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Ramesh Koneru - Lifestream and daily musings. Served fresh from Hyderabad, India.
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Why I, Like, Really Dislike Facebook's 'Like' Button - PCWorld

Facebook is taking the notion of "friends" more literally than most of its users do, I suspect. That leads to a Too Much Information problem, which its new "Like" program will only exacerbate.

Make no mistake, this is a power grab. Facebook is making a play to become the single-sign-on and social-sharing engine for every major site on the Net. Call it the FaceWeb.

What I keep thinking is that corporations spend tens of millions of dollars trying to figure out what consumers like. Facebook is getting this information for free. What will it do with this data, down the road when everyone is used to reflexively hitting Like? If you believe they aren't thinking about the buckets of money they can make from this in years to come, you are living in a dream world, my friend.

Of course this is no vast conspiracy to steal your data. You can opt out, though Facebook has yet to unveil granular controls that let you choose which "Likes" to share and which to keep to yourself. But you know most people will accept the default settings without thinking twice. (My advice? Think twice.)

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Most Innovative Companies - 2010: Facebook | Fast Company

Two beloved engineers, Ruchi Sanghvi and Aditya Agarwal, had arrived at Facebook as a couple in 2005 and survived the unique pressure of cranking out code for the hottest startup in the world. "They were a package deal," says Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg. So, over what the company still calls its "Christmas break," Zuckerberg and more than a dozen past-and-present Facebook indispensables -- including now-departed cofounders Adam D'Angelo and Dustin Moskovitz -- trekked to a beach in Goa, India, for a week-long family celebration. Everyone dressed in costumed splendor; Zuckerberg looked fetching in a maroon silk sherwani. Women flashed henna tattoos. The groom arrived on horseback.

The elaborate Indian ceremony, a Bollywood spectacle with a big helping of Silicon Valley, presented a rare, vulnerable moment for the Facebook infrastructure -- one rogue wave could have taken out much of the site's brain trust. But it also offered a point of reflection for the crew. "All of us together, in that beautiful place," one attendee recalls. "We've come so far. Literally."

Goa is a treat!
Nice.

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