Why localized social media is not as harmless as it seems.

What is Localized Social Media?

As you know, FaceBook, Twitter, MySpace and the likes are considered social media.  Social Media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques which turn communication into interactive dialogues [1].  The communication medium used for this is the internet.   Since the launch of web based services for mobile devices, the internet is no longer the network that links all computers but it now also includes any and all devices that connect to the 'old internet', expanding the internet tremendously and bringing it into our daily lives.

The Localized part of the definition refers to the ability of most devices to determine their position on the globe using GPS technology.  This position can be used as additional information to add as attribute to any type of information you want to share.  E.g. you can share your thoughts on FaceBook using your cell phone and have your GPS coordinate sent with it or you can automatically share with the Foursquare community that you just entered the Starbucks as such and such location.

Localized social media has been rising since the birth of Foursquare.  Before Foursquare, you had Google Latitude and even when device based GPS wasn't widespread, users on FaceBook and the likes would post their locations online by just typing it in.

Why bother with the Localized stuff?

 

All the FaceBook apps are already using your personal profile information so as long as the information is not linked back to you 'as a person', using the information is legit: the amount of female FarmVille users living in a certain region who focus on growing flowers instead of wheat might be interesting information to a local flower shop. Especially if they can relay their ads to your FaceBook session based on this info.  Most social media hubs like FaceBook already offer ads and suggestions based on such information.

 

Current easy data mining on FaceBook and Twitter provides feedback on the general 'mood' of a country: just query all the statuses of everyone listed in e.g. United Kingdom and filter on predefined words or their combinations related to emotional state. Trendspottingblog has a post on this here. Mind you that these statuses are free information, not personal profile stuff, and as such free to use by 3rd parties.

One type of functionality that will arise from the mix-and-matching of existing features is highly personalized and in-your-face marketing and advertisement. Your cell phone can feed your GPS location to your FaceBook post and as such this information will also be available for query.  Given that most internet users still remain unaware of the humongous loads of personal information they share online, it is only a matter of someone building the data systems to consolidate the bits and pieces. I'm not talking about a 5 year time frame here, this will happen before end 2011.

The next step - which is already being worked on - is bringing this information closer together in real time including your actual location instead of your web browser.

What does this mean for me?

The data mining companies will capture more data in less time which will lead to higher data intelligence.  People who are interested will know more about you than you would prefer.  This data can and will be used to derive 'your marketing profile' and ads will be fit to your assumed needs and wants.  Seems harmless no?

Well, as more information about you becomes available for the marketeers AND more technology becomes available to push information to you as a consumer, you will be confronted with commercial messages in complete new situations:

• Bill boards catering to the 'common divider' of the majority of people in range of this board.
• Your ATM might propose services or products as a means for the banks to cover the costs of the machines.
• Displays spread throughout a store will provide branded imagery tailored to your interest: a specific type of coat or hiking shoe because your FaceBook pictures hold a lot of pictures containing rocks and mountains.  The products you are browsing could be visualized in what is assumed to be your favorite clothing color based on the pictures where you are tagged in.

It seems harmless and to some level it is but the line between marketing and blunt manipulation will become thinner.  There will be a larger grey zone in between what is acceptable and what is not.  This grey zone will not be covered sufficiently by legislation.

On the personal level the impact will be stunning.  Imagine visiting a car dealership and the sales person knows your age, food preferences, color preference, holiday habits, hobbies and amount of children (from former marriages)?  He and all his colleagues got the information as soon as you walked through the door.

How did they do it?

Technically it is a marvel but the idea behind it is relatively simple.  You are your phone.  The one device you have on you at all times which is linked to the internet and the satellite network is your cell phone.

GPS location is still much more unreliable and inaccurate than we all think.  GPS granularity worldwide is still only guaranteed to be 15m.  Anything better is luck.  This would be sufficient to trigger billboard messages along the highway but in a store it is useless.

BUT any and all cell phones have a unique ID to make it accessible at any time in the worldwide mobile phone network.  It is an identifier that helps your calls, messages, data feeds etc to reach YOUR phone and not any other phone.  This Cell ID as it is called can be triangulated using your position with respect to 3 or more Base Transceiver Stations (the gsm antennas on top of buildings etc...).  Given the high density of BTSs in an urban area, this triangulation will have a much higher accuracy.  Some shops have additional indoor systems to enable use of your cell phone within their building.  These systems also have mini-BTSs which can do the triangulation too.

In short: if you send a post to FaceBook, the device it originates from is known by its Cell ID.  The post will be delivered to your account which can be linked to the Cell ID.  Whatever available information about you will also be tied to the Cell ID.  Your LinkedIn details can be found too and linked to the Cell ID.  Your tweets are added to the mix as well as your blogs.  All this information is mixed and matched to derive relevant information about your assumed or expected purchasing behavior (do not underestimate the power of psychological profiles!).  And all this information is now available to the sales guy, giving him a huge advantage in the negotiations.

 

And how about the privacy issue?

Hmm ... as long as the data cannot be routed back to you as a person they can get away with it.  To what extend will this hold if I gather information about my neighbor, link it to his phone but take away his name and personal identification?  I would end up with a context linked to a cell phone without knowing the name of the person holding it.  Now that even 6 year olds have a cell phone, one can assume that the person holding the phone is likely to be the owner.  Not sure if this sticks but I consider most laws to be a backdoor with legal text around it to cover it up ... and so do corporate lawyers (no offense to my lawyer friends).

Are we lost?

 

It all depends on how you want to experience your privacy.  In some countries, personal info like medical records is already shared amongst the hospitals if required without the need for your consent.  You might want to share thoughts and ideas using a blog, your emotional state using tweets, your location either automatically or by typing it in,...

I believe that the next few years will shape the way how privacy will evolve. We just left the decade where people got connected and strangers started sharing information and we are entering the decade where means and technology will allow anyone to sift and filter through this vast amount of data in search of information.  They will decide what they will do with the information, you need to decide what you will share.

Both your professional life and personal life are up for grabs if you're not careful.  Make sharing a deliberate choice, the same way you would do when sharing your lawn mower, your car or even your house,

To end with a positive outlook, some use of personal information will benefit you as some medical information might give emergency services an advantage, the pharmacist a better view on what not to prescribe, robbing a bank while taking your cell phone with you will become a no-no and you will be able to find your kid in the park IF he holds on to his cell phone (or whatever device with the functionality required).

 

Personal opinion - feel free to omit

Call me old fashioned but personally I do not want the rest of my friends to continuously know where I'm at. Buying birthday gifts would be a pain in the ass. Next to this, I believe that most people get numb to the ever expanding load of non-relevant information we get fed every day. This also holds the danger of us not caring anymore what we share, assuming the other people will not read it anyhow.  They might not but the computer systems definitely will.

Apparently the availability of means and technology still drives the manufacturers and developers to build new features and functionalities. Latest bright idea is Google's Instant Search feature which feeds results while you type.  Hmm ... so because the bandwidth is available someone at Google thought I would be interested in crappy results based on my incomplete query.  I'm wandering off topic here but for me, this type of functionality is broken on purpose (see TED talk by Seth Godin for more info on types of broken-ness).

 

I feel like this will not be the only post about this topic ... I'm not done talking just yet :-)

[1] Wikipedia