Facebook Needs to Stand up to Rogue Apps

Facebook’s modus operandi almost since its inception has been to launch a feature, listen to feedback from users, and then tweak it. Standard operating procedure for thousands of businesses, right?

Remember the News Feed launch and the huge uproar over that? And what about Beacon? The problem is that the amount of time Facebook waits before making changes is getting too long for comfort.

Case in point: yesterday, Facebook announced a series of changes designed to reduce application spam. You know - the apps that force you to invite friends so you can see the results of the quiz you just took, or the ones that send mail to your personal email account (such as the Movies app that spammed me 5 times over the weekend).

According to the Facebook Blog (emphasis mine):

• When you get a request from an application, you now have the ability to “Block Application” directly from the request. If you block an application, it will not be able to send you any more requests.




• A few weeks ago, we added the ability to “Clear All” requests from your requests page when you have a lot of requests and invitations that you haven’t responded to yet.




• Your feedback now determines how many communications an application can send. When invitations and notifications are ignored, blocked, or marked as spam, Facebook reduces that application’s ability to send more. Applications forcing their users to send spammy invitations can wind up with no invitations at all. The power is in your hands; block applications that are bothering you, and report spammy or abusive communications, and we’ll restrict the application.




• We’ve explicitly told developers they cannot dead-end you in an “Invite your Friends” loop. If you are trapped by an application, look for a link to report that “This application is forcing me to invite friends”. Your reports will help us stop this behavior.




• We’ve added an option to the Edit Applications page that allows you to opt-out of emails sent from applications you’ve already added. When you add a new application, you can uncheck this option right away.




• Applications must now give you advanced warning if you’ll need to invite friends to get information or access content. So you should always know ahead of time if that quiz you’re taking will require you to invite friends to see your results. If you see applications withholding content without warning, go to that application’s About page to report it.

The changes come only after Facebook members griped for months about spammy apps. And notably (see the boldfaced sentences above), Facebook isn’t being nearly as aggressive as members may have hoped. Instead of simply banning rogue apps, Facebook tells members that THEY have to do the complaining.

I think it’s time for Facebook to take more responsibility within the app ecosystem it created. ISPs routinely blacklist email spammers. Facebook ought to do the same for bad apps.