Facebook Applications: Silliness, spam and spoofs

Is it just me or have Facebook applications become too damn annoying?

Don't get me wrong. I think Facebook is terrific. I love when someone I know from a past life friends me. Or better yet, I am thrilled when someone who has read my book or heard me speak live connects via Facebook. I've got Facebook friends from all over the world (keep the friends requests coming folks).

As much as I like Facebook, I'm just not into the third party applications thing. I find the applications that require some sort of reply to be particularly annoying. So-and-so wants to "network using business cards" and this one "dedicated a song to you" and that one "asked her friends a question". The problem with these things is that they require action on my part. So I think of them as sort of spam-like. Sure it only takes a moment to click the ignore button, but these things seem a little outside the scope of Facebook, at least the way that I am using it.

Am I being overly harsh?

There are now 4,500 Facebook Applications, the vast majority developed by people who do not work for Facebook. In fact, this is a very hot area for Venture Capitalists to put money these days. There are sites that review and recommend applications. It's all very new and we're all learning as we go. But I predict a backlash against some of the more annoying applications.

Facebook is great for connecting. But I don’t see it as a game. I don't really want to know "What My Stripper Name Is" (Note, if you're actually a stripper, this switches to "What's Your Internetweb Geek Name") and I don’t want to use BoozeMail to "Send your friends a drink (or even a round of drinks) on Facebook." Although, I must admit I'm rather intrigued by NaughtyGirls "Get Naughty. Send very naughty gifts and very naughty messages to all of your friends."

And here's something really creepy to really gum up the works. Today I got a Facebook Application spoof email. It looked exactly like a typical Facebook request email, but when I moused over the URL, it was some dodgy address somewhere, not Facebook. Ugh.

Just when we figured out how to deal with comment spam and trackback spam, we’ve got to deal with Facebook app spam.

Comments

[Linda VandeVrede]

You're right - the applications have taken a good concept and made it junky. The best thing about Facebook, along with sites like LinkedIn, is the ability to protect your personal brand.
http://www.valleyprblog.com/?p=480

Maybe the college kids are the ones who enjoy the applications most. The site was originally designed for them anyway.

[Christine Kane]

I'm with you on Facebook. After I joined, people kept sending me things to put in my "aquarium" ??? It just got to be way too much like Hello Kitty or something.

HOWEVER - the other night, I did a rare performance at a university -- and many of the students at my show were ON THEIR LAPTOPS during my show. And I stopped to ask them what they were doing. EVERY one of them was on Facebook. When I asked about MySpace, they said it had gotten too "child molester-y."

So, off we go to add things to the aquarium!

[Parker]

I definitely agree with you, David.
To quote a friend of mine, "It's as annoying as MySpace...and when is the last time you saw an actually fact on myspace, past all those stupid extras?"

[Dharmesh Shah]

I could not agree more.

Another annoying habit of most third-party applications: They try to trick you into sending invites out to all your Facebook friends.

For example, when you Flixster (the movie application), and take the default action without thinking (i.e. click "continue") you end up sending a message out to all your friends to use the app. The option that does *not* do this is a bit hidden in the upper right corner.

Too many Facebook applications in an attempt to "go viral" try to lure users into spreading the application to their friends.

[Alina Anton]

Hi guys,

I just read all your comments about Facebook, and I want to share my view on this subject. I am new on this website, just joined it yesterday, and for me it doesn't look at all with Linkedin, where I have an account for more than an year now. Anyhow, Facebook seems to me like a getting together website outside work, while I see Linkedin focused entirely on work related issues. Maybe in time this will change, like it happened to Facebook, as I understood, but we have to take into consideration that all change, and evolve, depending on the users.

Cheers,

Alina

[Matt Rogers]

Sounds like you want to join this Facebook Group:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6425447055

It's the "Please don't be offended if I ignore your application request" group.

[Debra Yemenijian]

You have to give the application designers — whether on the Facebook payroll or not — kudos for their attempt at "viral" media. Unfortunately, this is just another example of technology missing the mark. Sure, it builds to the Facebook brand, but it's not helping me build my own.

As a MySpace veteran, I joined Facebook out of curiousity a few months ago. In that time, I've lost interest due to the number of times a week I receive invitations for applications meant to enhance my networking experience.

I'd much rather see Facebook integrate a blogging capability with RSS feed — a tool that allows me to market myself. To me, that's much more valuable than being able to attack friends with virtual vampires and ninjas or participate in a profile-to-profile food fight.

[Jeremy Schram]

While I do agree with most of you guys on how anoying some of these new applications can be, you have to remember who Facebook is targeted to. It started of as site where you had to belong to a school in order to join. Beyond that, I think you had to have a college email to join. That bein said, the target market for Facebook it the 18 to 25 year old college student. Many of them like these applications. The more they like them, the more they login, and the more often they see the ads on the sides of the page. get my drift?

[David Meerman Scott]

Jeremy,

While I agree that younger people like the applications, I violently disagree that Facebook is only targeted to 18-25 year olds. My daughter is 14 and spends an hour on Facebook a day and so do all of her friends. I am 46 and I have a bunch of friends and use Facebook a lot.

The people who run Facebook realize that it is a tool for all groups.

David

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