Archive for the ‘AllFacebook’ Category
Terrorist Recruiting Through Facebook
Friday, February 15th, 2008Yesterday over at The Social Times I wrote a post on how gangs are recruiting youth through social networks. It seems our friends across the pond (the Atlantic) are having a similar problem but with extremist Muslim groups instead. Today the Edinburgh Journal is running a story about creating jihads through Facebook.
The story, by Miles Johnson, claims that the banned Al Muhajiroun extremist group has been operating a private Facebook group that is being used to spread hate. The group has several British students as members and even included employees at the financial services company Citigroup.
The group has posted links to extremist propaganda written by jailed authors. I am not certain what the laws are in England, but in the US much of these writings would be classified as hate speech. Hate speech is not protected by freedom of speech because it incites direct action and propagates violence.
It will be interesting to see how British authorities handle this situation. Will the government see being part of a Facebook group as an actual affiliation? If the government decides to pursue this case, it could set some interesting precedent for Facebook.
Think about it like this: If the British government decides to say that joining a Facebook group is the same as joining an extremist group in the real world, it may cause a great deal of people to take a moment of pause when deciding what Facebook groups they join.
What if you joined a Facebook group that was labeled illegal by the government, should you face criminal charges? Should the government consider digital affiliation the same as physical? I don’t know. We see a great deal of change in the laws regarding digital rights and digital representation. I guess this is just one more example of laws having to play catch up.
Do you think the government should actively pursue banning certain Facebook groups?
Faceboook User Fights Animal Cruelty, Poster May Face Charges.
Monday, January 7th, 2008I recently posted a story out of Canada discussing the legal issues of posting the names of youths who have been accused with a crime in Canada. As I am an American my education in the realm of Communication Law has only extends to the laws of the United States where I helm my professional career. That being said I am forever interested in legal cases that pertain to Comm. Law anywhere in the world.
Jodie Sinnema, out of the CanWest News Service, just posted an article in the Canadian daily Times Colonist about three teens being charged with a crime after malicious Facebook profiles were created about them detailing acts of cruelty against cats. According to the article police were able to investigate and then charge these teens with animal cruelty based on information obtained from the Facebook profile.
Sadly the website that posted the names of the teens also posted hate words and promised acts of violence against the accused teens. This brings a legal dilemma for the police: if the Facebook profiles are used as evidence in court, the accused can counter sue the original posters. Also, since the original Facebook postings promised violence and bodily harm, the original poster can be charged with a crime as well.
While this is not the first case of Facebook being used to help fight crime, it does bring to light the duality of committing a crime to help fight crime. As law enforcement officials begin to use new media more and more to help fight crime, laws will be constantly challenged and reevaluated.
Should Facebook begin monitoring profiles for illegal activity on any level? Should the authorities actively pursue ALL illegal actives found on Facebook? Is committing a crime to stop a crime morally permissible?
Let me know how you feel about any of these questions, I would love to hear your opinion on this subject.
Is Facebook being hypocritical?
Friday, January 4th, 2008Paul Buchheit wrote an interesting post on his blog about Facebook being a hypocrite. Paul poignantly points out that when we all signed up for Facebook we let an automated service troll our email accounts to obtain email account information. 
Facebook has the right to ban whomever they want for whatever reason they want; but the old adage of ‘Do what I say, Not what I do’ never really sat well with me.
Certainly Facebook’s move to block automated programs is making every Facebook user safer, but Facebook needs to find a way to balance safety with usability. If Facebook becomes a sandbox that doesn’t allow its users to expand beyond its web pages, Facebook will face the way of the Dodo.
Crazy Moneky Crazy Fun
Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008I worked in the cube farms for many years. As any cube employee knows, the ability to waste hours of your employers time (and not get caught) is what being a low paid worker is all about.
As such I am a big fan of flash games created by Crazy Monkey. The app I found today is a port of the game ‘Hellstorm: Episode 2: Regroup’. 
The game is a fun over the top shooter where you pilot a helicopter around and destroy bad people.
I prefer to think I am a vigilantly Warrant Officer from the Army fighting my way to become AWOL; but that is just the rantings of an old Navy man.
The major draw back of the game is that it lacks any social interaction. Sure killing bad guys is social.. I guess.. but if I cant boast to my friends that I got a higher bad-guy killing score than them the app is really a failure.
Airwolf signing off.
Spamming your friends first in the New Year…
Monday, December 31st, 2007
If there is one thing I don’t get about social networking is the need to spam all my friends with generic greetings. Sure glitter is nice, bunnies are nice, heck glitter on bunnies is just about the greatest thing in the world, but please don’t expect me to jump up and down with glee because you have sent me a virtual bunny covered in glitter.
Currently I am looking at the “Happy New Year 2008” app by Cardinal Blue Software. This app is a generic happy New Year messaging tool that spams all your friends. Sure, the app lets you spam them with a faux picture of your home city with some fireworks over it. To be honest I live in DC, a city with crooked politicians, swamp rats, and more homeless than I can shake a stick at… so who would want to see some fireworks over my city.
I guess I am being too hard on this application. If you have thousands of friends, which I don’t, and you want to wish them a Happy New Year, which I don’t, than this app is for you!
My Mother Always Warned Me About Taking Advice From Strangers
Sunday, December 23rd, 2007I find myself writing my first review of a Facebook application: Local Picks by TripAdvisor. From this point on the application will be referred to as LPT since I have no desire to a: type that whole name out again or b: hit ctrl-V to paste in the name of the app (half my readers just scoffed at me for admitting to typing on a PC).
So, who wants to know what I think about restaurants or what dives I spend the most of my time in? Well with the LPT you can be that person! You will also gain the power to see all the restaurants I eat at neatly pointed out on a map in case you want to stake the joints out and see me eat my sad sad meals alone.
That being said you can’t take the map for face value, again I know I am never supposed to talk bad about “the Google” but it has my favorite restaurant being located by Howard University, which it is not, China Town Express is located in China Town of all places (stupid Google).
If I could complain about anything, I can and do thank you, I would like to see a photo upload or photo link function built into this app. I have taken TONS of pictures at restaurants around DC and I would love to show random strangers what I look like eating crab enchiladas at Lauriol Plaza.
I could see this app being fun if you were going to head up to a city you have never really been to and were looking to see what similar minded people thought, but I know my friends, they have horrible taste and will eat about anything. Strangers, well their advice is like dog with no tail: Sure it might look fine from the front, but without a clear indication of what he is thinking you just have to be careful.
-Anthony
AllFacebook.com Live Call In
Wednesday, September 5th, 2007So most of you have seen the first ever AllFacebook.com Video show. A few minutes ago an idea came to me. My friend sent me a link to his Ustream channel and an idea popped in my head. What do you guys think about a live call-in show where we have guests and live callers and take questions? We could do it once every couple of weeks as we interweave it with the existing AllFacebook.com video show. Just a thought! I figure since Facebook is such a hot topic there should be a live discussion. I know there probably won’t be a ton of people listening at any given time but I figured there could be enough viewers to have at least a 15-30 minute show. Thoughts?
AllFacebook Video Show Episode 1
Monday, September 3rd, 2007As promised, I have launched the AllFacebook.com video show. This has been a serious learning experience and we will continue to add features and improve our process. We hit a lot of technical difficulties in the production, editing and uploading of our videos. As a result, this video came out at 11:00 PM on Labor Day when I intended for it to come out in the morning. Such is life! If you have any suggestions, please make them. This is our first run and I will be extending the features. Thanks for your input!
Help With AllFacebook Video
Friday, August 31st, 2007So I have been planning a video show for a few weeks now and I finally have the team in place to make it happen. We are going to begin making a once a week show that discusses everything related to Facebook, social networks and social news. I’d like to make the show interactive though. Each week I will ask the readers about their thoughts on a given topic and get some feedback. Unfortunately, for this week I have yet to pick a topic! Help me out and let me know what you think the first show should be about. Simply post your comment below and the best idea wins. Just to get your brain going here are a couple I’ve though about doing: poking social dynamics and Facebook in the workplace. Have any other ideas?
AllFacebook on NPR
Monday, August 27th, 2007This morning I had the fortune to be on the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC, the New York NPR affiliate. I spoke with Brian about the opportunities for companies as well as answered caller questions. Unfortunately the first phone I was using was not very kind to me so I fell of the interview twice which was interesting. If you are interested in listening to the segment you can use the player below.
