14 DAY TRIAL // Doesn't that sound all too familiar at this point? I should think it does, it's not been a week since the Beacon scandal calmed down with the apology of Zuckerberg and now the same problems arise again. Well not exactly the same, but in that related area of customer service. Users were upset with Beacon because of the data gathering it had going on, now they are upset because many have been banned (or to say it nicely, their accounts have been disabled) and the company does absolutely nothing about it.
Don't misunderstand me, some accounts deserved their suspension, but others have been put a cross on, just for adding more friends or joining new groups. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't that exactly what a social network user should be doing? Ok, perhaps joining the "I'm building an atomic bomb in my basement" group isn't the smartest thing to do, but still, it's about freedom of expression, free choice and other such UN subjects that we keep hearing about lately.
The customer support service of Facebook is undeniably overstretched, but in spite of that, at least an "ok, I'll look into it" answer could have been sent to the users complaining about what's going on. And by that you should understand that no replies have been given and that the accounts' shutting down happened often without as much as a warning.
Well, if they can't talk to Facebook, users talk among themselves about those problems and so, Thor Muller, CEO of Satisfaction, a people-powered site, emailed Erick Schonfeld of TechCrunch.com about the whole deal.
"Satisfaction has been receiving a steady and significant stream of users whose accounts have been disabled without warning or explanation. Some of them may deserve it for mischief of one sort or another. Many others appear to be innocent victims of FB's unknown and unaccountable flagging systems. In all cases FB maintains a presumption of guilt, and provides users virtually no means to appeal or get information about the presumed offense. The distrust fueled by Beacon is being mirrored in this policy that indicates a flagrant disregard by Facebook towards its users", he says. I just wonder how much fight Facebook has got in it, if problems are going to keep popping up like this, on a nigh-weekly basis.