September 23, 2009 by Daniel James

Everyone loves free stuff. If a company gives away free t-shirts, regardless of what's on the shirt, people will flock to it like flies on honey. If a food manufacturer gives away free samples of their latest foodstuffs, you can be sure there will be a line of people to contend with. MIllions of people have jumped on "free" social networks like Facebook and MySpace. But why would a company, whose goal is to turn a profit, give away something for free?

Answer: Because there's money to be made somewhere.

For the company that gives away t-shirts, each person that takes a t-shirt and wears it is now advertising the company to all their friends, family, and people that come in contact with the recipient of the shirt. For the company that gives out samples of its foodstuffs, they're hoping to lure the tasters into buying more of what has been sampled. But what about the social networks? They appear to offer fun, social communications and sharing for free and with no product to lure you into buying. They allow you to share your interests, your age, your location, and your job information with others--all for free! But it's not really free, because advertisers are paying good money to target their ads based on your interests, your age, your location, and your job information. Free social networks like Facebook and MySpace thrive off of their users willingly and unwittingly giving them personal information, which they use to sell ads with.

In addition to selling ads by using their users' information, most users also do not realize that they give worldwide, royalty-free licenses on most anything a user posts to the social network. This means that if the marketing department of the social network found a cute photo of your family, an interesting journal, or a witty comment, the social network has the right to use it as they see fit.

WeOurFamily doesn't play this game. We charge a small subscription fee for members who want to share content with others. (It's still free for others to view and comment on content that has been shared with them.) But we don't require our members to grant us a license to use their content, and we don't use our members' information to sell ads. Sign up today and take control of your life online.