In a classic case of "Oops, we didn't think of that!" the fine folks at Facebook have had to do some major back-peddling in response to a huge backlash that resulted shortly after releasing their Beacon ad platform. Because of the way Beacon announces purchases made on participating e-com sites in the Facebook news timeline, friends and family were having their surprises spoilt by this innovative social-advertising model. Imagine logging into your Facebook account and seeing an update that your girlfriend/husband/mom/etc. had just bought a new digital camera at Best Buy - the same one you had hinted at wanting for Xmas. Doh!! Not surprisingly, the public outcry has resulted in a plague-like retreat from the Beacon offering by major advertisers.

Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg posted a humble blog entry explaining the screw-up to his user base in response. Hopefully he won't lose too many users as a result of this gaff. As has been mentioned many times before, Social Networks are extremely vulnerable to mass-desertion/defection if users deem them to be not cool, or even worse, untrustworthy. Lessons learned, to be sure.