Facebook Data Use Policy Updates
What is the Facebook Data Use Policy?
Facebook is updating its policies again, a move which will inevitably lead to another round of people declaring that the company is selling their 852 photos of Jr. and posting custom legalese on their timelines in an attempt to contradict whatever new policies the company has written.
Is Facebook using your private gallery in advertising? Will establishing your own copyrights in a post make any difference? The answers are no, but what really goes on behind the scenes regarding Facebook advertising, privacy, and its Data Use Policy can be a bit murky and complex, if not a little insidious. The current round of proposed updates includes more attempts at clarifying what already exists with new language so there’s not much new there. But just what are they doing, and how can you control your own data?
It Starts With You
First and foremost, as a Facebook user you must take control of your privacy settings. Facebook’s biggest crime is a tendency to make their users ‘opt out’ of sharing information, rather than opting in. It is up to an individual user to learn about privacy settings and who will be able to access and use their information. Facebook changes things around a lot, which makes keeping track of your permissions (and finding the settings) more complex than it has to be. Even so, Facebook will not share more than you allow – the trick is to knowing what you are allowing.
Public Information: Anyone can see your public information. It is what people use to search for others, and it’s what makes the social network social. Some information is always public, no matter how private you make your profile: your name, your profile picture and cover photos, your network, your gender, and your Username/ID. If you upload a picture of your kid as your own profile image or as your cover photo, that image WILL be visible to all.
Other Public Info vs. Private Info: From here, you choose whether to make your wall and other information public, shared with your friends, or customized. The little globe icon right next to the post button indicates that something is public, the icon of two people means ‘Friends’, and the gear means that a custom permission has been set (you can customize who sees what; for example, if you want to keep your family oblivious to your more off-the-wall hobbies). However, despite what you place as your settings, the publicity of your actions depends on what you do and where you post as well. If your friend makes a public post and you comment on it, then you should expect your response to be public. If you are posting to a public group, then other people may see it.
Your Friends
Your friends will see what you post to your wall, what you like, and what you share. Your friends may also affect the advertising you see, they can add you to groups, and they can affect your Facebook life in other ways – such as tagging awful pictures of you. Keep track of who you friend and how you plan to interact with that person. Sometimes the interaction can get out of hand in unexpected ways.
Likes Vs. Shares – And how Social Advertising Throws This Off
When you Share something on Facebook, you expect other people to see it and pass it along – this is a given. Facebook is social after all, and you want to share things you enjoy. Keep in mind, however, that when you Like something on Facebook, you are endorsing it – which may affect the way Facebook advertises to you. Your profile and image may also appear to your friends on that or other affiliated websites. Additionally, your endorsement may appear in the advertisements that your friends see in Facebook.
Did you click ‘like’ two years ago on a friend’s photography fan page? That photography page might show up in another friend’s news feed, endorsed by you – which could get awkward depending on the content of their photography, for example.
Social Advertising has the internet in a tizzy these days. While Snopes has put the rumor that Facebook is using your private images in public advertisements to rest, what you decide to share might very well be everybody’s business, depending on your privacy settings. Things you share and your likes will be shared with your friends. Likewise, the information that you allow apps to access will be sent to those 3rd party companies.
Data Mining
Even if Facebook is not stealing your images to use in public advertising (and your content DOES belong to you) Facebook’s data gathering is complicated, and may reach well beyond the scope that many people realize.
Everything you do on the Facebook platform is tracked – what you click on, what you like, the information you post about yourself, where you are, and your general behaviors. This information is intended to personalize the targeted advertising to you – it’s all about the ads. Say your public information states that you are a 28 year old male in Flint, that you like a given restaurant and you like ice hockey. Even with your personal identifiers are removed, that information is still highly detailed. If someone is looking to advertise a Flint Generals event at a given restaurant, you might fit into the demographic, sparking an oddly specific advertisement to appear on your news feed.
Even if you yourself rarely click a Like button, your friends can be used to fill in the gaps. (This is why we mentioned being careful about the people you are Friending.)
Beyond the Web
Data mining is not limited to Internet activity alone. Remember those little customer loyalty cards you scan at the store for discounts? The information gathered from these cards can be fed into one of several big data mining companies who can then associate it with your Facebook account (using a hashed email or phone number). If you purchase a car at a local dealership, you may be shown an advertisement for that car dealership on Facebook even if you never Liked anything related to it.
What to Do
Does this make you uncomfortable? If not, continue on your merry way. If so, however, there are steps that can be taken to minimize your use to advertisers in this way.
Update Privacy Settings: On Facebook you should regularly update your privacy settings and check out the new features. The little lock icon in the right hand corner of Facebook’s blue nav bar along the top will take you to the privacy page which allows you to manage everything from your timeline and tagging to deleting old apps and editing your Facebook Ads permissions. This is where you control social advertising.
Audit Your Likes: If you are worried about what might show up in advertising you can go through and delete old Likes, hide or delete wall posts, and otherwise clean up your account. Even if you’ve set your security to private, this can minimize future awkward advertising and associations, and avoid giving free advertising to companies that you don’t actually want to endorse.
Addon Help: Facebook utilizes cookies and browser storage. There are a variety of browser addons and extensions that will reduce your cookie tracks throughout the web, and there are also addons that will allow you to adjust what you see and use on Facebook.
Opting Out: The real-world data mining can be controlled to a degree as well. Using a different phone number (Google Voice offers secondary phone numbers) or an alternate email than the one used with Facebook can reduce the ability for companies to associate the two. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has written a guide on how to opt out of data mining for some of the big data companies.
Calling it Quits
If all this data mining combined with concerns over the NSA’s information gathering make you want to reach for your tinfoil hat, deleting your Facebook account is an option as well. This takes about a month to do and you may still have data in their servers for up to 90 days, but it is always an option to consider. While things you have posted on other peoples’ walls or comments may not entirely disappear, it will definitely reduce your digital footprint.
Improving Websites
When it comes to building a website for your business, it’s easy to get lost in the details – information you want to display on the site, what customers want and expect to see, and where to start. How can you make a website look good while keeping the information manageable?
Visible Basics
- Usability: First and foremost, a business website must be usable. Your viewers need to be able to navigate the website without a lot of hassle, find what they’re looking for in minimal time, and see what is before them without any effort on their part. This means that a clean layout with clear navigation is important. Think of your newspaper: you know where the header and the date and the table of contents are located. It’s about the same in most newspapers, even if it may change locations on the page, it remains easy to find. Compare this to a website – if you want to find the ‘Contact Us’ part of the site, it should be simple and intuitive.
- Readability: Usability ties heavily into readability – not only do you want things easy to find, but they need to be easy to read as well. This includes contrast between text and background, white space, and good typography. You want your viewers to stick around and read more of the website.
- Typography & White Space: Your typeface should be easy to read. Google Fonts may give you access to more fonts than Arial and Verdana, but don’t get carried away – the bulk of your text should remain in a clear font face, utilizing different font styles, sizes, and weights for headers. Don’t use more than two or three different fonts – it’s just not necessary. Also, gone are the days of tiny fonts bunched into all available space. Be sure you give plenty of breathing room for your content, not only between lines but also by using a big enough font that it is easy to read by many eyes, on many different devices.
- Bullets & Lists: Bullets and lists keep your readers’ eyes moving through large amounts of information. People reading websites expect ease of use and the ability to skim rapidly through large amounts of information. Use this to your advantage!
Effortless Usage
- Call to Action: Not only do you want to tell your users how they can engage with your business or website, but you want to make it simple. Want someone to sign up for a newsletter or donate through a button? Make this happen in as few clicks as possible.
- Easy Forms: Using the same principle, don’t ask users to complete lengthy forms – if it feels like work, they might just close the page and forget about it. Make it simple and people will be more likely to follow through to completion.
- New Info: Highlight new and important information and make it very prominent to see. New users will know the site is being kept up to date and returning users do not have to search through content they’ve already read.
- Manage Scroll: Web design is undergoing an evolution thanks to mobile devices. With smaller screens, buttons and links can be difficult to click and it’s unlikely everything will fit on the screen at once in all cases. Horizontal scroll is still confusing to many users so it should still be avoided. Vertical scroll should be limited to no more than necessary. Keep a simple design whenever possible.
Mobile Access
- More Every Day: Approximately 1.2 billion people access the Internet by mobile device, and this use is on the rise. Since a viewer might access a website while looking for information on the go, the quicker they can find what they’re looking for, the better.
- Data Use: Mobile users are often limited to restricted data plans, so keeping images optimized and websites light and quick to load is a boon for anyone needing to find an address or number by phone. Nobody with limited data wants to wait for huge banners to load repeatedly.
- Keep It Simple: Sites particularly geared for mobile users should be simple, short, and easy to navigate. Give people what they want and quickly – they’ll be far less annoyed and less likely to leave.
Design
- Color: Remember how we talked about making a site easy to read? Color ties heavily into this. Your color scheme is important – never make it offensive to the eye or difficult to read. Red text on a black background makes your site look dated and is hard on the eyes. Make your colors match your business, but be careful to use the colors in a way that ensures reading the text itself remains effortless.
- Images: Images should support your content and make sense, not just fill up space. You might like that picture of your dog or the logo of your favorite sports team, but unless your business website is about dogs or sports, these won’t be a good match for your content. Always resist the temptation to use images that do not support the content itself. Icons indicating specific information, on the other hand, can draw the eye and do wonders for your design.
Maintenance
- Storefront: Like a storefront, a website needs updating and maintenance. People like to know you’re there and active. Once a site is set up, regular low-level maintenance can keep it from getting dated and stale, and may help to remind search engines that you are keeping things fresh.
- Review: Review visitor statistics to make tweaks and adjustments to navigation and content. A high bounce rate means people are reaching your site from searching for certain keywords, but are not finding what they’re looking for. It is a good idea to investigate those keywords and landing pages to see if there is a discrepancy worth fixing.
- Guidelines: Google, Bing, and other search engines are continually updating their guidelines and how they process data. While this can be a challenge to keep track of, it can affect your traffic from search engines. Keeping up to date with these guidelines will help to bring more traffic to your website.
Here at Appletree Mediaworks, we have experience addressing all of these issues. If it seems like a lot to tackle on your own, we’d be happy to talk about the ways we can help improve or redesign your existing website.
June Union Edge Podcast Blog Post – The Choice To Jump To WordPress
The Choice to Jump to WordPress
A number of Appletree MediaWorks sites have taken the leap from a regular website or a Joomla based website to WordPress, and we’ve already explained at length why we prefer the WordPress platform for a website. But what are some of the things you can expect from a WordPress site if you choose to take that leap?
Updates
WordPress can be updated on the fly, even from a mobile device – no fighting with HTML, no shuffling files around. Simply log in and you’re there. There are even apps for iOS and Android to make these fast updates even easier.
Real Time Feeds, Social Media Integration
A number of our clients have added social media feeds on the front page of their site so users can get real time updates all in one place. Plugins also allow for a company’s own social media to feed right into their site as well.
Sharp, Eye Pleasing Photo Galleries
WordPress allows for impressive photo galleries – both static ones and rotating galleries to show many images with little effort. These make it easy for the client to update and add additional images.
Fast and Accurate Search Feature
In the past, on more traditional websites, it could be aggravating to use a search bar trying to find something on a website. These days, with WordPress, the search features are much more user friendly and likely to turn up intended results.
Great Looking Calendars
WordPress allows for the integration of event calendars to display what is going on in a variety of different ways to best suit your website layout and users. These calendars can connect to all sorts of desktop and mobile calendar applications for a seamless experience.
One Step Newsletter Sign Up
WordPress makes it simple to set up a newsletter signup form and easy to organize and keep track of your subscribers.
Easy ‘Sharing’ Plugins
Google Plus and Facebook like/follow buttons are easy to handle on WordPress, both for the entire site, and for individual pages and posts.
Effective Plugins for Managing SEO
WordPress is designed for Search Engine Optimization. This increases the likelihood that your website will rate highly on Google or Bing. Add to this a variety of plugins that effectively manage your SEO and keywords to improve upon what you already have.
Donations Integration
A useful favorite among tools for organizations is the PayPal donation integration, letting site visitors donate to the organization without complication, whether or not they have a PayPal account.
Responsive Designs
Not everyone uses a desktop computer to browse websites these days. Fortunately, WordPress has many responsive designs that are made to look great on all devices: Phones, iPads, iPods, tablets, and other devices.
Best of all, WordPress is easy to use and maintain. We can create your custom design for WordPress, and when updates and additions are needed, these can be added quickly and effectively. We also offer WordPress training sessions to help get you started.
Designing for All Devices
Why You Should Be Designing for All Devices
When you settle down to browse the web, you may be doing so from a conventional desktop PC with a widescreen monitor, you may be glancing at Facebook from a 7 inch Android tablet, or you might be checking out an address from your iPhone. For designers this incredible range of options in which to view a website means that a whole new way of thinking about web design is required. As the people responsible for setting up what a user sees, we have to think about the size of a device and what is important to the visitor using that device.
Once upon a time, the average screen size was relatively standard. Times have changed rapidly, and for today’s designer the end product may need to be displayed on a 4 inch wide screen along with a 23 inch screen all on one site. Not only do screens differ in size and how they are used, but they can also be turned from landscape to portrait in one motion, creating a whole new challenge for design and layout.
In the past we’ve designed for a vertical scroll, but now Windows 8 users are panning to the right for a different use of the touch-screen mechanism, an option that some viewing screens have, while others do not. Good design habits in the past become essential now, such as working within a grid system to keep shifting content moving in a controlled and coherent way.
As technology continues to march forward, new features are always popping up. To give an example, devices with Windows 8 have live tiles for apps – the new way to notify followers that their favorite organizations have something to share with them.
High-Density Displays
“Retina” is Apple’s brand name for its new double-density screens, but other manufacturers are creating similar displays under their own names. The technology is used in iPhones, MacBook Pros, and other high-end devices.
The device reverts to a standard resolution of 1,440×900 but the additional pixels can be used to make fonts and graphics appear smoother. While not everything caters to them now, these double density screens will eventually migrate to all devices. There is little reason to fret now, but there’s no harm in some forward planning on how to tackle the new challenge.
Speed
Many users will be using smartphones or tablets on slower mobile networks with limited bandwidth availability, so detecting the connection speed may ultimately be more beneficial than determining the pixel density. For this reason, a website must be optimized for page loading speed – a focus that we as designers shrugged off through the years, as broadband became mainstream. But even on tiny devices, fast and optimized pages lead to higher visitor engagement, retention, and conversions. There are tools designed to measure and help maintain speed optimization. Google’s PageSpeed Insight products will help you identify performance best practices that can be applied to your site, while its optimization tools can help you automate the process.
With continually enhanced technology and all manner of devices in which to use it, design will continue to be a challenge. Foresight and preparation will head off new display surprises and make it easier for us here at Appletree Mediaworks to create a perfect design for you, no matter what your preferred device.
