Victoria Buckley
Facebook apologises for ‘nipplegate’ debacle
Posted July 13, 2010 |
After days of stony silence, Facebook has indirectly apologised to Sydney jeweller Victoria Buckley, who has been at the centre of a global media frenzy after launching a battle against the social networking site over censorship.
Last week high-end jeweller Victoria Buckley lashed out at “Midwest American puritanism” on Facebook after Facebook threatened action against her for having pictures of nude porcelain dolls on her fan page.
The dolls were pictured posing with the jeweller’s products and feature in A3 posters that form part of Buckley’s visual merchandising displays in her George Street store windows.
After a week of global media coverage, Facebook has eventually apologised for censoring the images and said Buckley could reupload the images if she wished – which she has.
However, the jeweller’s battle has highlighted what Buckley warned was the “arbitrary” and “opaque” nature of the site.
“It just takes one click from one Midwest American puritan and the whole [online marketing campaign] gets taken down,” she told Jeweller last week.
Throughout the dispute, Buckley found it impossible to contact Facebook personally. When the social networking site eventually apologised, it did so through a media agency rather than contacting the jeweller herself. Facebook did not respond to Jeweller’s attempts to contact the site.
Writing on her Facebook page last week, she said: “I appreciate Facebook for what it offers – a free and fun platform to network from. I think, however, Facebook need to fine tune their approach, beginning with making it possible for users to contact them.”
She told Jeweller: “This is a bigger issue than just me. Other small businesses in a similar situation don’t have any recourse. There’s just no room for debate.”
Although the jeweller initially attributed the censorship to “Midwest American puritanism”, she later said she wanted to make it clear that her response to Facebook’s actions “is not an attack on Christians, Americans, Facebook, or any other group”.
She added: “It is however, a chance to calmly debate what constitutes nudity, and what is acceptable in art.”
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