Facebook disables (and re-enables) Robert Scoble (your data is not your data)

Last night Facebook disabled Robert Scoble’s account for violating the terms of service. Specifically, they disabled it because they detected page view activity that was consistent with an automated script.

Scoble posted the actual e-mail that he got from Facebook, so you can read it if you’re curious.

For a lot of people, getting sandboxed by Facebook is really bad news for them. It might hurt their business. It might kill a lot of their social interaction. For Robert, getting sandboxed by Facebook is bad news for Facebook, because that big fat elephant that was lurking in the back of their office—you know, the one about who owns your contacts?—has now been dramatically pushed to the forefront of the discussion.

Guess what: you don’t own the contacts you have in Facebook. You can’t take them with you.

Robert was disabled for using a beta Plaxo Pulse feature that pulls your contact data from Facebook and links it up with your Outlook. Which is, stupidly, against the Facebook Terms of Service.

Robert’s planning to do a live broadcast today at 2pm (pacific) to answer all sorts of questions about Facebook and Plaxo. I’m also looking forward to picking his brain at our CES party next week

The bottom line is, everything goes in to Facebook, and nothing comes out. It is a black hole. Which is dumb, because Facebook is based on your input. There are only a few things where, if I put stuff in, I never expect to get them back out. The stock market, for example. (Oh, Zing!)

On Twitter, Andru Edwards, Teresa, myself, and others are having a cool discussion about the validity of Facebook’s ToS. Worth following (start from the bottom):

dbrowell @TeteSagehen , IMHO, I feel that I should b in control of my privacy, not Scobel; not FB either, which is why Beacon made people mad, right? 7 minutes ago from web in reply to TeteSagehen

AndruEdwards Facebook has a TOS. If you agree to it, use it. If you don’t agree, then don’t use it. It’s that simple! Don’t agree and then break it. 10 minutes ago from twitterrific

AndruEdwards @jasonp107 - so that you can contact me off of facebook, not so you can scrape all my facebook data out of it. 11 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to jasonp107

jasonp107 @AndruEdwards then why do you list your e-mail address in FB? That’s a totally external piece of information… less than 10 seconds ago from web in reply to AndruEdwards

AndruEdwards @jasonp107 - yes, you get what info i provide ON and WITHIN Facebook. That is what i agreed to. 5 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to jasonp107

jasonp107 @AndruEdwards I get your point on privacy, but I feel like friending on FB = you get whatever contact info I provide 7 minutes ago from Snitter in reply to AndruEdwards

AndruEdwards @TeteSagehen - it was his data he wanted. it was his friends data. I didnt agree to that when i joined facebook. 17 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to TeteSagehen

AndruEdwards @TeteSagehen - it’s not lame to block someone who violates TOS! 20 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to TeteSagehen

trishussey @TeteSagehen but there are ways to do it w/o breaking the TOS http://urltea.com/2gpp -would you want FB to allow screenscraping for info? 22 minutes ago from twhirl in reply to TeteSagehen

TeteSagehen But really, it’s just that their TOS is shortsighted. If they claim a monopoly on my relationships, it makes me less likely to use the site. 25 minutes ago from twitterrific

TeteSagehen @trishussey and @jspepper it’s DUMB that they won’t let you suck things out of Facebook. Other sites do. Also, he’s Robert *effing* Scoble. 26 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to trishussey

trishussey @TeteSagehen is it though? He did break the TOS. Plaxo is complicit, IMHO. Maybe it should be lesson for all of us. We can’t break the rules 30 minutes ago from twhirl in reply to TeteSagehen

TeteSagehen Facebook is going to be royally fucked if they don’t let @scobleizer back on the site. INCREDIBLY lame that they blocked him. 44 minutes ago from twitterrific

[ Update: Scoble's FB profile just came back online ]

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