After two to three years now of nothing short of explosive growth, seems like Social Network users are feeling a little remorse …

• Prospective employers reviewing their Facebook and MySpace postings and photos

• Some Colleges when assessing applications also review Facebook and MySpace accounts

• Search engines discovering content that users “thought was private”

• Beacon (Facebook) disclosing online purchases – although Facebook has now made this feature opt-in

• Lack of awareness of the privacy settings

Great article in The Washington Post today by Staff Writer, Kim Hart … “The Rise of Alter Egos in Everybody’s Space – After Oversharing, Users Recast Their Online Personas”. As noted in the article, many users are resorting to deleting and/or ‘rebooting’ their profiles to clean the slate …

The Economist recently published an article on Online Social Networks entitled “Everywhere and Nowhere”.
The article leads with … “ Social Networking will become a ubiquitous feature of online life. That does not mean it is a business.” Moreover, it concludes with … “ Social Networking may end up being everywhere, and yet nowhere.”

Online / Digital Marketing Spend – not a business? Check again. Over $20 billion in revenues in 2007. Amount targeted towards niche social venues? – over $2 billion in 2007 (with this sub-segment projected to grow at a staggering 75% per annum). Why? They build targeted, relevant communities of interest. Conversations aggregate around communities of interest … not brand web sites. Savvy marketers understand the difference.

Great video from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, Jennifer Stoddart ... entitled "What does a friend of a friend of a friend know about you?"

So, do you really know how your data is being used? shared? correlated? Do you really read the Terms of Service? Oh, and by the way, ever tried to use the service without clicking through the (non-negotiable) Terms of Service?