I’m not sure why anyone is surprised. First, a great free service appears. A lot of mpeople sign up. Then at some point it all changes so the owners can make a profit.

It’s like the standard web business plan. No one should ever be surprised when this happens.

During the 90’s there were a lot of free email services. You signed up, gave everyone your cool new email address and the service was great! And better yet all free!

Then the day comes where you get an email saying that they are going to have to start charging for the service. Only $5 per month to help them with their expenses.

They know that if they have 10,000 email users, that at least 15% would rather pay than change their email address, find a way to store all those saved emails, etc. So 1500 x $5 equals $7500 per month and now they only need bandwidth for 1500 users rather than 10,000.

Facebook isn’t charging it’s users, but it does have a business plan you can accept or find another place to hang out on;

New Facebook ad program draws complaints
Feature publicizing their purchases is an invasion of privacy, users say

Picture from Craig Ruttle / AP file
Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg speaks to press and advertising partners in New York on Nov. 6. Two weeks after announcing a new marketing program, Facebook is facing complaints from some users who were surprised to find information about their online purchases added to their personal news feeds.

NEW YORK - Some users of the online hangout Facebook are complaining that its two-week-old marketing program is publicizing their purchases for friends to see.

Those users say they never noticed a small box that appears on a corner of their Web browsers following transactions at Fandango, Overstock and other online retailers. The box alerts users that information is about to be shared with Facebook unless they click on “No Thanks.” It disappears after about 20 seconds, after which consent is assumed.

Users are given a second notice the next time they log on to Facebook, but they can easily miss it if they quickly click away to visit a friend’s page or check e-mail.