Facebook Deals dumped

After its four-month test, Facebook has decided that whatever form its entry into the “local deals” market takes, it won’t look like Facebook Deals, which will be shuttered in the coming weeks.

Deals sites, in which businesses tip money into the pockets of middlemen so they can offer notional discounts for Brazilian waxes, are the engine-room of the current dotcom bubble. Facebook’s market test took place in Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, San Diego and San Francisco.

Facebook Deals was touted as a competitor to Groupon and LivingSocial, and as well as flogging offers secured by its own sales team, it added an extra layer of middleman into the deals business by on-selling offers set up by companies like ReachLocal, Gilt City and Zozi.

Putting a brave face on the flop, Facebook told Reuters it will “continue to evaluate how to best serve local businesses”. It is sticking with Facebook Ads, Pages and Sponsored Stories, as well as its Check-in Deals product.

August has been volte-face month for Facebook, which a few days ago also gave up on its Places product, a move that apparently caught its sales teams by surprise, since in Australia, the decision came shortly after major shopping centre operator Westfield would try marketing through Places. ®

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Kuwait commission denies social media accounts ban

Manama: Kuwait’s Civil Service Commission (CSC) has denied reports it would ban government employees from accessing Twitter and Facebook, saying they were baseless allegations.

“There were no reports or complaints from government sector officials about an increasing use of social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook during work hours,” Mohammad Al Roumi, Undersecretary at the CSC, told Kuwait News Agency (Kuna).

The commission will not therefore issue a circular after the Eid holidays to warn government employees against logging on to social networking sites during work hours.

Last week, reports surfaced in Kuwait, quoting Al Roumi as saying that the CSC was planning to issue a circular after the Eid holidays to caution government employees against logging on to social networking at work.

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According to the reports, the commission had complained that a large number of public sector employees regularly talked on the phone or logged on to social networking sites during work hours while others left their offices without informing their superiors, resulting in a slowdown of the workflow in several government institutions.

“The CSC has no authority to follow up the employees as this is within the prerogatives of their directors,” the commission said.

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