Re: But Facebook are not spammers [was: And Facebook sells user data, too ...]

[Gadi Evron <ge () linuxbox org>]

I quite understand why you'd prefer to claim that [1] I do not 
understand the definition of spam (which none of us argued, and we based 
our discussion on) or that [2] I am not experienced enough to understand it.

I understand because from my perspective, you are as much of a 
troglodyte who refuses to see what's right in front of him as you hint 
at me being. :) This is why we have these discussions -- to discuss 
evolving technology and how we should treat it. I'd prefer we do that 
now. If our beliefs hold true, all for the better. Then what's left is 
to see how our policies should reflect this.

Now, while I find your message most informative as an excellent essay on 
spam, its definition, and its history, I also find it irrelevant, as:

1. We didn't debate what spam is, only if what Facebook does is in fact 
spam under the reasonable definition you kindly provided.

2. Saying your opponents are inexperienced may be true, as it may be 
false, but it is also coping out of the discussion where your knowledge 
can be an asset.

I made solid arguments on why Facebook messages do not meet the 
definition of spam (which I have no argument with). You can counter them 
or present your own, but don't try and confuse me with big words, 
because I am obviously inexperienced (tongue in cheek).

Also, you may disagree, but this is one of them rare cases where 
top-posting does a better job at replying to emails. However, in your 
final comments you did add relevant material:

> [1] And I'm hardly the only one.  We've discussed this among some of
> the more experienced people working in the anti-spam field and it seems
> that many of us have a generous cross-section of spam from an assortment
> of so-called "social networks".  I often refer to them as the "privacy
> destruction industry" because as far as I can tell, their business models
> are based on a combination of con jobs, deception, data harvesting and
> brokering, privacy invasion, and abuse.  Certainly anyone who has been
> paying attention during even just the last month knows that this montage
> describes Facebook beautifully.

I agree, Facebook is a privacy eating machine. Relevance?

> [2] There are a few other things worth noting here: of course, Johnny
> Socialite is perfectly capable if sending out his own mail messages
> from his own account using his own mail server and saying "I just joined
> <blah>  and you should too".  There is thus no reason whatsoever for such a

Yes, but as Johnny Socialite I wish for a feature that lets me connect 
my different applications and functionality directly, be it social 
networking or email. Thus, I allow Facebook to let me do it from their 
site directly, with my clear permission and then approval of the text in 
the message.

> mechanism to exist -- *except* to send spam, and to harvest address books
> so that the data can be accumulated and sold to anyone with cash-in-hand
> -- including other spammers, some of whom find social graph information
> quite useful.

Possible, even likely. But presented as clear truth without proof, it 
fails as an empty assertion. Also, such a mechanism does have a reason 
to exist -- As a user, I make use of it and find its functionality 
useful (generic "I", I don't actually like this feature).

        Gadi.
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