Facebook has revised their Terms of Use recently and most notable changes basically state that they own all of your content from now until perpetuity.
Under “Licenses” heading they state the following:
You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.
This notion of Facebook ownership of anything you have posted under your account goes a step further and is additionally outlined even when you try to quit their service and remove your account (taken from Facebook “Termination and Changes to the Facebook Service” section):
The following sections will survive any termination of your use of the Facebook Service: Prohibited Conduct, User Content, Your Privacy Practices, Gift Credits, Ownership; Proprietary Rights, Licenses, Submissions, User Disputes; Complaints, Indemnity, General Disclaimers, Limitation on Liability, Termination and Changes to the Facebook Service, Arbitration, Governing Law; Venue and Jurisdiction and Other.
On the other hand, under their “IP Complaints” section they state:
We respect the IP rights of others and we prohibit users from Posting User Content that violates another party’s IP rights. When we receive a proper claim of IP infringement, we promptly remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing User Content. We also terminate the accounts of repeat infringers in appropriate circumstances.
A bit of an oxymoron on Facebook’s side, but time will tell what these TOS really mean. We will have to wait until content of a deleted account is reused and the inevitable law suit.