Food for thought: The spy who sold out
Forgiving a pretty face
Facebook to agencies: how will people share your story?
Is “The Pitch” an accurate reflection of our industry?
Questions of privacy in the digital space are nothing new. But with the U.S. launch of the Shopkick app and Facebook’s Places platform this week, we may have new material to work with. In one camp, those who love blurring the boundaries between their online and real life behaviour. In the other, those who believe that the combination of Facebook Places’ third-party check-in system and Shopkick’s trackable shopping may have tipped the scales towards Minority Report-ville.
Have you bought your futuristic leather jacket yet? At the very least, you may want to work on your intense, Cruise-esque “game face of the future.”
Whereas existing location-based application games like Foursquare and Gowalla are limited to first-person check-ins to alert friends to your location, Facebook’s application has a third-party check-in system. Simply: if you happen to be in a location alongside one of your Facebook friends, they can post that you’re there too. The trouble is, you can’t really turn it off.
Instead of allowing users to opt-in to Places, Facebook has left the Places privacy settings unconfigured, meaning that users have to independently find the convoluted instructions for disabling it. Those this seems to be common practice when Facebook updates functionality, it has resulted in a rather politically heated discussion with The American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, who have criticized the fact that you have to manually manage each check-in alert with a “Yes” or a “Not Now” response. Notably, never a “Never.”
Naturally, applications that depend on (or are enhanced by) location-based data will also be able to access the information you or your friends share with Places. Facebook counters the privacy criticisms with an argument that sharing this data has the “potential […] to make really compelling social experiences.” If this is true, then Shopkick has buttered its own bread.
Shopkick rewards you with “kickbucks” simply for walking into a participating retailer (Best Buy and Macy’s are early and notable participants). Not only that, but it geotargets your behaviour IN THE STORE, handing you additional reward points for demonstrating physical intent to buy, such as heading towards a change room or the register. GPS isn’t accurate enough to get down to such a granular level, so targeting is achieved via an in-store device called, compellingly, “The Deducer.” Marvel, eat your heart out.
Marketers involved in Shopkick decry the privacy issue by claiming that the program is opt-in. It’s simply another incentive program, only you are your own loyalty card.
Though Places and Shopkick are, in fact, still opt-in to a degree, they do serve up consumer habits in a way that most people may be incapable of calculating. The question is, do we bother worrying about it? By downloading the Shopkick app, you are technically opting into a rewards program. By signing up for Facebook, you’re signaling a desire to be public with your information to a certain degree. So, to what extent are our curiosity and participation responsible for inviting the very policies that we may come to resent?
Do we only care about privacy issues if our participation results in personal drama or spam?
Jim Hall
August 20, 2010 @ 10:20 am
It all comes with a price – to some extent, a lack of privacy. Is it all worth it? Remember the good ol’ days of not being connected and not expected to be connected 24-7. Being around people who did not interrupt you in the middle of a sentence to take an ‘important’ call. Have you ever shared something with someone, you thought was private, then seen it on a facebook page? There is a lot to be learned with all this whirlwind of new technology.
Ian Mackenzie
August 23, 2010 @ 11:17 am
“Do we only care about privacy issues if our participation results in personal drama or spam?”
My guess is yes, for the most part this is true.
Golden hands
August 23, 2010 @ 11:23 am
Perhaps it’s time to move to that log cabin in the woods…
Leilah
August 23, 2010 @ 11:27 am
@Golden Hands: It’s geolocation. There is no safe place. ;)
Ian Mackenzie
August 23, 2010 @ 11:36 am
Golden Hands just checked in at Log Cabin. He is now the mayor of Log Cabin.
Brook Johnston
August 23, 2010 @ 1:05 pm
Does Log Cabin offer kickbucks?