After the dissolution of its site governance policy, Facebook has devised a new way to parse the collective din of its one billion members. The old method invited Facebook members to vote on proposed policy changes, but the company and its users alike could agree that the system was inherently broken.
The new feedback channel, “Ask Facebook’s Chief Privacy Officer“, allows users to write in and pose their questions. Selections from the submissions will be answered monthly by Erin Egan, Facebook’s CPO and posted in an official blog.
“Ask The CPO” takes a qualitative approach – one ideally more meaningful than tallying votes. Considering that wringing a meaningful vote out of the biggest social network ever created is pretty much impossible, the process is far from perfect – but it’s still an improvement.
Under the site governance voting system, not only did the overwhelming majority of Facebook users have no idea that the vote existed, but that the process required 30% participation in order to create a binding vote.
If you’re dying to know Facebook’s official answer to queries like “Does Facebook sell my private information to advertisers?” the new policy feedback hub has a handful of example questions and answers up now. Head on over and see what Egan has to say.
