Like Once, Friend Anywhere→

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Ben Thompson, a month and a half ago on his blog, stratēchery:

If we accept the thesis that messaging is the foundation of social on phones, and that messaging is inherently personal, then that means Facebook has a pretty significant brand perception problem. Their definition of social is public broadcasting, a definition they have reaffirmed both through word and deed. Users have learned that nothing on Facebook is personal or private; why would they expect to use Facebook for messaging? It’s not just that other apps are better at messaging; it’s that Facebook’s carefully cultivated value proposition is in direct opposition to messaging.

So this is pretty old news, but it echoes something I noticed just this morning. I sent a friend a message on Facebook and even as I sent it I seriously thought to myself, "hey, is this going to show up on somebody's timeline?" How crazy is that? Facebook has created a platform so unpredictable and so weighted against privacy that I seriously questioned whether a direct message to someone might (accidentally or "accidentally") end up public.

Obviously Facebook would assure me that they'll never change their security settings (retroactively) so that my private messages would suddenly show up on my profile page. And that example is likely too extreme to pass the smell test. But their entire reason for being is "sharing", and they've built up a pretty serious history of erring on the side of everything-public-all-the-time. At this point nothing would surprise me.

So that's (one reason) why I barely use Facebook. And one reason why Ben thinks the company is in serious trouble.

Introducing A T-Shirt Celebrating The Washington ‘Football Team’→

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Wear it with pride.

Wear it with pride.

I’m not going to conduct a poll about it, and I’m not going to target-question American Indians, but I will venture to say some Washington football fans are uncomfortable with the team’s name. I know because I’m one of them. So we partnered with Sneeki’s Tees, which designs awesome D.C. sports stuff, to make a T-shirt that a progressive Redskins fan can wear without having a racial slur across his/her chest. Consider it an act of silent, wearable protest. Plus, it’s pretty good-looking shirt.

I love this shirt and bought one immediately. If you're a fan of DC football but not a fan of using a racial slur as a team name, you should buy one too.

As an aside, maybe the team should change the name to "Football Team". There might be some trademark issues but "DCFT" has a nice ring to it, right? And we'd already have these sweet shirts.

Exclusive: Inside Hangouts, Google's big fix for its messaging mess | The Verge→

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Google Voice, a product that could have been revolutionary but has instead languished, has been pulled into the Hangouts team with the promise of future integration. Singhal says that "this is the future for Google Voice," but offers no timeline for the integration of the the two products.

As a heavy Google Voice user, I am both irritated that Google hasn't improved the product in years and terrified that Google might pull the plug at any moment. If they really integrate it with the new Hangouts product (an effort to unify all of Google's messaging systems), that will at least indicate that they plan to keep Google Voice running - and perhaps even that they will be improving it. Time will tell, but every day they don't shut it down is a good one.

Red Carpet Rewards loses its luster for some Nationals fans - The Washington Post→

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But with no pre-season heads up, the Nationals front office for the 2013 season significantly diluted the Red Carpet Rewards program. The number of points needed to buy extra benefits increased dramatically. For example, a Saturday game against the Philadelphia Phillies on May 25th would cost 1,000 Red Carpet points for a field MVP or club seat, which is 10 times what the cost would have been last year. The Nationals also shortened the window in which you can redeem tickets ahead of time to one month; last year you could use points to buy a ticket for any game in the season.

Nationals fans are crying foul.

“With no announcement or heads up, they upped the redemption levels to the point where your rewards were cut by about 80 percent,” said Tom Snedeker, a local businessman who has owned season tickets every year since the team arrived in Washington from Montreal in 2005. “It’s kind of a slap in the face for those of us who have had season tickets since day one and supported the team through all the lean years.”

The program was particularly loved by fans who would buy a full season and use points to buy tickets for friends and family, or to buy better seats to watch some games up close.

Over the winter I considered going in on season tickets with a friend, in significant part based on how great the Red Carpet Rewards program had been. Now I'm very glad I equivocated too long and missed out on the seats I was thinking about.

I won't attempt to guess what the team is thinking here (or with its change to the rainout ticket policy), but the net effect is that its most passionate fans bear the brunt, while casual fans benefit. That may be (probably is) smart business, but it's a bummer. And it'll keep me buying my tickets a la carte on Stubhub rather than a season at a time direct from the Nats.

UPDATE: Per Adam Kilgore, the Nats have reversed their rainout policy (presumably due to this post).