I didn’t watch Mark Zuckerberg’s 60 Minutes interview.
The ripping the scab off the wound moment of the night came with Beacon, and if I’d been sitting on a chair I would have fallen off it, and not due to jet lag. Asked about Beacon and as to whether users who signed up to connect with friends now felt that they were “snooped upon” Zuckerberg responded that “Beacon makes Facebook less commercial.” WTF? You can draw your own conclusions on that.
Yeah, I probably would have fallen off my chair too, if that had been the context in which Zuckerberg made his statement. Here’s how it really went:
“People signed up for Facebook thinking that it was a way to just stay in touch with their friends. And now some of them feel that there’s some snooping going on,” Stahl says. “Is there any concern you’re turning Facebook into something much more commercial?”
“I actually think that this makes it less commercial. I mean, what would you rather see? A banner ad from Bloomingdale’s or that one of your friends bought a scarf?” Zuckerberg asks.
It’s not quite the self-delusional statement that I thought I was going to see. Zuckerberg isn’t saying that Beacon makes Facebook less commercial than before. He’s really saying that Beacon is a “less commercial” option than displaying banner ads–I would agree with that.
So, before you read the dozens of blog posts–including this one–that will no doubt breakdown and analyze every thing Zuckerberg had to say why not try something old fashioned. Watch the interview yourself and then form your own opinions. 
PS. TC’s Duncan Riley is an excellent journalist, so this is not a shot at him, rather at myself and others that rely too heavily on others’ interpretation of news. 
