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FACEBOOK IN THE CROSS HAIRS
This week, a former State Department official called the worldwide disgust with Facebook “a massive wave of outrage that will crash straight into the central premise of the company’s business model.”
In an article entitled "Regulators Everywhere Are Circling Facebook," The New York Times reported that "Regulators on four continents are preparing for a long-awaited showdown with Facebook..."
Some highlights:
- Facebook announced that they had set aside $3 - $5 billion for fines from the FTC for violations of the privacy agreement they had reached with the FTC in 2011.
- Facebook shares gained $40 billion in value in about an hour after that announcement. $3 - $5 billion is chump change for Facebook and will scare absolutely no one in tech world.
- It was reported that one FTC regulator was not satisfied with the fine and is demanding specific penalties against Mark Zuckerberg.
- My opinion: Privacy issues and regulators' actions will only be taken seriously by the tech industry when someone goes to jail. Until then, tech wizards will continue ignore privacy issues and look at fines as a cost of doing business.
- The Canadian privacy commissioner accused Facebook of violating laws by way of “superficial and ineffective safeguards and consent mechanisms.”
- The attorney general in NY is looking into how Facebook got unauthorized access to 1.5 million email addresses.
- In Ireland, Facebook's headquarters in Europe, regulators are investigating FB's compliance with GDPR. Facebook's compliance with GDPR is about as rigorous as bicyclists' compliance with stop signs.
- And, just for good measure, according to The Times, "officials in Britain, France, Germany and Ireland are scrutinizing the social media company’s practices. Governments in Australia, India, New Zealand and Singapore have passed or are considering new restrictions on social media."
Other than that, not much is happening.
Hot Air Merchants
The daily scandals of the online ad industry have left them greatly wounded in the eyes of the public, governments and policy makers. There is only one group who still seem enthralled by their horseshit. Marketers.
The ongoing pathetic threats of advertising and marketing bigwigs against Facebook and other online miscreants continue to be nothing but hot air. The absence of integrity is thrilling to behold.
The double-talking aristocrats of the advertising and marketing industry couldn't give a flying shit about how corrupt and irresponsible Facebook is, but want to look like tough guys by grandstanding at conferences and in the press. Facebook's revenue -- 99% of which came from advertising in the 1st quarter of this year -- just keeps growing.
If You're Not Paranoid You're Not Paying Attention
According to a piece in Engadget, of 36 "mental health apps" they looked into, 29 were sharing information with Facebook or Google, many without disclosing this to users.
The apps dealt with serious issues like depression and reportedly "shared particularly sensitive data like health diaries and voluntary substance use reports."
Remember, there is nothing these blood suckers will not collect about us and share and sell to marketers.
Google Bans Huge App Developer Over Ad Fraud
And speaking of creepy app news...
DO Global, a major Android app developer, has been banned by Google after it was discovered that several of its apps were committing ad fraud.
DO Global is owned in part by huge Chinese tech company Baidu (shocked, I tell you!) Software in some of the company's apps were committing automated click fraud -- continually impersonating people clicking on ads. "Click fraud" is one of two basic types of fraud (the other is "impression fraud") that the web is infested with.
According to BuzzFeed, DO Global apps have been downloaded from the Google Play Store over half a billion times - yes with a b. How many phony clicks were advertisers charged for? Who the hell knows. Who paid for the zillions of phony clicks? That's easy, Ms Advertiser -- you did. (H/T the great J. Tannenbaum)
Examining Privacy Issues
Kudos to The New York Times for launching something called The Privacy Project.
The paper says, "We’ll dig into the ideas, history and future of how our information navigates the digital ecosystem and what’s at stake." I can save them some trouble. Here's what's at stake -- nothing less than democracy as we know it.
It's refreshing to see responsible people taking this issue seriously. Here's an interesting piece they've done.
Meanwhile the important work that local press does is evaporating. According to Warren Buffett, who invested substantially in local and regional newspapers, the newspaper industry is "toast" because of advertisers' flight to digital.
WPP Turmoil Continues
The world's largest agency holding company, WPP, continues to be a semi-comical shit show.
It was reported this week that their income in North America dropped over 8% this year. This comes on top of months of instability including...
- The chasing of their founder, Sir Martin Sorrell, for reportedly being a bad little boy.
- Loss of the global Ford creative account
- The trivialization and morphing of two of their most valuable creative assets - Y&R and J. Walter Thompson - into awkward things called VMLY&R and Wunderman Thompson.
But, hey, they have a new logo.
More Talk, Less Music
I'll be heading back to Europa later this week for a talk sponsored by GroupM in Copenhagen on the 7th.
Then it's over to the Great White North to speak at Canadian Music Week on the 10th in Toronto.They specifically asked me to leave my guitar home.
