The Northerner

Issue date: 9/20/06 Section: Features

Many Northern Kentucky University students have become uncomfortable with the new "face" of Facebook.com.

It's not the pictures your best friend posted of you from your dance party or a post your ex wrote on your wall. It's the fact that your friends can now see those actions without even having to search. It's News Feed.

While some members are enjoying the convenience of News Feed's automatic updates, others are creating anti-News Feed groups on Facebook and fretting about the implications such an addition to their homepages might hold. The words "invasions of privacy" are swelling within the campus networks.

When Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook, it was with the intention of having "an environment where people could share whatever information they wanted, but also have control over whom they shared that information with."

Sites like MySpace allow anyone to view a member's profile whether they are friends or not. However, Facebook only allows people to access other's information if they have already been accepted as a friend.

Ruchi Sanghvi, the product manager for the feed, said it "updates a personalized list of news storied throughout the day … Whenever you log in, you'll get the latest headlines generated by the activity of your friends and social groups." News Feed is constantly updating all kinds of actions from who posted on whose wall to who just got engaged.

Yet some people feel that even reading the News Feed on their friends is a little discomforting. "It's a really nosy thing," said freshman nursing major Brittany Wood. "I don't look at it because I feel rude. If you want to know that stuff you can look at their page."

Undeclared freshman Cari Vaughn said, "I don't like it because I feel like it's an invasion of privacy."

Sophomore Andrew Raver said it's bothersome to have the front page of his Facebook to be a detailed list of all of his friends' moves. "I hate it. I don't need to know everything all of my friends are doing. It's cumbersome."

News Feed was launched Sept. 5, 2006. That same day, Zuckerberg received enough complaints that he posted a response reminding users that only their friends will get their information posted on the News Feeds: "none of your information is visible to anyone who couldn't see it before."

So why is it still bothersome? Jodie Ulm, freshman pre-veterinary major, said she doesn't like News Feed because it takes up space. "News Feed tells me things that really have nothing to do with me. It's just that it's all right there in front of you, telling me what I'm constantly doing-it's a waste of space."

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