Comments on: Facebook Data and Funding http://fstutzman.com/2007/09/25/facebook-data-and-funding/ Thoughts about information, social networks, and privacy Fri, 06 Jan 2012 21:54:51 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: fred http://fstutzman.com/2007/09/25/facebook-data-and-funding/comment-page-1/#comment-950 fred Wed, 26 Sep 2007 17:39:00 +0000 http://127.0.0.1/~fred/projects/blog/?p=495#comment-950 JKD, AFAIK Facebook has no such formal policy. There were stirrings inside the company of a data mining group that would work with external researchers, but to the best of my knowledge that initiative was killed (it did lead to the publication of the Golder paper).<br/><br/>In my last conversation with Facebook, they told me they have cut all ties with researchers, and no researchers are allowed to conduct any automated collection (previously they had exempted me and a few other institutions).<br/><br/>To the best of my knowledge, Facebook is not working with any researchers, but you do wonder how many papers like this are still in submission/rewrite/etc. This was pretty surprising to the FB research community, but there may be more to come. JKD, AFAIK Facebook has no such formal policy. There were stirrings inside the company of a data mining group that would work with external researchers, but to the best of my knowledge that initiative was killed (it did lead to the publication of the Golder paper).

In my last conversation with Facebook, they told me they have cut all ties with researchers, and no researchers are allowed to conduct any automated collection (previously they had exempted me and a few other institutions).

To the best of my knowledge, Facebook is not working with any researchers, but you do wonder how many papers like this are still in submission/rewrite/etc. This was pretty surprising to the FB research community, but there may be more to come.

]]> By: jkd http://fstutzman.com/2007/09/25/facebook-data-and-funding/comment-page-1/#comment-949 jkd Wed, 26 Sep 2007 03:15:00 +0000 http://127.0.0.1/~fred/projects/blog/?p=495#comment-949 The big question here for me is lack of transparency. More than just the disappearance of the previous data privacy page, does Facebook have a publicly stated (and/or available) policy on disbursal of data for research purposes? Certainly that'd be nice, especially if they're more open to said research - but if it's done on an ad hoc and permission-granted-by-request basis, then I think it's worth both users and researchers asking why user data is made available for some purposes and not others. The big question here for me is lack of transparency. More than just the disappearance of the previous data privacy page, does Facebook have a publicly stated (and/or available) policy on disbursal of data for research purposes? Certainly that’d be nice, especially if they’re more open to said research – but if it’s done on an ad hoc and permission-granted-by-request basis, then I think it’s worth both users and researchers asking why user data is made available for some purposes and not others.

]]> By: fred http://fstutzman.com/2007/09/25/facebook-data-and-funding/comment-page-1/#comment-948 fred Tue, 25 Sep 2007 20:44:00 +0000 http://127.0.0.1/~fred/projects/blog/?p=495#comment-948 Not a typo, I actually meant 30M ;) Not a typo, I actually meant 30M ;)

]]> By: Nikita http://fstutzman.com/2007/09/25/facebook-data-and-funding/comment-page-1/#comment-947 Nikita Tue, 25 Sep 2007 20:41:00 +0000 http://127.0.0.1/~fred/projects/blog/?p=495#comment-947 Fred, thank you for the find, really interesting.<br/>Please !!! Correct the typo — it's 3M, not 30M in the last sentence. Fred, thank you for the find, really interesting.
Please !!! Correct the typo — it’s 3M, not 30M in the last sentence.

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