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Comment by mootothemax | Hacker News Reader

This seems to be kicking up a fuss over nothing, and any controversy disappears once you read how to use the feature in question:

Using your microphone and music apps lets you share the TV and music you’re currently playing to your posts.

To identify and share what you're listening to or watching:

1. Tap Status on your News Feed or tap Write Post on your Timeline.

2. Wait for us to identify what you're listening to or watching. You'll know if we're searching for audio matches if you see [an animated icon] moving.

3. Once a match is found, tap [an icon] to select the thing you'd like to share and then fill in your status update.

4. Tap Post.

https://www.facebook.com/help/android-app/710615012295337

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The fuss is about the data sent to Facebook's servers for "identification". You can make the decision to post it or not, but Facebook knows it in either case.

>The fuss is about the data sent to Facebook's servers for "identification". You can make the decision to post it or not, but Facebook knows it in either case.

But it's OK for Shazam or Soundhound?

At which point is a feature just what it says on the tin?

Their main functionality is that data, which user knows before installing the app.

So, without opt-in, they record, upload, and match the content of my conversations, without previously getting consent from all parties that might have been involved?

>So, without opt-in

From the article: "If you choose to turn on this feature..."

You choose to turn on the feature.

The people around you have no choice at all if they are recorded or not.

>You choose to turn on the feature.

>The people around you have no choice at all if they are recorded or not.

How's that different to literally any application that sends microphone recordings across the 'net?

It’s not very different, except usually you have to turn it on manually for every single recording. If you record without permission, it is illegal.

Here a user turns it on once, and it will record every time you write a status update, and they might even forgot they turned it on – it poses a liability issue, and it leads to people being less able to find out if they are recorded or not.

In the end, probably it will be the users that end up in court, not Facebook.

It is no different, any application that does this makes you subject to liability depending on local laws. If it is illegal in your area to record someone without their consent and you hold up your phone in a bar while using something like Shazam you may be breaking the law. While the odds of you being prosecuted for it may seem unlikely, doesn't change the potential liability.

How is this different from Shazam? I don't think very many people are paranoid about their conversations being recorded when someone in a bar holds up their phone to identify what's playing.

Because here you have to opt in once, and it will record in the future every time when writing a status entry. People holding up a phone to identify what’s playing are at least noticeable.

Same reason why recording video with a phone (for which you have to hold it awkwardly, or you’ll just record the ground) is different from recording with Google Glass (at first, no one notices if you record or not)

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