Party Foul: Facebook and “Political Views”

In case you missed it, Facebook changed the default options for the “Political Views” section of user profiles. From the official announcement:

“Find the Political Views menu on Facebook a little limited? Users have often asked for the ability to select from more options to describe their political viewpoint, so we’ve expanded the list. And since terms like “liberal” or “conservative” don’t necessarily mean the same thing in every country, we’ve switched to a global listing of national political parties.”

Users are still free to define their political persuasions ‘free form,’ eschewing party labels for something of their own creation. Facebook veterans will be familiar with other free form categories: one of my friends has defined her religious views as “pandora.com,” for instance, and we all know “that guy” whose status generally reads something like “Joe Schmo is COME TO MY SHOW TONIGHT!!!#@!” By contrast, political views as a category previously followed a simple spectrum from “Very Conservative” to “Very Liberal,” with an “Apathetic” alternative. No more.

Michael Whitney, writing on techPresident, described Facebook’s ill-conceived motivation for change:

“Organizing people into political parties allows Facebook to sell microtargeted ads to advertisers looking to reach, say, Democrats in Ohio. Unfortunately, the change in emphasizing in party over position will organize a small base of users who self-identify as members of the national parties, and scatter the rest into free-form identification.”

When faced with unlimited choice–and, in this case, a list of esoteric and marginal political parties–Facebook users consistently use it as an opportunity for humor. This can’t just be my friends–I gather that it’s a universal phenomenon. When political categories were ideological you occasionally saw an active Young Democrat self-identify as “very conservative” for a chuckle (and/or to shock their distant acquaintances), but by and large those who chose to include an ideology did so earnestly. Whether it’s bad to offer users unlimited self-expression in place of pre-defined options (from a user perspective I tend to think it isn’t), it certainly won’t be profitable for Facebook when micro-targeting options disappear into a diverse sea of unclassifiable musings and converts to previously-unheard-

of parties. Michael Arrington of TechCrunch demonstrates the point nicely:

“I chose to support the ‘Alliance For Congo’s Renewal’ party for now. Just because I really don’t need to see any more political ads.”

Hello enhanced freedom on the user end; goodbye revenue for Facebook. Of course, there’s a philosophical argument against this change as well. While I’m admittedly fairly partisan, there’s certainly truth to this reaction offered by Nancy Scola on techPresident:

“[L]imiting how people self-identify politically to party labels is [. . .] such a strange, disconnected, and ultimately sad understanding of what this politics thing is all about. ‘Progressive’ or ‘conservative’ or even ‘independent’ are world views, missions, weltanschauungs. ‘Democrat’ or ‘Republican’ is what we are in the voting booth a couple times a year.”

What are your thoughts? Will you be changing your stated “Political Views” to take advantage of the new system? Will you now identify with a party? What’s the funniest thing you’ve seen in a friend’s “Political Views” field?

Image used under a Creative Commons license courtesy of Flickr user dbking.