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Let's keep talking more about this big nothing burger "Russia's intervention" and ignore that Facebook is now actually all about injecting irrelevant posts into

by myf01d 9y ago

Let's keep talking more about this big nothing burger "Russia's intervention" and ignore that Facebook is now actually all about injecting irrelevant posts into users' timelines that are sponsored while burying stories and links of pages that don't pay. Facebook now doesn't let you reach even 5% of your fans until you pay. Facebook's business is all about injecting posts by those who pay, even if the Russians did that (I believe they didn't), they just did the only thing upong which Facebook model exists aka pay to reach the target.

wootness 9y ago
What you "believe" is irrelevant. The facts are facts. Get over it.
ForHackernews 9y ago
> pay to reach the target. Isn't that how ads work? Why is this any more controversial than Google's paid, targeted ads?
- Spivak 9y ago
  I think the parent is claiming that FB has blurred the line between organic and sponsored results and is pushing paying customers higher in a user's organic timeline higher than those that don't.
  - myf01d 9y ago
    Yes, I am sorry if that wasn't clear, I am not talking about sponsored ads, I am talking about ordinary posts, Facebook now doesn't let you reach more than 5% of your fans unless you pay, then they show a little by little depending on your spending. I used to have many active popular pages myself and I felt the difference over the past 3 years, what's happening in Facebook now is disgusting to say the least
  - deleted 9y ago
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cameldrv 9y ago
Don't forget that the 95% only exists to activate your reward centers enough to keep you coming back. Their machine learning algorithms will figure out what content that you share causes your friends to engage, and what content of your friends will cause you to engage. Let's say the content is a share from one of the Russian fake news sites. Unconstrained by the truth, these sites make and promote stories that are seductive, controversial, and likely to be shared. When you post it, you might get some of your friends to comment saying that it is wrong, and you can have an argument about it! That's engagement! Everyone's got their blood up, your friendship is slightly compromised, and you've probably blown half an hour going back and forth, but I'll be damned if you didn't see a lot of ads in the process. This is what facebook is, and it's what any machine learned user interface is, if the loss function on the machine learning algorithm is ultimately corporate profit. Your time, friendships, and emotional stability are all just raw materials to be mined, at near zero cost. The worst part is, in the U.S., the average user spends 50 minutes per day, 300 hours per year on facebook, but facebook earns less than 25 cents per day for each U.S. user. They're screwing up your relationships, getting you pissed off, sapping your precious free time, all so they can get a lousy quarter. We have got to come up with a better revenue model for sites like this than ads.

by myf01d 9y ago

wootness 9y ago

What you "believe" is irrelevant. The facts are facts. Get over it.

ForHackernews 9y ago

> pay to reach the target. Isn't that how ads work? Why is this any more controversial than Google's paid, targeted ads?

Spivak 9y ago
I think the parent is claiming that FB has blurred the line between organic and sponsored results and is pushing paying customers higher in a user's organic timeline higher than those that don't.
- myf01d 9y ago
  Yes, I am sorry if that wasn't clear, I am not talking about sponsored ads, I am talking about ordinary posts, Facebook now doesn't let you reach more than 5% of your fans unless you pay, then they show a little by little depending on your spending. I used to have many active popular pages myself and I felt the difference over the past 3 years, what's happening in Facebook now is disgusting to say the least
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

cameldrv 9y ago

Don't forget that the 95% only exists to activate your reward centers enough to keep you coming back. Their machine learning algorithms will figure out what content that you share causes your friends to engage, and what content of your friends will cause you to engage. Let's say the content is a share from one of the Russian fake news sites. Unconstrained by the truth, these sites make and promote stories that are seductive, controversial, and likely to be shared. When you post it, you might get some of your friends to comment saying that it is wrong, and you can have an argument about it! That's engagement! Everyone's got their blood up, your friendship is slightly compromised, and you've probably blown half an hour going back and forth, but I'll be damned if you didn't see a lot of ads in the process. This is what facebook is, and it's what any machine learned user interface is, if the loss function on the machine learning algorithm is ultimately corporate profit. Your time, friendships, and emotional stability are all just raw materials to be mined, at near zero cost. The worst part is, in the U.S., the average user spends 50 minutes per day, 300 hours per year on facebook, but facebook earns less than 25 cents per day for each U.S. user. They're screwing up your relationships, getting you pissed off, sapping your precious free time, all so they can get a lousy quarter. We have got to come up with a better revenue model for sites like this than ads.