Suit Forces AOL to Let Users Log Off

Sam Biddle: It's trying 'to be' the Internet, just like AOL did—badly

(NEWSER) - So now we'll be able to watch movies on Facebook. And play Angry Birds . And pretty much everything else, the way things are going. "Facebook is reaching its tendrils into every single thing we like about the Internet, far, far beyond the actual reasons we rolled up to Zuckerberg's site in the first place," writes Sam Biddle at Gizmodo . That strategy remind you of anything? Try AOL back in the 1990s. More»

Said reporter posing as girl harassed by men

(NEWSER) - Posing as a 14-year-old girl on Facebook, a Daily Mail reporter was bombarded by messages from 20- to 40-year-old men wanting "to perform a sex act"—only it was really another social networking site, and Facebook is livid and threatening to sue over the misreported story . The author of the item, which appeared yesterday, said he was on another site and that editors added the mention against his wishes. Fine, says Facebook, but the paper was slow to respond and the damage is done. More»

Chasing search terms is a bad way to produce content

(NEWSER) - AOL’s latest brilliant plan is to reinvent itself as an imitation of what Farhad Manjoo considers possibly the worst website in the world. New CEO Tim Armstrong recently unveiled his plan to make AOL a premier provider of “content.” It’ll have a computer scan search results for popular topics, then pay freelancers next to nothing to produce something related. If that business model sounds familiar, it’s because it’s similar to that of Associated Content (a company in which Armstrong is said to be an investor), notes Manjoo on Slate . More»

(NEWSER) - A group of Facebook users has sued the social networking company for violating consumer privacy laws by harvesting personal information for commercial purposes and failing to compensate clients, reports CNET. "Plaintiffs and the general public desire and expect a level of privacy, which Facebook has failed to satisfy," states the California lawsuit, which includes two children, a model, photographer and actress. Facebook officials insist the case has no merit. Canadian courts are currently cracking down on Facebook's access to user data. More»

Most listed on site actually don't subscribe, says NY man

(NEWSER) - A Brooklyn man is suing Match.com over “humiliation and disappointment” suffered by users who seek dates with non-subscribers, the New York Post reports. Most people listed on the site, he says, “are canceled subscribers or never subscribed at all.” And those who e-mail them “feel rejected when their e-mails get no reply,” Sean McGinn claims. More»