My first personal experience with Facebook Beacon was viscerally negative.

After playing the flash game Super Crazy Guitar Maniac Deluxe 2 on Kongregate, I was surprised to see that my secret longing for guitar superstardom was splashed across my Facebook homepage.

That’s none of Facebook’s business! The information was shared with Facebook without asking my permission or even telling me that it was going to happen. Does Facebook get to use this information to tailor their marketing to me?

What’s worse, Facebook was about to tell all of my friends, with a convoluted opt-out UI. Where’s the No thanks button?!! (Note that this is Facebook’s improved UI in reaction to user complaints; I’m glad I didn’t see the first one.)

I’m not a designer, but I’d like to propose the following alternate UI which might better accomplish Facebook’s goals for Beacon (with apologies to Mike Collins.)

Contrast Facebook with Google. 

Sure Google gathers and aggregates your searching, browsing, and purchasing behavior across the internet.

But they don’t tell other sites about it, and they don’t your friends about it. That significantly better than Facebook (so long as Google’s hacker and anti-government defenses remain strong!) And in case you might have any lingering privacy concerns, Google also doesn’t share their knowledge about you with you, granting us all the refuge of blissful ignorance.