About Facebook -------------------------- I'm not sure that you're aware that Facebook is part of a Federal Data Mining Program that is linked directly to DARPA and the Office of Information Awareness. The stated mission of the Office of Information Awareness is to gather as much information as possible on everyone and store it in a centralized database for easy perusal by the US government. Facebook utilizes data mining tools that allow them to capture all of a users internet activity, including credit card purchases, car rentals, medical records, driver's license info, etc. In other words, Big Brother is indeed watching through the use of Facebook and other social networking sites. I avoid Facebook like the plague. They utilize non-expirable cookies that are extremely difficult to erase from your registry, and even if you could erase them all, they are re-seeded with each new visit to your page. This is mainly how they are able to track your movements around the net. Your surfing habits are all recorded so that other advertisers (and who knows who else) can do target-marketing directly to you and your individual interests. I'm not at all trying to tell you what to do here but I just want to make clear that I will be unable to contribute any work that will be associated with Facebook. These types of personal info databases are used against citizens all the time. They are part of a larger objective that includes Watch Lists and No-Fly lists and other Red Flag governmental programs. Not trying to sound like I'm wearing a tin foil hat or anything. I just figured you had no idea of the extent to which Facebook in particular invades personal privacy. Excerpt from the Terms of Service: When you post User Content to the Site, you authorize and direct us to make such copies thereof as we deem necessary in order to facilitate the posting and storage of the User Content on the Site. By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing. You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content. Facebook does not assert any ownership over your User Content; rather, as between us and you, subject to the rights granted to us in these Terms, you retain full ownership of all of your User Content and any intellectual property rights or other proprietary rights associated with your User Content. Excerpt from their Privacy Policy: Facebook may also collect information about you from other sources, such as newspapers, blogs, instant messaging services, and other users of the Facebook service through the operation of the service (e.g., photo tags) in order to provide you with more useful information and a more personalized experience. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office Excerpt from that wiki-page : The Information Awareness Office (IAO) was established by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense, in January 2002 to bring together several DARPA projects focused on applying information technology to counter transnational threats to national security. The IAO mission was to "imagine, develop, apply, integrate, demonstrate and transition information technologies, components and prototype, closed-loop, information systems that will counter asymmetric threats by achieving total information awareness". Following public criticism that the development and deployment of these technologies could potentially lead to a mass surveillance system, the IAO was defunded by Congress in 2003, although several of the projects run under IAO have continued under different funding. -------- Texts of the Facebook site : Facebook is a social networking website launched on February 4, 2004. The free-access website is privately owned and operated by Facebook, Inc. Users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages,.. Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet. Anyone can join Facebook.