You can host an image locally, and create a link using it. You don't need to hand over the browser of all of your visitors to one or more AD companies by letting them execute arbitrary JavaScript on your pages.
Things like Facebook's "share" and Twitter's "tweet" buttons don't execute any arbitrary (i.e. not specified by the developer) JavaScript.
1. Doesn't have a Facebook account.
2. Runs NoScript to whitelist scripting and site trust.
3. Runs Cookie Whitelist to whitelist cookies.
4. Runs BetterPrivacy to wipe Flash/LSO cookies.
5. Runs Adblock Plus to prevent viewing ads wherever possible.
?
That said, at least some like Heise.de, have put in place solutions that do not add to the underlying problem.
EDIT: Here is a Slashdot discussion[1] about a German newspaper who did that, and here's[2] the link to their jQuery plugin who does just that: only load FB code when the user clicks on the button. It's in German, but translation services are good enough nowadays.
EDIT2: And here's[3] the HN discussion.
[1]: http://slashdot.org/story/11/09/03/0115241/Heises-Two-Clicks...
* As a site operator, particularly if you're keen on 'organic' and free traffic, you need to keep on top of the latest in search engine and social marketing. Facebook and other social networks are becoming more important as traffic sources, as 'recommendations' from friends become more trusted. Bing and Facebook reached a deal to prioritize some results based on social recommendations ('likes'), and Google is rolling their own solution, so site owners have incentives to include the links.
* As a user, you generally want to see the most trusted results you can, and occasionally may want to recommend sites to your friends. Facebook's verbs 'like' and 'share' work well here - Google's '+1' is a little more opaque to most web users I'd suspect, but they're trying to convey the same intention.
* As Google/Facebook, you want as much data as possible about the behaviour of web traffic - search, engagement/interaction, conversion rates, even raw traffic figures. Even if people aren't interacting with these widgets, they are still often served up by AJAX from the source. This implies that Google/Facebook/etc see an incoming HTTP request, and sometimes associated cookies/referers. Add a little GeoIP and other user analysis, and you have very valuable data on aggregate.
All these generally seem like 'wins' for the parties involved - and that's usually the sign of good business taking place. For me, the main concern is that all this data belongs not to the general public, but to the widget providers, and large information disparities in any situation can be abused.
actually, what started the decline was the very subject of this article. I don't like Facebook watching where I go, and I started putting Facebook in another browser; naturally, I'm on Facebook less because it's harder to get to.
In theory, using a separate browser is not adequate protection from tracking. The Flash Player's "Shared Objects" (aka Flash cookies) are stored in a common directory, so the same Flash data is accessible from any browser running as the same user. I do not believe Facebook's tracking is this nefarious, but the method would be quite easy to implement.
What was it that Dennis Ricthie said about his move to Bell Labs? Something like "It was 1968 and working on military projects just didn't feel right." He went on to make an enormous contribution and, we hope, preserved his peace of mind at the same time. You will never regret taking the high road. Just an opinion.
WARNING: STRONG LANGUAGE! ;)
"d00d, Quit being a FUCKING ASS": http://www.pigdog.org/auto/software_jihad/link/2581.html
I'm not worried about the ethics of Facebook. I don't think a site like Facebook should be prevented from doing this openly. I'm worried about whether I can ethically include all these social plugins knowing that they will, in my opinion, invade my users' privacy.