Everyone is changing their avatars on Twitter because they are suffering from what Mashable is calling manga kerrazy, and it’s driving me nuts. FaceYourManga is a free service that allows you to simply create your own cartoon version of your face. While it’s a fun little service, it’s annoying me for two reasons.

1. During my presentation on branding with Twitter I mentioned finding your avatar and keeping it the same. When I look at my Twitter timeline I recognize the faces before I do the names. Imagine your friends changed faces every day, it would get confusing wouldn’t it? The same reason is why brands don’t change their logos very often. When was the last time Nike changed the swoosh?

2. I don’t think anybody has read the privacy policy for FaceYourManga, perhaps because it’s in Italian. I used Google translate to read it and discovered a couple of things:

1) PURPOSE OF TREATMENT OF DATA.

Under Article .13) of Legislative Decree mentioned, collection and other processing operations are carried out dall’Azienda Data for following purposes:

a) advertising;

b) sending information and promotional material;

c) sending commercial communications;

etc…

Under section 7) EVENT OF CONSENT it basically says that you give up your email to receive advertising, blah blah blah.

There’s a simple solution to this, just use a temporary email address when you register. Or take a screenshot of your avatar before you hit submit.

Go ahead and have fun with FaceYourManga, but please don’t change your face too often. I confuse easily.