Score One for Consumers....

Under mounting pressure from its community and various consumer privacy groups, Facebook has moved to scale back its ambitious plans to publish accounts of its user’s purchases and other commercial actions publicly to their various friend groups. As of late Thursday, Facebook users must now proactively consent to alert friends whenever they take various actions, such a renting a DVD or purchasing a pair of sneakers. >>Full Story

Thoughts// Would you like your social network of friends alerted about every recipe you've saved on Epicurious.com, every flight you've booked on Travelocity or every movie purchase on Fandango? Facebook's controversial new ad platform "Beacon" was supposed to do just that...essentially telling your friends about your "vote of confidence" for these brands; and yes, these brands have a partnership with Facebook.

Sound big brother to you? More than 50,000 Facebook users did. In the face of a flurry of protests by both users and privacy groups, Facebook has scaled back the program. Users now have to explicitly give permission (opt in) before their purchases are announced to the world.

I suppose we could forgive Facebook for this misstep. In the midst of a meteoric growth in terms of users, third party applications and not to mention it's "media darling" status, perhaps Facebook forgot the carnal rule of digital marketing...it's PERMISSION based!