05-Jan-2012 11:49

Flagged Facebook Photos Offensive or Unattractive?

Last year Facebook determined that the majority of photos its users reported as offensive were not actually offensive. Much of the time, they were just unflattering angles or situations.

We are vain creatures, as it turns out…

The thing is, you don’t necessarily own the rights to a picture someone else takes of you, and Facebook accentuates the awkwardness of that situation.

Below every photo on Facebook is an button to flag it for violating the service’s terms of use. Since Facebook users upload an average of more than 250 million photos per day, this is a way for the company to patrol its site without employing warehouses full of people scanning pictures for violence and nudity.

After Facebook noticed how often users were putting the flagging tool to unintended use, the company changed its photo reporting dialog in August to allow users to message the person who posted the photo and complain.

New options include “I don’t like this photo of me,” “It’s harassing me” and “It’s harassing a friend.”

Those complaints and the conversations they inspire tend to trigger compassion on the part of photo posters, according to Facebook engineering director Arturo Bejar.
This week he spoke about Facebook’s effort to encourage compassion on NPR’s “Talk of the Nation.”

The thing is, Facebook takes down offensive photos, but it doesn’t delete unwanted photos — the uploaders have to decide whether or not to do that themselves.

What do you think?

(Source: Liz Gannes - All Things D)