When Facebook threatened me with banishment for "spamming" in February of last year, I took it seriously. Maybe more seriously than I should have, but, if you think about it, to many of us social media addicts at this moment in time, Facebook is to communication what AT&T was to long distance in the 70s and early 80s. There's no denying we are fast-becoming a nation of "slacktivists," and I'm not proud to be a member, but, what would you have done, if, in 1979, AT&T accused you of making obscene phone calls and banned you from using their service, all while giving you no acceptable means of recourse? You probably would've had to resort to the "soup-can-and-a-string" method when you wanted to say hi to mom in sunny Florida.
Same thing goes in this day and age for us Facebookers. Where do you go if Facebook says you can't play there anymore? Google Plus? Myspace? Please. Sure, you can always start from scratch and create a new profile, but a good majority of us now spend months, even years, creating and building our profiles -amassing, not only a chronicle of our lives -- happily displayed for friends we hardly know -- but, in many cases, incl. my own, creating a network of business contacts as well. Thus, the threat of losing everything I personally spent the last few years building, combined with the shocking realization, that, in Facebook's eyes, you are guilty even if you are innocent, was enough to prompt me to investigate.
I was astonished to discover that a company as large as Facebook, one that's arguably the most influential on the planet and shows no signs of slowing, has no legitimate user support system of any kind. (Don't even try to suggest using the "feedback forums" - where users submit questions and suggestions into the void, n'er to receive a response).
You may laugh this off, and say, "There are so many real and important issues currently facing us, why the heck do you care about Facebook?" It's because of the future. Many of us continue to protest the almost limitless power the Patriot Act gives our government. Aside from a few recent investigations over privacy issues, the way it currently stands, Facebook has its own "Patriot Act" when it comes to deciding the fates of its users, and, if left unchecked, it will only get worse.
More than a tenth of the world's population currently uses Facebook, and, in the coming weeks or months, it will be a publicly traded company worth approximately $100 billion and counting. The only reason Facebook is worth more than fifty bucks is because of us. We put the "use" in "users." We are its stock. And, our information, 'likes,' and dislikes, are the currency of the modern era.
That being said, there's apparently no way for anyone to pick up a phone, or send an email, and receive a timely response from a live human being at Facebook. We're talking about a company that's more powerful than Microsoft (if you had to invest tomorrow, who would you put your money behind?) and the "Oz-like" relationship King Zuckerberg has with his subjects is just plain scary. I'm not talking about trying to "friend" someone you don't know, I'm talking about legal issues like identity theft, pedophiles, stalking, etc., and who knows what else?
The interesting part of all this is, during my search for a way to defend myself against the unfounded charges laid against me, I realized the only way to get Facebook's attention was to sue them. So, I did.
Not wanting to give the impression that I was just another leech trying to make a quick buck, I decided to sue them for $1.00. And, after overcoming a few annoying legal hurdles, i.e. small claims vs. civil court, provisions in Facebook's user agreement requiring them to be sued in California, etc. etc., it worked. Or, so I thought.
I found a lawyer interested in taking on the case and, within a few weeks, we had their attention. Or, more to the point, their out-sourced counsel's attention. Then, an unexpected thing happened; I began getting emails from people all over the country telling me of their own frustrating experiences while attempting to communicate with Oz. The issues covered all of the issues above; from simple threats of banishment for following Facebook's own "friend suggestions," to more serious ones of credit card theft and stalking.
Before I knew it, I had several hundred emails from people wanting to be involved in whatever lawsuit was being put forth regarding user discrimination (or, as I prefer to call it, stonewalling) - and this was only from a few thousand actually reading about the lawsuit - so, my attorney and her colleagues changed course and began to pursue a class action suit against Facebook.
While this was going on, I received a personal settlement offer from Facebook. I would be able to voice whatever changes I thought should be made during a conference call with a senior developer and they would guarantee these changes would be "taken into consideration" (Uh, huh. Like a grizzly bear takes into consideration the pleas of a salmon). All this, in exchange for dropping the suit, relinquishing all rights to sue in the future, and - here's the best part - if I spoke about the case accidentally at a party or in conversation for-the-next-ten-years, I would be in violation of their confidentiality clause and subject to a ten thousand dollar fine and further legal action. Knowing my own uncontrollable tendency to blab about large companies when they behave badly, I knew full well, upon signing that document, I'd go from plaintiff to defendant overnight. All in exchange for a phone call.
As much as I wanted to have a dialogue, which was the objective of the lawsuit in the first place, there was no way I could do it under those conditions, not to mention, the class action was now more important than my personal settlement.
Yes, the class action! To me, this was exactly what I hoped would happen. Through the power of the Net, one person notices a wrong being done to thousands on a daily basis, and, together, they unite and fight to correct it! "Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?!" Ah, democracy. But, not so fast.
After weeks of hemming and hawing, it was determined the best way to force King Zuckerberg to address the injustices heaped upon the peasants was with injunctive relief. But, even with a dozen highly-trained legal minds on the case, they could not think of a viable claim that would encompass us all. Next came breach of contract, but because Facebook is not currently a pay service, that one flopped as well. They even tried defamation, but, apparently, it's a tough sell in the context of a class action.
Bottom line, after months of research and consulting with several class action firms from Palo Alto to Houston to New York, we soon realized nothing like this had ever been done, and there's simply nothing on the books to prevent Facebook from doing whatever it wants to its users when it comes to unwarranted abuse and persecution. And, in my humble opinion, there's something really wrong with that; the beanstalk grows higher into the sky, while simultaneously crushing the billion or so 'Jacks' who planted it? That's a load o' b.s.
I also discovered, after discussing the subject with one of the more liberal commissioners at the FCC, that he, personally, feels our current laws are dangerously ill-equipped to deal with the exponentially fast-growing pace of technology. He couldn't even say for certain which agency would ultimately prosecute - FCC, FTC, FTD, etc. Granted, maybe the floral chain wouldn't be the best place to start, but they seem to have just as much jurisdiction over this matter as the rest of them.
In the end, my one dollar lawsuit wound up costing me more than $3,000.00 in attorney fees - and that was at the 'interested-lawyer-discounted-rate' - but, what we discovered might actually be useful to some crusading congressman in the not to distant future. That's provided they can tear themselves away from the photo ops with Mr. Zuckerberg long enough to see the problem.
If you ask me, pay or not, Facebook is at least guilty of ethics violations when it plays judge and jury and convicts a user for policy infringements without providing him/her with an ample forum for defense. It's also guilty of the most blatant customer service violations when it 'accidentally' leaks your private information and doesn't even offer a phone number to call to correct it. And now, that the Silicon Valley behemoth is planning on turning on its users and selling their info to advertisers, this lopsided relationship grows even more one-sided. http://tinyurl.com/7fztzba
Most importantly, Facebook's non-existent user response center, and its fight to keep it that way, should serve as a warning going forward to all of our congressional rep's. The last time lawmakers let an online service run amok, someone got killed. The last thing anyone wants is a Craigslist-like incident where some lunatic gets banned for whatever reason, and, because he can't reach anyone to complain about his ex-girlfriend posting rumors about him on her page, he walks into Facebook's offices and opens fire. Sadly, it's not that far-fetched.
I'm no lawyer, but it seems much easier to simply pass legislation making it a requirement for any business - free or not - in control of sensitive user information to provide a valid source of customer help and feedback. Not some FAQ page with answers a monkey would know in an attempt to assist eight hundred million people (the credit bureaus have that market cornered, anyway). iTunes does it, Amazon does it, why shouldn't Facebook do it? If they're too busy, why not make it a contest? Everyone fancies themselves a developer nowadays, so, if Zuckerberg's robots can't figure out a way to handle the world's biggest switchboard, why not offer $25,000.00 and a development job to the coder whose idea best solves the user support issue? Seems they can afford it, and doing it that way would reflect much better on them in the court of public opinion, rather than waiting until congress forces them to.
In closing, I will say, while no one will begrudge Mr. Zuckerberg and Co. their capitalist right to make as much money as they possibly can off the upcoming IPO, Facebook and its staff have an obligation to each and every user who made their obscenely large bank accounts possible. And, to quote Roger Waters, that obligation simply means, "Tear Down the Wall!" Otherwise, we won't 'like' them anymore.
Click below to read the original articles on the issue of Facebook user support.
http://www.webpronews.com/facebook-sued-dollar-david-fagin-2011-04
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7tqeeJsyp0
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