On a serious note - FB putting "ads" in the news feed doesn't seem any more intrusive than promoted Tweets.
In fact may even be less. According to the news I've read on InsideFacebook and ZDNet and Facebook itself it sounds like these stories can only be ones that you could have seen anyways. To quote ZDNet's concise explanation:
[In order to see the Featured story from Ben and Jerry's] First, you must have already Liked Ben & Jerry’s Facebook Page, or one of your friends must have interacted with Ben & Jerry’s Page. Second, Ben & Jerry must have chosen to have the ad promoted to users who have Liked its Page.
Alternatively, a story you wrote can also be featured as an ad, but it will only be shown to people you originally shared it with. A business may want to do this in order to get more people to Like its Page by showing off someone important Liking their Page, or underlining interesting content someone posted on their Page. Facebook is likely hoping the fact that since the story is being shared between friends, it will be considered more relevant than a traditional ad would be.
Since these ads are just stories, they cannot be stopped completely (although ad blockers may find a way around this). Users do, however, have three options provided by Facebook to limit the ads: click hide to remove individual stories, limit the volume of stories you see from a specific friend to only important posts, or unfriend the person and/or unlike the Page to stop seeing certain kinds of stories altogether.
This new "featured" option is just giving brands a way to (pay to) get around the negetive effect of EdgeRank.
Per usual - I have a dual reaction to this. As a user, I'm not particularly thrilled. I still think the ads i see on Facebook are marginally more relevant than those I see on any given website (provided it isn't using retargetting) but that's not to say I enjoy them. I just have come to accept them as a necessary evil, right there with death and taxes.
On the other hand, as a marketer, this is fantastic news. 1) I can now pay to get around an EdgeRank block 2) I know that Facebook ads are highly targeted and relevant (see my own comments above) 3) I can use the social context of friends' stories and fans' connection with me to increase that relevance.
What do you think (either as a user or a marketer)?
