Facebook freezer v 1

A FRENCH town called Bitche has been cancelled by Facebook – because it sounds like a sexist insult. Now other French places with names including Arse, Anus, Condom, and Pussy also risk being cancelled by the Facebook algorithms. Officials in the small community on the River Horn, on the German border, on Tuesday confirmed that the page "has been censored" since last month. “We’ve appealed but this can take a long while,” said a town hall spokesman in Bitche, which has a population of just 5000." In the meantime, they have renamed their Facebook page ‘Mairie 57230’ – a combination of the word for ‘town hall’ and their postcode. Valérie Degouy, a spokesperson for Bitche, told local radio: “I appealed on 19 March but [the page] hasn’t reappeared again. I have tried every way to contact Facebook, through the different forms, but there is nothing more to do. "I tried to send a private message on the Facebook France page, I left about 10 messages every day. "I was … [Read more...] about French town of BITCHE cancelled by Facebook for its ‘offensive’ name… so will Orgy, Condom and Pussy be next?

Nikki Grahame told friends she was "all good" just weeks before entering a specialist clinic for treatment for an eating disorder. On February 27, Nikki posted her last photograph - a vase of beautiful vibrant pink roses on a table in her home with the caption: "Thank you for the beautiful flowers" followed by emoticons of flowers and a smiley face covered with love hearts. She did not address who the flowers were from. Next to the vase of flowers was a book on one of her favourite musicians and singers, Kate Bush. Called Inside the Rainbow it's a collection of rare and unseen photographs of Kate with essays by her brother John Carder Bush about her life and music career. In a haunting last message from her when asked by a friend in the comments below the post on how she was doing, Nikki replied: "All good darling." Tragically Nikki lost her decades-long battle with anorexia in the early hours of last Friday morning. She was just 38. Just a few weeks after her … [Read more...] about Nikki Grahame’s final Facebook post revealed as she told friends she was ‘all good’ before entering clinic for treatment

Source: Luke Filipowicz/iMore What you need to know A German regulator is trying to stop Facebook's recent changes to its WhatsApp data policies. Facebook tried to change WhatsApp's privacy policy earlier this year but was met with staunch backlash. German regulators want an order to stop the changes immediately. German data authorities are seeking an order to stop controversial changes planned by Facebook regarding its WhatsApp privacy policy. According to Bloomberg : One of Germany's toughest data regulators is seeking an administrative order that would stop Facebook Inc. from collecting user data from its WhatsApp unit. The regulator in the city of Hamburg is seeking an "immediately enforceable order" before May 15 over concerns that policy changes could lead to the use of such data for wider marketing and advertising purposes. Data commissioner Johannes Caspar stated that WhatsApp in Germany is even more popular than Facebook in the country, and … [Read more...] about Facebook could face German intervention over controversial WhatsApp changes

Source: Harish Jonnalagadda / iMore Facebook acquired WhatsApp back in February 2014 for a staggering $19 billion . At that time, the service had 500 million users; it now boasts over 2 billion users today. Facebook tried a lot of methods to monetize WhatsApp over the years, introducing business accounts to allow brands to chat with customers and even turning the platform into an e-commerce destination . That said, the app was left as its own entity, and Facebook didn't meddle too much into the core service itself. That's changing now. WhatsApp has updated its privacy policy , and the new terms requires users to share data with Facebook as well as its associated companies, including Facebook Payments, Onavo (a web analytics service and controversial VPN), and CrowdTangle (a social analytics tool). The data that will be shared with Facebook and its companies as part of the new terms includes the following: Profile name Profile picture IP address Your phone … [Read more...] about WhatsApp now requires you to share data with Facebook — or stop using the app

This French town made Facebook's algorithm blush STRASBOURG (FRANCE) - The French town of Bitche celebrated its return to Facebook on Tuesday, three weeks after censors took down its page, believing the name to be an insult. The mayor of the northeastern town of 5,000 inhabitants, near the border with Germany, said that Facebook took down the page on March 19 on the basis that Bitche was a "violation of the conditions applying to Facebook pages". "Our town's name seems to be have been misinterpreted," mayor Benoit Kieffer said in a statement, suggesting it had been mistaken for the derogatory English term. Bitche, famous for its 17th-century citadel, promptly appealed the ban but its pleas to have its page, which has more than 2,350 followers, reinstated went unanswered for weeks. Desperate to reconnect with residents, the municipality set up another page with the more unobtrusive name of "Mairie 57320" (townhall 57320), after its postal code. The town's campaign to clear … [Read more...] about Life’s a Bitche for French town censored by Facebook