The new Facebook ads that track your actions on third-party sites and then use your name to endorse these brands to your friends may be illegal. According to the New York Times, there's a 100-year-old New York State statute which says that "any person whose name, portrait, picture, or voice is used within this state for advertising purposes or for the purposes of trade without the written consent first obtained" can sue for damages. Facebook would also be committing a misdemeanor. 1.7 million of them, by the latest count of New Yorkers in Facebook's ad-targeting system.

And that's just for starters. William McGeveran, a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, told the Times that the law applies to any Facebook users so long as the illegal ads are displayed on computer screens somewhere in New York. Facebook's chief privacy officer quickly contacted the Times after it ran its report. Kelly said the ads aren't illegal because they aren't endorsements, they're a "representation" of user activity.

Ah, the smell of corporate spin in the morning. McGeveran was not to be dismayed, however. He also argued that Facebook's new ad system illegal invades user privacy. "One who appropriates to his own use or benefit the name or likeness of another is subject to liability to the other for an invasion of his privacy," McGeveran said, quoting law.

Facebook? Invading people's privacy? Who'd believe that? It's not like there have been reports of Facebook employees systematically abusing user photos, tracking user activity for dating purposes, facing reprimand from product managers over privacy abuse, or even allegedly logging into user profiles and uploading obscene images in place of profile photos.

But like I've said before, Zuck, I'd be cool with your illegal ads. Just so long as you call me Lebron, baby. 'Cause if you want to use my smiling face to endorse product, I want a cut.