I’ve been having an interesting pair of discussions over on Twitter this morning about the twin blazing issues of Apple Computer’s reaction to an iPhone G4 prototype being sold to Gizmodo and a Facebook user privacy policy seemingly designed by Rube Goldberg.
I’m very curious to know what everyday people think about either of these issues–if anything at all. What has surprised me is the number of people who seem quick to say they know of many people moving away from Apple product or leaving Facebook caring nothing whatsoever about it.
One woman told me that all her friends were switching from iPhone, but she later said she was “speaking figuratively.” Same with my Twitter colleague who estimated that 60 percent of facebook would leave.
I just do not think that this is how a major brand, supported by hundreds of millions of people implode, It is not so simple and it is certainly not so fast.
Let there be no mistake. In my view the decisions and actions of Facebook and Apple are deathly serious and could have enormous, and long-lasting impact on corporate position.
That is if the actions of the last few weeks end up being datapoints on a timeline that show a reversal of company behavior, a behavior that continues for a prolonged period into the future.
There’s really no doubt about it. Most people who use Apple products and Facebook don’t like what these companies have done. They don’t like it enough to remember the incidents for some time to come. They don’t like it enough to insert privavcy and police in the night into conversations about these companies.
But so far, very, very few people will be willing to just walk away.
It’s sort of like a loved one who disappoints you. Have you have a long, well-established relationship, that disappointment would have to be huge for you to just walk away. It should be.
But still, it makes you pause to think. It makes you watch the other party’s words and acts a little more closely and with a tad greater suspicion. If there are subsequent breeches of faith, then you might start seriously examining other options.
And while such trends always start on a minuscule level, they can accelerate with great speed. Just look back. In my life. conventional wisdom told me that GM simply made the toughest and most enduring cars; that IBM literally owned the PC industry that no modern enterprise would trust open source applications; that IT would never allow the internet security dangers. We also knew that there three TV networks, and few powers were great than big media power.
And so on.
Each of these were tiny, little movements. Then one day, we blinked and generally recognized truths were no longer true and the new powers seemed to have come out of nowhere.
One of those two powers came out of Harvard University fraternity houses. Another, Apple Computer involves the restoration of an exiled founder named Steve Jobs. This latter one is the best industrial comeback story I know.
Both Apple and Facebook got to where they are with great speed and with few people seeing it coming. Both could return to oblivion with equal or perhaps great speed.
Whether this happens or not does not depend on a few poor choices they recently made. It depends upon what they do next.
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Does anybody reading this article remember this Wired story, dated July of ’09: http://bit.ly/b9jJQ1
Hang with me, here are some of the key phrases in this article, if you don’t want to read the whole thing: “unleashed its central security division”, “unbearable interrogation techniques”, “apologizing for the incident”, “used “inappropriate interrogation methods,” including possible beatings, searching Sun’s house and holding Sun in solitary confinement.” “Apple is infamous for operating with a level of secrecy comparable to the Central Intelligence Agency.”
ANYBODY HERE REMEMBER THIS HAPPENING? I brought this up to some techies right after this May 26th article came up, which everybody seemed to be so incensed: http://bit.ly/9Bxxtf – NOBODY remembered that July 09 “incident.”
Here’s my point: We are “drinking our own tea” if we think the average joe on the street has heard anything like that story. They have Katie Couric, CNN, NYT, LAT, FoxNews, et al., IF they have that much news.
A few weeks ago, I would purposefully ask some regular people that I knew were on FaceBook about some recent news items regarding the privacy flak that has been mounting. Some under cover journalism, if you will. I found that not one single person out of about 25 people had any clue that there was any problem.
I didn’t try to educate them, either.
People have short memories in politics and tech!
Facebook will not go away completely any time soon (MySpace is still around), but when it does begin to fade, it won’t be because of privacy issues. Facebook is a fad just like MySpace and Instant Messaging before it. It’s original success came from people’s growing disinterest in MySpace. Facebook was new, better, less complicated, and most of all did a better job of listening to what the users wanted. Currently Facebook doesn’t have any real competition, but if Diaspora ever roles out, it may be in trouble. *Generation Y generally doesn’t care about our Facebook information getting out to marketers, employers are a different story, but anyone who worries about that simply doesn’t put incriminating information on FB. We’ve all been told a thousand times: if you’re not comfortable with it being on the front page of your local paper, don’t put it on Facebook.
Not to excuse Apple, but it seems odd to me to lump their offenses with those of Facebook. Facebook’s privacy policies affect everyone on their site. Apple responded to a singular and event with arguably criminal activies by instigating an egregious, but narrowly directed, police action. Facebook’s policies define the actual product that everyone uses. Apple’s aggressiveness has become a cause celebre for a very narrow group of folks—none of whom will ever have a visit from the police.
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