Facebook Mirror

As I write this there is a revolt of epic proportions occurring on the facebook developer forum!!  Well, maybe not, but there are a lot of developers who are pretty angry that the CBS Sports NCAA brackets application has gotten some serious advantages in promotion.  One major advantage is the fact that you are allowed to invite 100 friends to this application, when only weeks ago facebook announced they would be reducing the number of invites.

One developer writes, “They[facebook]have never given an application this type advantage before, a true functionality advantage.  I did not complain or post on these boards when they were giving CBS incredible marketing advantages (2 million emails to people who hadn’t added the app - a direct violation of their own policy, the in-your-face News Feed ad that you could not avoid without taking action).  I understand you can pay for an advantage in that realm.  But to be able to pay to change the rules of the game is an entirely different story.

Forgive me for the sports analogy but that’s the world I live in.  The Yankees have more money and thus buy better players than any other team.  Still, they don’t win the World Series every year because you still have to beat all of the other teams on a level playing field.  Now what if the Yankees could buy an extra out per inning?  What if the Yankees got to use an extra fielder in the outfield?  That is what Facebook has afforded CBS with this move.”