Facebook’s leading game developer Zynga has be sue for sharing personal information of Facebook users.
The class-action lawsuit was filed in a Federal Court on San Francisco by Nancy Graf of St. Paul, Minnesota. The suit seeks monetary relief for those Facebook users whose data was shared. It also seeks injunctive relief for prevention of “continued privacy abuses.”
Zynga has been accused of violating Facebook policy as well as numerous Federal and state laws.
The lawsuit is said to be linked to the report first published in the Wall Street Journal, where the popular game developer along with other app developers was accused of sharing Facebook users IDs with ad companies. This privacy breach has seen LOLApps games being shut down by Facebook for a couple of days.
Zynga plans to contest the suit stating, “We believe that the complaint is without merit and we intend to defend against it vigorously.”
The recent privacy breach reported by WSJ also got attention of Congress that eventually lead them to ask Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg about what the company knew about the privacy breach and steps the company is taking to remedy the situation.
The scale of the privacy breach is being debated, with many believing the problem has been over hyped.
In a new move to tighten security and prevent information leaks, Israeli soldiers will be prohibited from accessing social media while they are at army bases.
Soldiers will be barred from social networks like Facebook and Twitter, as well as from using email sites like Yahoo and Gmail.
A military operation was cancelled after a soldier revealed the plans on his Facebook page. The Israeli’s military also faced world-wide criticism and embarrassment after photos of Israeli soldiers mistreating detained Palestinians were posted on Facebook and after classified military information was leaked on the Internet.
The decision aims at preventing the leakage of classified information as well as facing embarrassments like the several incidents the Israeli military faced in the recent past.
Facebook is getting extremely close to reaching 500 million registered users. Many sites, including this one, predicted that based on the user growth rate Facebook would reach the 500 million user mark by mid July 2010.
Facebook has sent an email to Facebook employees, new and old, to thank them for their contributions as they prepare to announce the 500 million milestone and asking them to upload photos to thank users. While we don’t know the exact date that the 500 million milestone will be surpassed, we’ve been hearing increasing talk surrounding the announcement and are expecting it to take place within days.
In a recent interview Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed estimates that Facebook would make between $1 and $1.1 billion this year. In 2009 Facebook’s total revenue was reported to be $800 million. Some people believe that the $1.1 billion estimate may be too low, and that Zuckerberg is trying to keep their true earnings on the down-low.
From the interview:
The reason we corrected it last year is because it was hurting us. People thought it was too low. Now what I would say is that the estimates are not so far off in either direction that it’s causing us any pain, so we feel no need to correct it. Also, if it was too high, we would want to correct it too, because we don’t want expectations to be too high and we don’t want people to be disappointed if they joined. I think people are getting a better feel for it, but in general I think people underestimate the value of the whole thing.
Have you had enough of social-networking-virtual life? Irked by the recent privacy changes on Facebook? Want to kill your Facebook avatar? Kill it. Kill it, with honor, with the help of the anti-social network Seppukoo.
Named after the age-old seppuku ritual suicide practiced by ancient japanese samurai warriors, the site seppukoo.com operated by a group calling themselves Les Liens Invisibles, an “imaginary art group from Italy,” offers the users a honorable and ritual destruction of their virtual identities complete with a customizable memorial page.
Whether the site is about poking fun at Facebook, a means of playful protest against people being obsessed with virtual life or increasing corporate interest in social media, the site is getting it’s due share of focus. But, the site with it’s honorable ritual is more of a game, because every time someone in your Facebook network commits Seppukoo, you get points and increase your Seppukoo rank. So, it is probably unlikely that the site will drive away anyone from their Facebook account, or at least not more than a few days. Users can still make another Facebook account if they feel bored later on or thinks “digitally death? That’s not me!”
We would love to hear your thoughts on this site. Do you feel the site is playful and fun or going overboard?
If you’re connected to a Facebook group or you run a group on Facebook there are exciting things in store for you! Facebook recently updated the capabilities of groups. Normally you would have to surf through your info tab to get to the groups you’ve joined but soon enough you will see it debut on your home page. Group pages will transform themselves into more of a Facebook Page, somewhat like your profile page. As of now you’re unable to see the group updates unless you travel to the actual group page.
One of the additions to the revamp is being able to see what users post on the group page from your home page. So you think to yourself, “Wait, I don’t want to see thousands of stranger’s updates”. Ah, behold, Facebook already thought about that inconvenience. Knot Pipatsrisawat, a software engineer intern at Facebook, said in a post on the company’s blog “To ensure that you get the most interesting and relevant content from groups you’ve joined, you only will see stories when one of your friends posts within a group rather than when all members post.” Thank you Pipatsrisawat, we get enough email spam from strangers somewhere out there already. Who wants to have an overloaded Facebook home page with stranger’s opinions on top of that? Thumbs up Facebook!
Other additions include being able to comment back on the updates directly from your home page and there are some publisher pluses too. Publishers will be given a feature which allows members to share their content. They will be adding in a wall, just as you currently have on your profile page. The wall will sum up all the recent activities of people within the group.
Facebook is currently testing this new layout with a few select groups and should be available to all groups within days. Hooray for updated options! There’s always room for improvement.
According to a new Nielson study, if you are additcted to posting updates on Facebook, there’s a good chance you have money and are more urban than your non-facebooking peers.
Facebook users are more affluent than their counterparts on Myspace. And bloggers and Facebook users tend to live in urban areas.
The survey showed that Facebook users generally have an upscale profile. Other recent studies have shown that as Facebook grows in popularity, its user base is growing older.
That means Facebook, which has shown phenomenal growth in the past year, appeals to an older, wealthier demographic.
Yesterday, facebook announced that in addition to breaking the 300 million user mark worldwide, extending their lead as the biggest social network, facebook is now cash flow positive. 5 Years after launching, and millions of dollars in investment later, facebook is generating more cash than it burns.
Financial estimates made earlier this year didn’t expect facebook to reach cashflow positive until 2010 at the earliest.
