Facebook Turning Your Status Updates Into Ads

Are you ready to become an unpaid spokesman for all your favorite things? Facebook sure hopes so. The company has just rolled out a new advertising product called “sponsored stories” that will turn your posts into ads for companies you post about. In the example video, a user “checking in” at Starbucks generates a link to Starbucks’ fan page. And there’s no way to opt-out, according to CNN.

One report identifies Coca-Cola as one of the product’s first clients. Facebook’s last attempt at integrating ads with the newsfeed, Beacon, crashed and burned over privacy concerns, but Facebook promises that won’t be a concern this time. “Anything that one of your friends is seeing as a sponsored story … is actually something they would have already seen in their news feed,” the product manager says in the marketing video launching the product, adding that only friends can see sponsored stories.