Like, what’s not to like?
Facebook’s new ‘like’ button has been attracting a lot of attention since it was announced at the site’s F8 conference in San Francisco last week. Essentially, a ‘recommend’ link, it’s the centrepiece of the Open Graph program, by which aims to open up more of its user activity to other sites.
Great for advertisers, seems to be the general verdict: massive amounts of social data will now be spread all around the Internet, offering all kinds of possibilities for brands to reach potential customers. If a company includes the like button on its own web pages, visitors will be able to post the information directly to their Facebook page, where all their friends will see it.
Not so great for people who cherish their privacy, and worry about there being just too much personal information flying around.
However no one’s in the least doubt that this initiative will catch on. Since Facebook’s Beacon content sharing platform flopped three years ago, the site has grown from 50 million to 450 million users, and is rapidly overtaking Google as the Internet’s dominant presence.
There’s a handy audio clip here which explains how the tool works.
Some other posts you'll find interesting:
- Diaspora aims to capitalise on Facebook privacy rebellion
- Corporate snoops
- Barclays joins the Social Media Leadership Forum
