Facebook seems to have contributed to countless broken love affairs, divorces, and insane levels of jealousy. People pry into your friend lists and updates until they sometimes reach conclusions far beyond reality. How lovely, then, that a mere status update appears to have saved a Harlem man from jail.
According to The New York Times, Rodney Bradford decided to update his status with a call from the soul. "Where's my pancakes?" is the Times' translation of a status update it says was written in "indecipherable street slang." The fact that Bradford did this at 11:49 a.m. on October 17, using his father's computer, meant that he would not have to suffer pancakes of a more distasteful nature in the local penitentiary.
(Credit:
CC Slushpup/Flickr)
Bradford, you see, was arrested the next day for robbery. However, after he was booked, his lawyer was intelligent enough to update the district attorney with news of Bradford's Facebooking.
A subpoena was swiftly flung the way of the Zuckerbergville crew so that they might reveal whether the timing and location of the update were correct. They were, meaning Bradford could update his criminal status to "cleared."
There are some, however, who are not entirely convinced the charges should have been dropped. Joseph Pollini, a teacher at the Department of Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration at John Jay College of Criminal Justice told the Times: "With a username and password, anyone can input data in a Facebook page."
He also offered a dire warning of the infinite dastardliness of people Bradford's age: "Some of the brightest people on the Internet are teenagers. They know the Internet better than a lot of people. Why? Because they use it all the time."
Oh, why is it so hard to give young people the benefit of the doubt--especially on Facebook?
Facebook may have 300 million members, but a news story this week makes one particular member stand out from the crowd.
Jonathan G. Parker, 19, of Fort Loudoun, Pa., is alleged to have burgled a house of two diamond rings. However, according to the Journal of West Virginia, Parker is alleged to have done something of a highly modern nature during this burglary.
For the victim, examining her computer after the burglary, noticed that her computer was logged into someone else's Facebook account. This might seem strange in itself. However, the person who logged on (perhaps to update his status to "feeling lucky today"?) also seems not to have logged off. That led intrepid sleuths to the figure of Parker, whose Facebook page it is indeed alleged, was the one that lay open.
Parker has been charged with one count of having an impressive and excessive ego. I'm sorry, that's not quite right. He has been charged with one count of felony daytime burglary.
It would be churlish to suggest that our obsession with networking socially will get us into trouble. However, after a Florida case in which a man allegedly stole a laptop in order to check his Facebook page, shouldn't we really consider whether the Facebook habit might be leading some to difficult and damaging behavior?
I know there are some bloggers who would like to charge people for leaving comments on their posts.
Not I. Here at Technically Incorrect, you are totally free to besmirch or befuddle without charge.
However, Facebook is now testing a rather interesting way for members to show appreciation for the quality of their friends' updates--giving them credits. And, as I read the smaller print of the scheme, it seems to be something of a dripping revenue stream.
Essentially, the idea is that when you decide that an item on your feed deserves a comment--"How lovely! That's YOUR dimpled bottom skinny-dipping?"--you can leave a certain number of credits to register just how lovely you thought this particular item was.
As far as I can make out, in order to give your love, you have to give your money.
It costs $1 to buy 100 credits. In a world in which we are all striving to show some love to each of our 5,000 friends (you don't have 5,000? what kind of inadequate are you?), it seems quite enchanting that Facebook would like to make a little money out of our need to please.
(Credit:
CC Chicago Eye/Flickr)
According to VentureBeat, whose company network is one of the guinea pigs (along with 15 college networks on Facebook) for this fascinating tryst between Eros and Mammon, Facebook is emphasizing that this is not a competition. This is pure love-giving of the most basic and heartfelt kind.
The number of credits available only apparently appears at the moment when you decide to give some. It's never on your profile page. And you won't ever see how many credits other people gave to a particular item ("What do you mean 'zero credits for my wedding pictures?' That photographer cost us 4 grand!!!").
Now the cynic inside me--who's only been there for a couple of weeks and claims that he's merely a disappointed optimist--suggests that advertising has to be lurking behind this scheme.
Facebook is trying to collect information of such purity that advertisers can take it as emotionally factual. The lack of public scrutiny of the credit numbers means that no one can be influenced by anyone else's opinions.
It also means that Facebook can gauge the items that seem to move people the most and then begin to create selling constructs behind those items.
Facebook says that at some point, it may reveal the list of updates that people are crediting, without, presumably, revealing exactly how many credits these items mustered.
So having adopted some of the emotional characteristics of Twitter with its redesign, Facebook is now asking you to, well, digg.
Digg into your pocket, that is.
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