Facebook is a great tool for communicating with friends, family, and even business contacts, but it’s also a great tool for rapidly spreading myths and rumors. We regularly get emails about myths and rumors, so we decided that we’d post the most popular myths and rumors that come across our desks. Below is a list of 7 of the most popular Facebook myths and rumors.
Facebook Will Charge To Use The Site
This has to be the most popular rumor. As we’ve written on numerous occasions, Facebook is not charging and never will. However thousands of users every day, and frequently many more, spread the myth that Facebook is about to start charging for the service. The price tends to differ each time the myth arises, yet people continue to fall for it. The company has officially told us that Facebook will not begin charging for the service.
Facebook Will Sell Your Data
If Facebook isn’t charging for the service, that must mean that they are going to have to sell you data to survive, right? Wrong! Facebook does not sell your data to advertisers. Instead, they let advertisers target users with advertisements through their self-serve advertising program based on a number of factors. None of the user information is ever exposed to the advertiser. Instead, the advertiser is provided with an anonymized report showing which demographic groups clicked on their links. No personally identifiable information is ever exposed to advertisers.
While some people continue to argue that one day Facebook will need to sell your data in order to become profitable, the reality is that the company is doing just fine with advertising revenue. In fact, the company is projected to surpass $1 billion in revenue this year, the majority of which is generated through the company’s advertising platform. In other words, the company will never need to sell your data in order to cover costs as they are rapidly approaching profitability without doing so.
Finally, selling user data would damage their trust with users and users are the most important group to the company.
Social Plugins Expose Your Data!
You know those new plugin that let you see what articles are the most popular among your friends or let you view who else is sharing content on a site? Some people have suggested that these plugins expose data to the owner of the site that those plugins appear on. In reality, no data is ever made available to the site owner. The reason site owners place the “social plugins” on their site is in order to increase the engagement of users. In other words, it keeps the visitor on the site for a longer period of time, something that most site owners desire.
Facebook Is Launching An Email Product
One of the lesser-known rumors was that Facebook was going to launch an email product. While many of us have hoped that Facebook would launch an email product, Mark Zuckerberg recently dismissed such claims. Paul Bucheit, the creator of GMail also previously told us that he was not working on a secret email client. Yes, it would be awesome if Paul redefined web-based email twice in a row, but Mark Zuckerberg has publicly stated that the company is not working on an email client, so don’t expect it!
Facebook Is Launching A Music Company
One of the other popular rumors for the past three years has been that Facebook was secretly working on a music project.
While iLike rose to become one of the most popular, and one of the most viral applications of all-time, that was the closest Facebook ever came to an official music project. Then in October of last year, Lala entered the gift shop but by May of this year it was pulled after Apple shut it down.
Since then, no rumors have surfaced that the company is launching another music service. One thing has become clear though: Facebook would much rather let another company handle music than handle it themselves.
