If you haven’t read about it already, Facebook is breaking new ground with their "Beacon" feature that associates purchases with purchases and creates member endorsements alongside ads.
Here’s a press release that describes the service: http://www.facebook.com/business/?beacon
What do you think of this? getting on your "privacy" nerves? a good service to consumers trying to make smart purchasing decisions?
The products you buy could end up being published (unless you opt out) for others to see. and you can bet that the knowledge of what you buy will be taken advantage of by advertisers who want to prey on you. are you comfortable with that?
On the other hand, you can opt out whenever you want. and, i personally would love to have more peer endorsements out there rather than having some actor/barker trying to bang me over the head with a sales pitch when i know he’s biased, hired gun.
It comes down to caveat emptor. buyer beware. if you buy something going forward, just know that you’ll have to manage privileges of others to see your purchasing history.
I’ll be commenting on this on Fox Business News tonight on Scoreboard if you’re in front of the boob tube…
