Facebook, Facebook, Facebook and its struggle to make money. This new ad model they are working on is interesting to say the least – endorsing something you have an interest in (based on a profile) without your opt in and sold to your friends/connections to benefit a brand for free – can anyone see a problem(s) with this? We know that Facebook owns anything that is on its network and eventually will use it to make some money… one can argue if that is OK or not, but agreed when signing on… is this way of using your relationships and reputation right? Not so much according to me… See it like this – we now see how powerful consumer recommendations and reviews are online (take a look at Amazon or any smart business selling something) – essentially eWOM – it is growing rapidly and the validity of the information is weighting in heavily on both consumers and business. As it should and has for century’s before the web. Potential gold mine here for a business, if daring enough (give away some control)… You know, when researching something, and you are making that decision on going with brand/product x or y, those reviews get really important. Not so surprising that Facebook jumped on this, since they have quite a bit of interesting info on there users… I see the selling/usage of user stats and slightly agree. The application think is great and powerful. But what is not cool is the model which makes you the sponsor/promoter of a brand/product to friends without having a say. This is misuse of personal info. And will be negative for both all… read this article and make up you own mind – Is Your Reputation Worth $15 Billion?

At the end of the the day – what is the purpose of the social network? Connect with friends, make new friends, share common interest, having some fun right? Believe that most of the info/interests/behavior you share on these networks are mostly personal and for fun (not so much anchored in reality all the time. Many are also made up). And intended to be…
So here lies the dilemma to make some profits form advertising – user are not interested/open to brands and much of the user behavior/stats are most likely misleading. Of course there are quite a bit one can do to go around this and make it work. Just need to think what can I add to the experience… How will this benefit and be worthwhile for the user…

Conclusion – let the user use the mediums as intended and just add to the experience.