Comment by jacquesm

I haven't asked Zuck personally if he made these comments. However I can say that after working with him on privacy and photo related issues that these comments definitely don't characterize his approach to the subject. He seems like a pretty normal guy just trying to make the world more open and connected.

I agree with jacquesm...this is a great lesson. Don't email, IM, text, etc anything you wouldn't want to read on Valleywag.

To be honest I think this is linkbaity - it's the same quotes that have been acknowledged more or less openly since spring. Maybe he's a bad person, maybe he was just a typical shit-talking 19 year old. It's kind of meaningless without the context of their other conversations; for all I know it's some running joke that went between them, or a movie reference or whatever.

What significance will this have? The lawsuit from the twins is parked in the courts, and the breach of contract one launched recently is entertaining but not very likely to succeed. When the movie comes out next month everyone can hate on the socially awkward guy and argue about whether he deserves his millions or not, probably on Facebook. I think the only consequences are to boost movie ticket sales a little and make Zuckerberg even more of social recluse. Even if he is an arrogant jerk and every bad thing about him is true, so what? Has he killed anyone? Was anyone forced to use Facebook? I wasn't, I logged in 6 months ago and set my account to have minimal sharing permissions, and I don't think there was ever much that could be called scandalous there anyway. He doesn't seem any worse ethically speaking than the YouTube guys.

The only thing I have a problem with is the idea that once you get anywhere, everything you ever said on the internet is going to be dug up by someone because now there's a market in discussing your personal details, and digging them up requires almost zero effort. There's a big difference between standing in the metaphorical public square shouting your opinion to the world (which you expect to have recorded forever, for good or ill), and saying something random in some dimly lit restaurant booth to a friend, only to have it analyzed worldwide as if it were the crystallized essence of your personality many years later.

Does this matter? An immature kid collected everyone's personal information that they willingly volunteered. He said he was going to fuck them in the ear, but didn't.

Now his company has a privacy policy that they are legally obligated to follow. If Zuck decided to fuck someone in the ear right now, that would be a problem. But he seems to be under control.

So what now? Is everyone going to stop using Facebook? Are people going to take his company away from him? I just don't see any recourse that anyone can take other than not clicking ads on Facebook. In the end, that's all Facebook a website with ads and your friend's phone numbers.

(I don't have a Facebook account. I also use OTR for my instant messages.)

Dunno... nice scandal, but I don't think it matters at all. Zuck is human. He is trusts his friends and maybe talks him self up a bit. That's all I get from this "scandal", and I'm the biggest Facebook hater around.

I don't know why you got downvoted. The phrase I like to use is that "what happens on the internet stays on the internet"

I dunno, it seems like Zuck is plenty successful and will go on to lead a wealthy and fulfilling life. Maybe the takeaway should be, "Don't worry about how you talk to your friends privately. By the time it can come back to bite you, you will already be too rich to care."

I'm hearing the immortal words of my first (and only) law professor:

The E in E-mail stands for "Evidence"

My personal favourite:

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?GhostOfUsenetPostingsPast

Including our comments on this forum.

One good that can come out of it is people will start behaving themselves online too, just like they (mostly) do in person.

Maybe they can. They certainly shouldn't. Should you be required to act "responsibly" at all times? I think most everyone plans on being "successful" one day. A lot of them will never succeed - should they all spend their whole life being ultra-PC/conservative/responsible/whatever you want to call it? I'm not sure that's a good deal to make with society.

This sounds like silly posturing of a young rebel - or at least someone who wants to appear to be a rebel to his friend. And that is one of the points of privacy - YOU decide which face to show to which person. A lot of the conversations that come out in this style are private; IMO they should never be published. I grant you that in this case he was talking about his business. But even here, I'm not sure I agree with the morality of it being used against him.

Impressions do matter, but the expectation of privacy is a reasonable one, that ideally would be better protected by law. Even if you are not a privacy nut, I think it's pretty clear that this allows you control over your image to a certain extent. You are allowed to act differently in your own home than when speaking as CEO. People should not be allowed to pry on one & use it against you for the other.

I love Robert Scoble's view on this. Anything happening online is effectively public.

As he puts it, if your "private" data is just a copy-paste away from being posted in public, it's not really private at all.

Or, if you don't feel like internalizing a bunch of "responsibility" and watering yourself down, get ready to be misunderstood and torn to pieces. And get ready not to care about people who don't care to understand you.

I understand that having integrity (a public face no different than your private face) is better than being a hypocrite. But it's better to have real, strong opinions than to have milquetoast integrity.