• All Facebook et al, Thursday, October 7, 2010 2:14 PM

Facebook on Wednesday outlined some fundamental network changes, which, in a nutshell, give users more control over the stuff they share, and how they share it.

As All Facebook explains, Facebook will now offer "a more structured way of defining our affiliation groups or our personal social networks," and, critically, let users walk away with any personal information and content they've uploaded to the site.

Paradoxically, industry watchers attributed the changes to a new confidence on the part of Facebook (having more than half-a-billion users will do that to a company), as well as ongoing fears over privacy-driven backlashes and Google's social ambitions.

As Inside Facebook sees it, "Facebook addressed two of its deepest, long-standing criticisms ... ahead of what may be a tough fight with a forthcoming rival social networking product from Google."

Inevitably, new products on Facebook bring out the privacy hawks, and, cries already resound that, as The San Francisco Chronicle puts it, Facebook's two least favorite words in the English language are: "Opt-in." More are sure to follow.

Regarding the social net's decision to free up user content, TechCrunch notes: "It seems like Facebook is the 'open' portable Facebook, as the company now feels secure enough to let users leave with info intact."

Notes Gawker, the bold moves are "clearly designed to assuage criticism from Facebook users that the site doesn't offer users enough control over the [sic] privacy, makes privacy settings too hard to navigate and even cynically manipulates settings to advance its own interests."

Seen as a defensive or offensive move, Facebook's changes are largely perceived as having major implications for the future of the social network.

"Taken together, these changes create a framework for Facebook to further expand its reach and depth into the 'non Facebook' web," writes Federated Media founder John Battelle. "The major impediment to increased off-site engagement for Facebook have been instrumentation, on the one hand, and trust, on the other ... Give me more instrumentation/control, then I'll trust you to be part of my non-Facebook interactions across the web."

Indeed, with the changes, "Facebook hopes to encourage users to upload more photos, videos and other information to the site while giving them new ways to control who sees what," writes The New York Times.

"The three services [Zuckerberg] unveiled may address some of the biggest criticisms of Facebook and redefine the way we experience the social network," asserts MercuryNews.com.

And some reports obsessed over Zuckerberg's public persona (some somewhat viciously), and others took the opportunity to try to get Zuckerberg's take on "the Social Network," the film about the company's founding (though he doesn't bite).

Read the whole story at All Facebook et al »