Facebook users faced off against the social networking giant over a change that threatened their privacy and won.

In an about-face, Facebook yesterday returned to its previous terms of service and invited members to help craft the new user rules.

"Over the past couple of days, we received a lot of questions and comments about the changes and what they mean for people and their information," Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg said yesterday in a post to The Facebook Blog. "Based on this feedback, we have decided to return to our previous terms of use while we resolve the issues that people have raised."

"Feedback" is putting it mildly. The Feb. 4 change that outraged many seemed to give Facebook control of all content posted to users' Facebook pages forever -- even if users deactivated their accounts.

Most didn't notice the change, which went into effect without notice, until tech-savvy bloggers and members of the 175 million-strong Facebook community balked about it in cyberspace during the long Presidents Day weekend.

"Facebook's New Terms Of Service: 'We Can Do Anything We Want With Your Content. Forever,'" read a weekend headline on a consumerist.com blog post decrying the change. As of Tuesday, more than 60,000 Facebook users had joined the Facebook group "People Against the new Terms of Service (TOS)," where members questioned and complained about the change. Some removed content from their Facebook pages and others even closed their accounts in protest.

Then, yesterday at 1:17 a.m., Mr. Zuckerberg's post announced the site will revert to its previous user rules, which stated Facebook's use/control of content ends when users close their accounts.

And members of a grateful Facebook nation rejoiced.

"I was quite shocked to see that Facebook has reverted to their old TOS so quickly!" said Scott Auth, 26, of Sewickley. "It really says something about the power of their users, blogs, media, etc. I'm glad that Facebook is going to look into the issue and revise their TOS."

"VICTORY! YOU SPOKE, and FACEBOOK LISTENED," read the heading on a post at the Facebook group "People Against the new Terms of Service (TOS)."

In addition to privacy concerns, some worried the change in terms of service also gave Facebook rights to use or market original works -- including writing, music, photographs and other art -- posted to users' Facebook pages.

"It was never our intention to confuse people or make them uneasy about sharing on Facebook," Facebook spokesman Barry Schnitt wrote to the now 99,000-plus members of "People Against the new Terms of Service (TOS)" group. "I also want to be very clear that Facebook does not, nor have we ever, claimed ownership over people's content. Your content belongs to you."

So, that original song you posted and hope to put on your next album and that spring break picture of you in a string bikini are safe from Facebook use/control into perpetuity.

To help revamp its old terms of service, Facebook has created the group "Facebook Bill of Rights and Responsibilities," where users can post suggestions. This group has 60,000-plus members and many are simply asking that Facebook be fair and transparent.

"If you look back at the instances when changes in Facebook policies caused users' reaction, they were often connected to instances that the users perceived as decreasing their control on information," said Alessandro Acquisti, online privacy expert and professor of information systems and public policy at The Heinz College at Carnegie Mellon University. "Users are happy to reveal lots of personal information when they feel they can keep control of it and when they feel they are losing control, they act negatively."

Users did just that in November 2007, when Facebook introduced Beacon, which targeted advertising to Facebook users based on their credit-card use. Outcry prompted Facebook to allow users to opt into the service.

Facebook also pledges the next incarnation of the terms of service, due out in a few weeks, will be written in plain English, not legalese.

Mr. Auth hopes that is true, but still doesn't like how Facebook can change its terms of service at any time without user notice or approval.

That's a common problem with terms of use and privacy policies, many of which include the provision that they can be changed at any time without prior notice, Dr. Acquisti said.

Most people don't closely read terms of use and privacy policies, and even if they did, they probably wouldn't understand them.

"You have to be quite well educated to parse that," said Dr. Acquisti, mentioning that previous Carnegie Mellon University research has shown people need, on average, a graduate level education to understand many terms of use and privacy policies. He's also a bit skeptical of Facebook's pledge to write the new terms of service in understandable English.

"I'll wait and see."