Facebook has once again grabbed gumboots and a bucket and gone wading into the streams of data flowing from its users, attempting to pan for advertiser gold with scant regard for user opinions or privacy concerns.

Latest Facebook folly: “Sponsored Stories”, which the social giant describes as:

“word-of-mouth recommendations about brands that come from your News Feed. Examples of the types of stories that can be surfaced in Sponsored Stories include: Page Likes, Page posts, app interactions and Place check-ins. For example, if your friends like a Page, in addition to seeing that story in your News Feed, you may see the same story on the right-hand column on Facebook.”

If you want to see how Facebook thinks marketers can exploit consumer interest for commercial gain, take a look at this video spelling it all out in painful detail.

Apart from such minor issues as privacy, Sponsored Stories have the potential to change consumer behaviour on the site.

Why on earth would you mention a brand in any post if that brand was suddenly going to pop-up on all your friends’ newsfeeds, proclaiming your championing of their brand as if you were suddenly their greatest evangelist?

Immediate side-effects of this latest crass commercialisation: consumers unliking your brands en masse, and going out of their way to avoid using any sponsored apps or checking-in at any major location.

Not to mention class-action lawsuits from those whose privacy (and reputation with their friends and followers) is threatened. Oh yeah, and a deliberate strategy by disgruntled users of posting negative comments about participating brands, to taint their Sponsored Stories ….

Who dreams up these ideas?

Oh, right, saw it on “The Social Network” — anti-socialites.

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Tags: Facebook, fail, sponsored stories