Facebook has been recently under fire for changing privacy settings. What started as complaints in a few blogs is starting to reach the big media and several parliament buildings around the globe. Facebook needs user data to make advertisement deals, if those users start mistrusting Facebook the business will be over.

On one side, sharing information has many clear advantages and a lot of money can be done with that. On the other side, there are already good examples on how protecting information or giving users clear control about what they share could be beneficial for users and businesses. As interaction designers we could and should improve those experiences.

A Venetian mask, symbol of privacy.

Anonymity and privacy also means freedom. On the contrary, being forced to be 100% public might, in many cases, prevent people to create new things and to share what they really think. There are many things one should not say in public; consequences could be hard if those messages have to be attached by default to the speakers real name. The magic of message boards and chats on the internet beginnings was their anonymity, without that many topics would have never been discussed in a truly sincere way.

It is clear that one benefits from others´ information. Is it possible to share information, keep the user secure and make money with it? Yes, it is; I have two good examples.

Genius, the Apple iTunes recommendation service, is getting tons of information from users, like favorite artists, most listened songs, playlists, movies and TV shows. In order to convince people to share all that, Genius proposes sharing in an anonymous way: no, with Genius you can not see what music your friends are listening. But that´s all right, the best recommendations are done through the analysis of the data coming from thousands of users, not just your friends. Is Apple making money with Genius? I bet they do!

Delicious is another good example of user protection. The public bookmarking service stores users´favorite websites; people allow that because in principle their data is kept private. Delicious reinforces that feeling of privacy through its interface design:

“If you do not want personal information to be displayed for other users to see, do not check any of these boxes”, a setting on Delicious profile creation page. This is a key feature of the Delicious service, without that many people would not share many of their bookmarks, like the ones related to politics or to adult content. Delicious is clearly profiting from sharing and being protecting at the same time.

The future

I predict people will share even more in the future but websites like Facebook will get more pressure to offer better privacy and the design of interfaces and services that offer more intelligent ways of sharing information without compromising privacy will become a big business.

Venetian mask picture by Misteraitch

Now a days it seems that products have to be sold worldwide to be considered successful. Every product, a camera, a TV or a website, that aspires to become usable in different countries have to be carefully designed. Buttons, icons and colors should be either worldwide recognizable or adapted to the local market.

Design for the public space

City sign design seems to be a very localized field, traveling around I discovered that signs vary from country to country and often from city to city. I have an example of how a concept or sign could be differently interpreted.

Traveling in Argentina I saw the following sign… 

Public space sign designs in Buenos Aires (Argentina) are, in my opinion, pretty well done. The sign used to indicate the name of a plaza is not an exception but it is very localized. It’s clear for Argentineans that plazas have always trees and that’s why this sign works so good there. 

In Europe the plaza sign from Buenos Aires might not always be understood. In the old continent most plazas don’t have trees. 

Why this example?

This is to show why localization of designs are important. This example is about a design in the public space but it could be applied to software, web and product design. If you want to sell your product oversees you should take care of the meaning sign, symbols, icons and colors could have there; a good designer should think about localization and what signs or icons could potentially mean in another culture.

Giving users an easy way to see and change their privacy policy gives them a better sense of security and at the end they might finish up giving you more information if you take the time to design a good privacy page. Keep in mind that some users don’t want to share any kind of information with websites but, fortunately, thats not the typical user profile. 

"give them the chance to control all that data all the time…"

Most users will accept to give you some information, specially if you give them the chance to control all that data all the time. That’s why it’s important to give users an easy access to the privacy settings, make that link highly visible, like Facebook does.

Facebook has also a good privacy settings page design. They grouped the settings in different categories. Once inside the category the user has great amount of options. My first impression was that this was too much, but if the website gives the option to deactivate single features there are more possibilities for the others to remain active.

Advanced options…

Make your privacy policy easily accessible to your users in every moment and build trust. Although most of the people wont ever read the privacy policy, it is a good usability practice to make it clear how you manage and protect users’ information.

Make the privacy policy specially available during the sign up process and during the check out if you are selling something. Just make it visible there and your users will feel safer.

Empressr, the online presentation tool, is an example of good design. They placed a “Respect” box with a link to the privacy policy right next to the sing up form.

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