There have been a few cases (that we know about) of social networks going wrong and high profile service providers have been found out for stepping over the line when it comes to privacy, Facebook's Beacon being the most high profile example.
Now it's my turn to experience a social networking glitch...
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Plaxo (Pulse)Â is telling me I've done things that I haven't done. It's giving me credit for the content creation of my connections.
For example:
I see that I recently uploaded some pics from a trip to Paris.Â
Weird!
I haven't been to Paris since '97 but my colleague Ed got back two weeks ago.
I was also surprised to see that I had added a couple of notes to Facebook in the last few days. The first was a link to an NYT article and the second a post on the LaGrange Point blog (see below).
The funny thing is: It's not my blog. It's not my article. Â
You can see what's happening here:
Plaxo is BETA so maybe they are due the benefit of the doubt.
The network seems to be gaining traction with a professional audience. There is a gap here - Facebook falls short and is poorly positioned for business users.  These discrepancies only relate to Facebook notes and updates, so maybe it's a Facebook problem. I have no idea.
The bad news is that glitches like this and the resulting coverage can un-do months of good work in minutes and hours resulting in serious reputational damage to emergent brands. Â
Anyone else experiencing this?Â
For the two connections that I reference in this post - thanks. I hope you don't object to the reference.
Daniel Young, PR consultant, writes on the impact of new technology and the Internet on PR and corporate communications. Daniel is based in Australia.
