Two Weeks on Apple’s Ping OR “Is Anybody Out There?”

When it comes to technology, I am under the firm belief that it is important to give something a real go before judging it. I’ve been on Apple’s Ping music-based social network for 2 weeks now and I finally feel like I am ready to make a ruling. Unfortunately for Jobs and co., it’s not one they are going to like – Ping is bad. Really bad. Terrible in fact. So bad that I would rather listen to a two hour recital for the local beginner’s Suzuki violin-based music program than spend another hour messing around with Ping.

The worst part might be that there are so many different bad parts, that I have no idea where to start. But here goes my attempt. The five reasons why Apple’s Ping needs to meet the fate of Google Wave (at best) but should really disappear all together in order to facilitate quick un-remembering.

Five Major Ping Fails:

1. Population – Apple billed Ping as its very own music-based social network, the final nail in MySpace’s coffin capable of rivalling and even surpassing the social aspects of Last FM (though without the all important streaming function). However, for either of these predictions to come true, large numbers of people would actually need to be using Ping, which they are not currently doing.
2. Sign-Up – To be able to get a Ping account, it is necessary to go through an iTunes store account. This isn’t a problem in and of itself except for the major issue that in most countries outside of the United States it is necessary to use a credit card to create an account. Do you think nearly as many people would be on Facebook if it required a credit card to sign up? Definitely not. Yes, there is a work around (by going through the App Store) to be able to get an account, but it is cumbersome and few but the most keen and most savvy potential Ping users would be willing/able to follow through. There are lots of people who do not have and do not want a credit card (I being one of them). Apple needs to stop pretending like we don’t exist.
3. Search – Those few people (especially interesting people) that are actually on Ping are next to impossible to find. Without being able to easily connect to friends on other social networks such as Facebook or Twitter, or even being able to find people via an email contact book, building a network is very difficult. Add to that ridiculous suggestions from Apple on people/artists to follow (no Apple I do not want to follow Miley Cyrus!) and this alone is a recipe for disaster.
4. Personalization – Considering that Apple is the largest online music retailer, it should certainly know better than to suggest that a person can only like three different genres of music. Furthermore, that Apple would force Ping members to choose from such a limited list is downright embarrassing. Where is folk on the list? Or blues? Can’t jazz music be inspirational? When has someone ever responded “soundtrack” when asked what kind of music they like to listen to?
5. Like – Ping only allows users (at time of posting) to like music they have purchased or are purchasing from the iTunes store. For someone like me who prefers to buy CDs, this means that my commitment to purchasing music in local record stores or at concert venues doesn’t count for anything. I understand that Apple is a company and wants to make money, and quite possibly thinks that this constraint will encourage people to buy more music from the iTunes store. But, at the same time Apple needs to recognize, if it is truly serious about becoming the network for music lovers, that none of the major social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube etc. – grew within a highly commercialized network model and there is no reason to suggest that Ping could be the exception. Even where social networks, Last FM being a prime example, have developed a highly commercial model, they have done so after generating a wide user base who is familiar with the services offered and is excited about the great value that they will be getting for any dollars spent.

Now I’m not doing anything as drastic as shutting my Ping account down completely. I hope that Apple goes back to the drawing board, and does so quickly, to be able to work out all of the major kinks in Ping. But, I remain cynical. Apple, at least lately, seems to have forgotten what it is to be cool. Bullies and control freaks may seem cool in high school, but in the real world it is the carefree, the open, the useful and the fun that are cool, just like it was when we were children. Apple it’s time to grow up.*

* Note in interest of fairness, this was written from a MacBook (though using open source software).

Checking Out of Facebook Places

Those of you who have read my earlier blog post about location-based social networking are already aware of my personal inhibitions towards having my real time location shared online. With yesterday’s launch of Facebook Places, the time has come for more platform specific advice.

The first thing that all Facebook users should know is that regardless of your privacy settings on Facebook the privacy options for Facebook Places by default allow:

• At least your friends to see when/where YOU check into a location
• Friends (your Facebook friends) are able to check YOU into places

The problems with these defaults seem pretty obvious but here are a few examples of potential disastrous uses of Facebook Places in case they aren’t:

1. Yesterday you promised your grandmother that you would come over for dinner, but by noon today  you had forgotten. A friend from work invites you out for wings and beer at the end of the day and you go along. This friend checks you into the bar and Gramma (who’s your Facebook friend – yes lots of grammas are on Facebook!) sees. How do you think this is going to make her feel? How hard are you going to have to work to make it up to her?
2. An old friend is having a party, but you don’t want to go. You haven’t seen her in a while, you don’t know many of her new friends and you know it would be awkward. When she calls, you lie and say that you can’t come because you have to work late. That night you go to the movies with your new boyfriend instead. Proud to show you off he checks you in. Awkward next time you do run into this old friend? Most certainly.
3. You’re 18 years old off to college/uni for the first time. The first night you’re there you decide to go a little wild (it’s your first night away from home after all). A fun-loving new friend checks you in at “Kevin’s Crunknormous Keggar – Blazing and Boozing all Night Long!”. Your rather strict mother is your Facebook friend.
4. You’re in high school and you’ve been getting bullied pretty bad. A friend tries to cheer you up by taking you for an ice-cream. She checks into the ice-cream shoppe via her phone and checks you in too. Five minutes later your worst nightmare shows up. So much for the cheer up!

Where the percentage of Facebook users under the age of 18 has skyrocketed these default settings are something parents of teenagers in particular should definitely be aware of not just in terms of cyber-bullying but also in terms of ensuring that the risk of your child coming into contact with online and offline predators is as best mitigated as possible.

In terms of family safety, you may not want your child naively “checking in” to places while on a family vacation or day trip if their privacy settings are set to everyone – they may not realize it but essentially they are telling the world that you are not home (and if on vacation that you likely won’t be for a while). That fake beware of dog sign suddenly doesn’t seem like full enough protection does it?

How to Disable Facebook Places

Lifehacker has created an excellent video tutorial for disabling Facebook Places as best as possible (it is as of yet not possible to disable or remove the entire feature).

If you are having any difficulties in disabling Facebook Places, or would like to discuss it further, please let me know!

Social Media: Where Should We Draw the Privacy Line?

I like social media a lot. But I like my computer, drum kit and Playstation more. Not only do I enjoy playing a Playstation (2) or drum kit more than I enjoy tweeting, but I also much prefer owning these things than being on the cutting edge of social media. That is why my line is drawn at Four Square – maybe the correct terminology should be my line is drawn just before Four Square –  regardless of the wording, I am on one side and Four Square is definitely on the other. Four Square isn’t lonely though as it’s joined by nearly all applications that can track you and reveal your real-life whereabouts online.

For those of you familiar with Four Square, it is a location-based social networking site and global game where users use their mobile phones (through text, applications, or internet access) to “check in” at different locations pretty much anywhere. I’ve seen check-ins at coffee shops, tourist sites and even forests – nowhere seems to be off limits. Users can collect badges and points based on the number of times they check into location which can be redeemed for discounts or other perks. Plus there is the glory of being the first person to “check in” somewhere.

There are obvious privacy implications with using this kind of software. Please Rob Me said it first (and best): “The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you’re definitely not… home. So here we are; on one end we’re leaving lights on when we’re going on a holiday, and on the other we’re telling everybody on the internet we’re not home.” This is why for me there is this trade-off – I can either join my friends on Four Square and increase my chances of being burgled or I can not join in and keep my Playstation and drums. It seems like a no-brainer.

And in this unfair world that we live in, as a woman not only would I be putting the safety of my belongings into jeopardy, I’d also be risking my personal safety. That women (and men too) are experiencing an increase in cyberstalking should come as no surprise – we already reveal so much of ourselves on our Twitter accounts and Facebook profiles, that even for someone as privacy conscious as myself it wouldn’t be difficult for someone to compile a lot of data on me. But whereas with Facebook creeping and Twitter over-following there still seems to be some sort of barrier from it crossing too-often into the real world (though this barrier is still crossed with alarming frequency) Four Square blows away this barrier entirely. As your Twitter follower (and really what percentage of Twitter users protect their tweets), if you have your Four Square synced I can easily track you down anywhere nearly any time. There have been cases of this already, though the two that have been most high-profile of late are mostly benign (How I Became a Four Square Cyber Stalker in The Sydney Morning Herald) (The Night I Was Cyberstalked on Four Square from The Guardian) I can easily see this slipping into the dark quite quickly.

Now I’m not advocating that these technologies be abandoned entirely, I’m just saying that I think we as users of social media need to think carefully about the compromises and trade-offs that we are being asked to make for the sake of being part of the ‘in-crowd’. If you think that having the chance to meet new people, cultivate off-line relationships with on-line personas and get 10% off your morning coffee is worth the privacy risks then go for it. For me it just isn’t. It’s entirely possible that I’m just paranoid, in fact it is likely, but I would rather exist in my tiny bubble of false security than exist any other way. I’ll keep meeting new people the old-fashioned way  - striking up conversations and letting them evolve naturally based on listening fully to the other person, relying on my gut instinct to guide me rather than a digital list of common interests. Not only  does this seem less creepy but it also seems more fun.