they are mutual friends.
If Jim and I are friends, then a conversation between Jim and I has no place in my Mom's newsfeed who has zero context about the nature of my friendship with Jim.
Apparently I am not the only one with this gripe. In fact, facebook allowed you to have this before removing it at some point in 2008-2009. There is a whole thread here with a whole lot of people concerned about it:
http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=69178204322&topic=12981





