Facebook, the social networking site created by Mark Zuckerberg out of his Harvard dorm room — in case anybody was unaware of what Facebook was — has recently been in the spotlight for its privacy standards, or accused lack thereof.

The website, which generates 570 billion page views a month (yes, billion with a ‘b’), in order to fix this problem and combat all the negative PR it’s received lately, Facebook has recently stated that it is going to streamline its privacy settings and basically make them more user-friendly.

Now at face value this problem doesn’t seem very significant, other than the fact that the negative publicity isn’t good for the company’s image (although, with 570 Billion page views a month I don’t see the site losing its popularity any time soon); people make a fuss, the company comes out and makes minor cosmetic changes, criticism is quelled end of story.

But, being a college student and part of the majority demographic of Facebook users, I’ve never heard anybody complain about the privacy policy of the site; not a friend, classmate, roommate or anybody. So far it’s only been in the media and, subsequently, older generations of users.

What I think this issue of privacy highlights is the generation gap of technology users. We current college kids, or so-called “Generation Y-ers”, have grown up with computers and the internet for a majority of our lives.

As a result it seems we are much more comfortable with the technology, which would explain the lack of complaints on this privacy issue from our age group.

This is in opposition to our parent’s age group, which remembers a much larger span of their lives without broadband connections.

But in an era when you don’t have to worry only about your physical possessions being stolen, but also your intangible assets such as your identity, is comfort with relaxed privacy settings dangerous?

Personally, and I’m sure a majority of my contemporaries would agree, I don’t see too much of a threat as long as you’re responsible about what you post om Facebook.

Obviously you shouldn’t put your social security number on there (I have yet to ever see anybody do that). Maybe it would be wise to not disclose your year of birth, physical address, and to monitor what pictures you post or get tagged in. If you put even this much effort forth, I don’t see how anything could really come back to hurt you.

Recently, however, a pretty iffy IM conversation was released from when Zuckerberg was only 19 and still living in his dorm. He was discussing his early site with a friend and the exchange went as follows:

Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard
Zuck: Just ask.
Zuck: I have over 4,000 e-mails, pictures, addresses, SNS

(Friend’s Name): What? How’d you manage that one?

Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don’t know why.
Zuck: They “trust me”
Zuck: Dumb (f#&%$)

While these messages don’t look too great for Facebook or Zuckerberg’s image, they could have easily been taken out of context. Also, it doesn’t change the fact that unless you personally post information you shouldn’t, there isn’t really much incriminating evidence on the website.

Lastly, I think it’s interesting to view the idea from Facebook’s perspective. People generally tend to think, because they use the site, they are its customers. This is not entirely accurate.

As long as Facebook is supported by advertising, and now also supported by developers with the introduction of social gaming, these advertisers and developers are Facebook’s true customers. And if these are its customers, what is the company selling? Facebook uses its knowledge of our interests and basic demographics to tailor advertising, social games and programs to us. So in a sense, it’s selling us.