How Facebook's Newest Feature Could Change the Internet - Business - The Atlantic

See the full post for more analysis (via Slate)

Facebook will allow website developers to collect and use our information when we connect to a site. When I press the "like" button, that goes into social clearinghouse of information. Other sites can see the articles I like on CNN, the music I like on Pandora, the food I like on Yelp ... and that's in addition to any information I make public on my Facebook profile. The Facebook team calls this application "Open Graph." You can call it the future of marketing.

What does this mean for privacy? Open Graph initially sounds pretty invasive. But remember that everything that flows into this reservoir of content is already public. Facebook's new policy doesn't make your private information public. It makes your public information a lot more public. Content that was once between you and your pal's news feed is now playing all your friends' CNN Facebook plug-ins and sloshing around in a matrix of information. "Public no longer means public on Facebook," says Mashable's Christina Warren. "It means public in the Facebook ecosystem. My advice to you: Be aware of your privacy settings."

How Facebook's Newest Feature Could Change the Internet - Business - The Atlantic