
Proposed Law Would Require Social Networks to be Private by Default - miraj
http://networkeffect.allthingsd.com/20110516/proposed-law-would-require-social-networks-to-be-private-by-default/?mod=ATD_rss
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wccrawford
I like the part where they admit they are screwing their customers:

"For instance, if the default settings are all private, it could be hard for
new members to get value out of the sites because they won’t be found by other
users."

In other words, if the customers weren't ignorant and knew how the change
their info to private, the system would fail. (We know they're calling the
customers ignorant, because private-by-default means the system fails because
users don't change their info to public. Their logic always assumes the
customer isn't smart enough to change from the default value.)

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dhruval
I wouldn't label it stupidity or ignorance, but it is a weel documented quirk
of human behavior the default state of opt in / opt out systems makes a huge
difference.

This ted talk is an excellent and talks about the very significant differences
in organ donation rates between countries that use an opt out system vs. those
that use an opt in.

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9X68dm92HVI>

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xorglorb
While I think that it is important for consumers to realize that there are
privacy features, and how to use them, I really don't think that this is an
area in need of governmental regulation. The major social networking sites
have privacy options, and if people are worried enough about their privacy,
they are fully welcome to enable them.

