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Facebook Forces NYT to Quietly Delete Unflattering Reference to Sheryl Sandberg

305 points by uptown 9y ago

fnayr 9y ago
Where's Zuckerberg in all of this? It's strange with all the controversies hitting and the stock crash that he hasn't made any sort of public statement (unless I missed it?).
- deleted 9y ago
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- justboxing 9y ago
  He's been super busy dumping a whole lot of his Facebook Shares before the Sh*t hit the fan.[1][2] Sources: [1] Zuckerberg has sold more Facebook stock in the last 3 months than any insider at any other company => https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/zuckerbergs-facebook-stock-selling-dwarfs-all-other-insiders.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/zuckerbergs-facebook-stock-s... [2] Zuckerberg saved tens of millions of dollars by selling Facebook stock ahead of Monday’s decline: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/zuckerberg-saved-tens-of-millions-by-selling-facebook-stock-ahead-of-monday-decline-2018-03-19 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/zuckerberg-saved-tens-of-m...
  - fnayr 9y ago
    I have seen that. It doesn't look good for him no doubt. But that equates to less than a billion right? The stock drop alone in the past few days cost him much more than that ($5 billion from one article I read). So given that he's probably not an idiot, it looks really bad to sell if he thinks it's going to drop, and the money he made from selling is far outweighed by the drop from the controversies, it doesn't seem likely to me that it was because "he knew it was going to drop." I don't like the guy but my feeling is it was unlucky timing.
    - pbalau 9y ago
      As with the intel ceo case, as fb employees we have particular windows when we can sell shares. I don't think Zuck is extempted from this.
      - tanderson92 9y ago
        The intel ceo case is incriminating because the intel ceo dumped as much stock as contractually allowed by Intel, with the plans to do so being filed well after Intel was informed of the security flaw. It's not incriminating solely because he sold stock (in fact he regularly sold stock that was granted to him, but never this much so quickly).
    - deleted 9y ago
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    - rsuelzer 9y ago
      This stock is still well above where it was a few months ago. I sold my FB at 140 because I felt it was overvalued. I wouldn't blame Zuck for thinking his company was overvalued at its current price.
  - nopriorarrests 9y ago
    Such sales are usually coordinated with SEC well in advance. You submit your filing to SEC and sell accordingly during next 365 or 180 days (not sure about timeline, but definitely not a week).
  - karmapolic 9y ago
    did u see the term "scheduled"?
  - Lightbody 9y ago
    I'm super frustrated with Facebook, but this is conspiracy theory territory. Place the anger in the right direction. Those trades were part of his 10b5-1, a scheduled trading plan set in place at a minimum 3 months ahead of time and typically extends out 12+ months. Trades in the plan are protected from insider trading accusations and considered an "affirmative defense" [1]. While you can trade shares outside your 10b5-1 plan, those trades aren't protected from insider trading accusations. [1] https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/03/24/a-guide-to-rule-10b5-1-plans/ https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/03/24/a-guide-to-rule-1...
    - eganist 9y ago
      Considering the time scales we're playing with here, 3 months is more than enough time to delay reporting and let 10b5-1 sales trigger to salvage as much value as possible. Shoot, Stamos had apparently been nagging them for a while leading up to the December reorg, and we're only just hearing about it.
    - shanghaiaway 9y ago
      Both links contain facts not stories. You came up with the idea that there would be a conspiracy. You are the conspiracy theorist.
      - threeseed 9y ago
        It's a conspiracy theory to state or insuniate that Zuckerberg is committing a crime in order to save some money. Especially given that the facts are that (a) selling stock involves a lot of people, (b) Zuckerberg has gone on record saying he will be selling stock, (c) he has plans for politics/philanthropy which will depend on an intact reputation and (d) he will be so rich i.e. multi-billionaire regardless that it seems strange to risk jail time for a few hundred million. If you make claims. Then you need to back them up.
        shanghaiaway 9y ago
        I didn't make claims nor did anyone else. There's only facts that he's been selling stock.
  - threeseed 9y ago
    As other's have mentioned stock sales are planned. And why is it surprising that Zuckerberg has sold lots of Facebook stock. (1) He owns the most and (2) he has previously gone on record as saying he will be selling stock to finance his charity.
- 1337biz 9y ago
  I bet he tries to avoid this becoming a 'Zuckerberg' story and is more okay with FB declining a few points on its brand perception.
  - threeseed 9y ago
    Especially since Zuckerberg has very big plans post Facebook.
- bsder 9y ago
  Does he have an evil lair in New Zealand like the rest of the oligarchs? Might want to check there. Zuckerberg is probably with his lawyers who are telling him to keep his mouth shut for now. There are active warrants and subpoenas flying around in multiple jurisdictions that could conceivably extradite or detain him. Being rich isn't fun if you can't go anywhere or do anything. Better to let the stock crash for a while than risk incriminating yourself because you shot your mouth off. Zuck isn't as stupid as Trump.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > Where's Zuckerberg in all of this? Working out scheduling for testimony to a UK parliamentary inquiry, a couple US congressional committees, and the US FEC? More seriously, the question is being asked everywhere, even, apparently, within Facebook: http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/20/technology/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-data-controversy/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/20/technology/mark-zuckerberg-f...
  - bigphishy 9y ago
    Is that a question or a statement? If it's a statement, it comes across as pontifical.
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      > Is that a question or a statement? Which sentence, the one with the question mark at the end or the other one? The answer is different for each, and which is which should be obvious.
    - totalZero 9y ago
      The word pontifical has a pontifical air to it, don't you think? To answer your question about the question....it ends with a question mark, so it's probably a rhetorical question suggesting that Zuckerberg has his hands full at the moment. I'm sure you've seen the headline about MPs requesting his presence at a hearing.
- baq 9y ago
  what could he say to make you feel better about the whole clusterfuck that's unfolded in the past few days? 'I'm stepping down' is probably the only thing i'd buy.
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gervase 9y ago
Is there any evidence that this change was the result of external pressure from Facebook, rather than as the result of internal NYT editing? Articles frequently change in content, titles, and so on after publication, after all - that's why HN has to update titles so frequently. Edit: Whoops, missed it the first read-through. Looks like the change was confirmed by the original reporter to be as the result of a request from the Facebook PR team.
- adambyrtek 9y ago
  Respectable sites usually include a list of corrections and changes made to an article after publication. When it comes to submission titles, HN has a tendency to change them for no obvious reason even if the original title hasn't changed.
  - masonic 9y ago
    Respectable sites usually include a list of corrections and changes made to an article after publication Respectable sources properly fact-check before publishing in the first place. Generally, most people who read an erroneous original will never see the corrected version.
  - tptacek 9y ago
    NYT stories routinely change, sometimes substantially, between online and print versions, without corrections. There used to be a site that tracked this.
    - zevyoura 9y ago
      You may be thinking of http://newsdiffs.org http://newsdiffs.org Here's the page for the article in question: http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.co...
- snowwrestler 9y ago
  Your edit is wrong; the NY Times reporter only confirmed the chronology, i.e. that the change happened at a later time than the contact from Facebook PR. She did not confirm that the change was a "result of a request from the Facebook PR team"; in fact she vehemently denied it on Twitter. The story in this blog post is bullshit; it's made up. > I was the NYT reporter who was in contact w/Facebook over our Stamos story yesterday. We didn't remove any references to Sandberg at Facebook's request. (For the record, Facebook made no such request). If anything we added MORE detail to the story between the 1st and 2nd versions https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/976238483122487296 https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/976238483122487296 EDIT to clarify: Nicole Perlroth is the reporter mentioned by name in the blog post who confirmed the chronology. Sheera Frenkel was another reporter on the same NYT byline who tweeted the above. Here's a tweet from Perlroth too: > Echoing Sheera here. @colinkalmbacher needs to correct his blog post to reflect that it is inaccurate, even his attempt at our name spellings. He should also address why he chose to ignore our responses, which contradicted everything he wrote. https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976241288411430912 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976241288411430912
packeted 9y ago
It's also interesting that there is barely a mention of all this in my news feed on Facebook and there have been no links to it as a trending story.
- threeseed 9y ago
  It is a trending story for me on Facebook. Interestingly the lead article is, "Here's how to see which apps have access to your Facebook - and cut them off".
non_sequitur 9y ago
I don't even like Facebook, but really, is this newsworthy now? I know the media sees it as a chance to dogpile the company that has taken them to the cleaners, but there's a reason people don't trust or like the media anymore and "articles" like these are a big reason why.
- symlinkk 9y ago
  You don't think evidence of the NYT being bossed around by Facebook is newsworthy?
- mannykannot 9y ago
  Interference with major news sources is always newsworthy. The absence of a customary explanation of a correction is particularly noteworthy.
- koomi 9y ago
  Why would Facebook making a major newspaper stealthily edit an article to their liking - as confirmed by one of the authors - not be worthy news? Do you think this is normal behavior for a newspaper?
- fnayr 9y ago
  Is it unexpected that that one company asked for a newspaper to change their article to remove references that make one of their C level execs look bad? No, not at all. It is somewhat thought provoking though that said newspaper may have felt compelled to comply with the request because of Facebook's power (for instance not wanting to lose favorable placement in feed or trending sections). So to me the newsworthiness of this depends on how likely it is that they changed it because it was simply inaccurate versus something more nefarious (such as above). I believe that may be too subjective to determine at this point so probably no fruitful discussion can come in trying to figure that out.
- danso 9y ago
  Cambridge Analytica has been the subject of two very high profile investigations in the UK this past week, which caused Facebook to take punitive action against the firm, even though the firm and its misuse of FB data was written about several years ago. One of the revelations this week is that Facebook's CSO had been critical of FB's lack of response to CA and is now leaving the company: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-... Sometimes newsworthy things become newsworthy after the actual time of events. Harvey Weinstein's sexual abuse had been hinted at for years but only this past year did the amount of reporting and attention cause him to face real legal and business problems. Same with Bill Cosby.
danso 9y ago
FWIW, a NYT article undergoes many changes from the time it was originally posted to whatever its final state (usually, the next day, after the print edition). The story in question was just a few paragraphs when it was first posted, and then more details were added. You can use newsdiffs.org to see the various changes: http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.co... Here is the specific diff where the Sandberg reference was changed: http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytim... That said, if the explicit conflict between Stamos and Sandberg was a prominent detail, then many folks would argue that the NYT should have a clarification or editor's note explaining the change. However, it's worth noting that the reference to the conflict between Sandberg and Stamos is not omitted from the final edition. Original: > Mr. Stamos had been a strong advocate inside the company for investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook, often to the consternation of other top executives, including Sheryl Sandberg, the social network’s chief operating officer, according to the current and former employees, who asked not to be identified discussing internal matters. Final: > Mr. Stamos joined Facebook from Yahoo in June 2015. He and other Facebook executives, such as Ms. Sandberg, disagreed early on over how proactive the social network should be in policing its own platform, said the people briefed on the matter. In his statement, Mr. Stamos said his relationship with Ms. Sandberg was “productive.” The latter reference seems to be just as damning to Sandberg when it comes to her complacency in policing the FB platform, though it doesn't say that her disagreement with Stamos was specifically about the Russia question. You could still argue that this merits a clarification, i.e. A previous version of this story stated that Ms. Sandberg disagreed with Mr. Stamos in his advocacy for "investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook". However, Mr. Stamos said that he and Sandberg disagreed in general with how proactive Facebook should be in policing its own platform, but the two never specifically debated the issue with respect to revelations of Russian interference.
- Karrot_Kream 9y ago
  Thanks for posting about newsdiffs.org. I didn't know about this, it's awesome!
deleted 9y ago
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Analemma_ 9y ago
For everyone who cheered when Thiel took down Gawker, this is what you've wrought. Look up the definition of "chilling effect" sometime: even if Gawker's behavior wasn't defensible, now that newspapers know Facebook has a board member willing to go to war with news organizations that don't get in line, they have to self-censor to stay alive.
- twblalock 9y ago
  The coverage of Facebook has been quite negative, including from the NYT. So I'm not sure what self-censorship you're referring to.
danso 9y ago
My main argument for incompetence vs. malice is not necessarily that the NYT is too good to be corruptible/pressured, but because the purported gain (in favor of FB) is so small. Let's assume the NYT can be influenced to change/kill stories. After all, the Obama administration was able to get the NYT to delay/suppress stories on national security grounds [0], and this doesn't count all the stories that have been starved because of discouragement/apathy by editors. But these are stories that have been stopped before they saw the light of day. This reference to Sandberg was published in a widely-publicized (i.e. banner breaking news headline on nytimes.com) breaking news story. To censor it for any reason is going to be a difficult and embarrassing and noticeable decision, and one that is going to piss off someone in the editorial chain (e.g. the reporter, or her editor). So if Sandberg has the ability to pressure the NYT to revoke this reference, why would she do it now? The story is already a major clusterfuck for Facebook because it ties the abrupt dismissal of Facebook's entire security team to allegations about Russian/CA malfeasance on FB's platform. How much face does Sandberg save when the entire company is eating shit, with Sandberg at the helm and being conspicuously absent from making a public statement? If Sandberg had editorial power, don't you think she would've exercised it by having prior review of the entire story? If the NYT editors were so afraid of her that they'd cave in to pressure to retroactively edit a story in her favor, don't you think they would've brought this story to her attention before publishing it as a breaking news item and spreading it all over Twitter? NYT famously has one of the most anal-retentive social media policies among all media organizations. If Sandberg had real influence, NYT reporters would not be tweeting this kind of stuff about her: https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/975899584550465537 https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/975899584550465537 https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/975793549076611072 https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/975793549076611072 FWIW, the author of the NYT article in question has responded to the claims made by the submitted Law & Crime article: https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976156184909553664 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976156184909553664 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976157825331216384 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976157825331216384 [0] https://www.wnyc.org/story/nyt-reporter-james-risen-reporting-during-war-terror/ https://www.wnyc.org/story/nyt-reporter-james-risen-reportin...
- mannykannot 9y ago
  I do not see that there is any relevance to this case in the NYT being sensitive to national security issues - that is clearly not an issue here. And if issues of importance have routinely been "starved because of discouragement/apathy by editors" (as opposed to possibly flawed judgements of importance), then it would be helpful to your argument if you could enumerate them. No-one is suggesting that Sandberg had the editorial power of reviewing all Facebook-related articles before they were published, so the question of why she did not suppress this article before it first appeared does not arise. NYTs failure to seek permission beforehand can adequately be explained by a) it didn't expect the response it got and b) if it were in the habit of seeking such approval, it would destroy its brand, and its reason for existence. The issue is that the NYT caved in to a demand without even following its normal policy of explaining a correction, and this is a serious matter regardless of whether Sandberg or Facebook were ill-advised to follow this course of action. The article's author's responses look to me like an attempt at damage control, in that they talk around the central issue with heavy use of weasel words. If the original was deleted because it was superseded by a clearer follow-up, why is the follow-up notably unclear on this very issue?
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donohoe 9y ago
As someone who worked at the NYT for 8 years and saw the inner workings I want to say the main assesrtions of this article are FALSE. Seriously. WTF
- stochastic_monk 9y ago
  Please be clearer. Which claims do you not think are true, and what reasons/evidence do you have behind your assertions? Do you mean the assertion that NYT made these changes in response to being reached by Facebook's PR team? (This is difficult to prove but suggested by the facts we have.) Do you mean the assertion that the NYT regularly changes headlines in response to criticism of those being covered? (This is alleged, but I have no proof of this.) Do you mean the assertion that Facebook contacted the Times after the article was published? (I highly doubt that this is false, and it being true suggests that the first point was true.)
  - donohoe 9y ago
    I was on the subway so I couldn’t dig deep. In short, the opening paragraph, which the article leans on struck a nerve. The New York Times offers powerful third parties the ability to edit away–that is, to delete from the internet–unfavorable coverage appearing in the paper of record’s online edition. It’s false. The editorial process is pretty rigorous. No company has a magic “edit” button. The article goes through rounds of edits post-publish. It’s a established process and not done as-hoc.
    - fancyfacebook 9y ago
      Nobody at Facebook pushed a button, but the article was edited to remove an unflattering reference to Sheryl Sandberg after a phone call from Facebook PR. Also, just because you work(ed) at a company it does not mean you are fully aware of everything that goes on there, so don't make blanket statements about what can or can't happen. Employees are often some of the least informed about the inner workings of an organization, as they tend to dismiss uncomfortable findings out of hand and refuse to read about them.
tptacek 9y ago
This story doesn't appear to back up the headline. Unless I've missed something, it says that Facebook PR reached out to the NYT, and that the article was edited. That might mean Facebook "demanded" changes, or it might mean that they pointed out errors or additional facts that warranted the correction.
- danso 9y ago
  You are correct based on what's written. The author implies that Facebook PR reached out to NYT -- but doesn't claim what Facebook PR wanted or how the NYT reacted. This fact (the NYT agrees that FBPR contacted them) is juxtaposed with the observation that people are mad the NYT removed this graf from the original 300-word breaking news story: > Mr. Stamos had been a strong advocate inside the company for investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook, often to the consternation of other top executives, including Sheryl Sandberg, the social network’s chief operating officer, according to the current and former employees... This is definitely an interesting graf, but I don't (and neither do the NYT reporters, ostensibly) think that it's the key part of the story, not even of the 300-word blurb. In any case, this blurb was updated (rather, replaced) by a 1,300 article at the end of the day: http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytim... The critics of NYT think that the "consternation" line should not have been erased because it apparently is so directly damning of how Sandberg was resistant to deal with Russian interference. The NYT reporters have disagreed; they see the 1000+ words adding far more evidence of how Stamos tried to warn FB. In any case, the article author is trying to associate 3 unrelated events together: - NYT made a major update/rewrite of its article about Facebook - People are mad that the most damning line against Sandberg (re: Russia) was watered down - Facebook PR contacted NYT after the first version of the story/blurb was published. The OP has a hypothesis. But no evidence to support it. "Facebook Forces NYT" is not the right headline because the author never purports to prove or claim that Facebook forced NYT to do anything.
wcr3 9y ago
Garbage Pet Site Doles Out Libertarian Snackables. where's my freelancer check you animals?
davidf18 9y ago
Trump was right. Fake News from NYT. NYT revenues are partially derived from Facebook, posing a conflict of interest problem. We need a special audited, non-noncorruptable news source that people can consult when they want transparency in their news. The truth is that in domains that I understand well, the NYT is frequently biased or leaves out important facts.
botskonet 9y ago
The NY Times twitter accounts are saying this is false: https://twitter.com/NYTimesPR/status/976499121799483394 https://twitter.com/NYTimesPR/status/976499121799483394

305 points by uptown 9y ago

Where's Zuckerberg in all of this? It's strange with all the controversies hitting and the stock crash that he hasn't made any sort of public statement (unless I missed it?).

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justboxing 9y ago
He's been super busy dumping a whole lot of his Facebook Shares before the Sh*t hit the fan.[1][2] Sources: [1] Zuckerberg has sold more Facebook stock in the last 3 months than any insider at any other company => https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/zuckerbergs-facebook-stock-selling-dwarfs-all-other-insiders.html https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/zuckerbergs-facebook-stock-s... [2] Zuckerberg saved tens of millions of dollars by selling Facebook stock ahead of Monday’s decline: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/zuckerberg-saved-tens-of-millions-by-selling-facebook-stock-ahead-of-monday-decline-2018-03-19 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/zuckerberg-saved-tens-of-m...
- fnayr 9y ago
  I have seen that. It doesn't look good for him no doubt. But that equates to less than a billion right? The stock drop alone in the past few days cost him much more than that ($5 billion from one article I read). So given that he's probably not an idiot, it looks really bad to sell if he thinks it's going to drop, and the money he made from selling is far outweighed by the drop from the controversies, it doesn't seem likely to me that it was because "he knew it was going to drop." I don't like the guy but my feeling is it was unlucky timing.
  - pbalau 9y ago
    As with the intel ceo case, as fb employees we have particular windows when we can sell shares. I don't think Zuck is extempted from this.
    - tanderson92 9y ago
      The intel ceo case is incriminating because the intel ceo dumped as much stock as contractually allowed by Intel, with the plans to do so being filed well after Intel was informed of the security flaw. It's not incriminating solely because he sold stock (in fact he regularly sold stock that was granted to him, but never this much so quickly).
  - deleted 9y ago
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  - rsuelzer 9y ago
    This stock is still well above where it was a few months ago. I sold my FB at 140 because I felt it was overvalued. I wouldn't blame Zuck for thinking his company was overvalued at its current price.
- nopriorarrests 9y ago
  Such sales are usually coordinated with SEC well in advance. You submit your filing to SEC and sell accordingly during next 365 or 180 days (not sure about timeline, but definitely not a week).
- karmapolic 9y ago
  did u see the term "scheduled"?
- Lightbody 9y ago
  I'm super frustrated with Facebook, but this is conspiracy theory territory. Place the anger in the right direction. Those trades were part of his 10b5-1, a scheduled trading plan set in place at a minimum 3 months ahead of time and typically extends out 12+ months. Trades in the plan are protected from insider trading accusations and considered an "affirmative defense" [1]. While you can trade shares outside your 10b5-1 plan, those trades aren't protected from insider trading accusations. [1] https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/03/24/a-guide-to-rule-10b5-1-plans/ https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/03/24/a-guide-to-rule-1...
  - eganist 9y ago
    Considering the time scales we're playing with here, 3 months is more than enough time to delay reporting and let 10b5-1 sales trigger to salvage as much value as possible. Shoot, Stamos had apparently been nagging them for a while leading up to the December reorg, and we're only just hearing about it.
  - shanghaiaway 9y ago
    Both links contain facts not stories. You came up with the idea that there would be a conspiracy. You are the conspiracy theorist.
    - threeseed 9y ago
      It's a conspiracy theory to state or insuniate that Zuckerberg is committing a crime in order to save some money. Especially given that the facts are that (a) selling stock involves a lot of people, (b) Zuckerberg has gone on record saying he will be selling stock, (c) he has plans for politics/philanthropy which will depend on an intact reputation and (d) he will be so rich i.e. multi-billionaire regardless that it seems strange to risk jail time for a few hundred million. If you make claims. Then you need to back them up.
      - shanghaiaway 9y ago
        I didn't make claims nor did anyone else. There's only facts that he's been selling stock.
- threeseed 9y ago
  As other's have mentioned stock sales are planned. And why is it surprising that Zuckerberg has sold lots of Facebook stock. (1) He owns the most and (2) he has previously gone on record as saying he will be selling stock to finance his charity.
1337biz 9y ago
I bet he tries to avoid this becoming a 'Zuckerberg' story and is more okay with FB declining a few points on its brand perception.
- threeseed 9y ago
  Especially since Zuckerberg has very big plans post Facebook.
bsder 9y ago
Does he have an evil lair in New Zealand like the rest of the oligarchs? Might want to check there. Zuckerberg is probably with his lawyers who are telling him to keep his mouth shut for now. There are active warrants and subpoenas flying around in multiple jurisdictions that could conceivably extradite or detain him. Being rich isn't fun if you can't go anywhere or do anything. Better to let the stock crash for a while than risk incriminating yourself because you shot your mouth off. Zuck isn't as stupid as Trump.
dragonwriter 9y ago
> Where's Zuckerberg in all of this? Working out scheduling for testimony to a UK parliamentary inquiry, a couple US congressional committees, and the US FEC? More seriously, the question is being asked everywhere, even, apparently, within Facebook: http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/20/technology/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-data-controversy/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/20/technology/mark-zuckerberg-f...
- bigphishy 9y ago
  Is that a question or a statement? If it's a statement, it comes across as pontifical.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > Is that a question or a statement? Which sentence, the one with the question mark at the end or the other one? The answer is different for each, and which is which should be obvious.
  - totalZero 9y ago
    The word pontifical has a pontifical air to it, don't you think? To answer your question about the question....it ends with a question mark, so it's probably a rhetorical question suggesting that Zuckerberg has his hands full at the moment. I'm sure you've seen the headline about MPs requesting his presence at a hearing.
baq 9y ago
what could he say to make you feel better about the whole clusterfuck that's unfolded in the past few days? 'I'm stepping down' is probably the only thing i'd buy.

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gervase 9y ago

Is there any evidence that this change was the result of external pressure from Facebook, rather than as the result of internal NYT editing? Articles frequently change in content, titles, and so on after publication, after all - that's why HN has to update titles so frequently. Edit: Whoops, missed it the first read-through. Looks like the change was confirmed by the original reporter to be as the result of a request from the Facebook PR team.

adambyrtek 9y ago
Respectable sites usually include a list of corrections and changes made to an article after publication. When it comes to submission titles, HN has a tendency to change them for no obvious reason even if the original title hasn't changed.
- masonic 9y ago
  Respectable sites usually include a list of corrections and changes made to an article after publication Respectable sources properly fact-check before publishing in the first place. Generally, most people who read an erroneous original will never see the corrected version.
- tptacek 9y ago
  NYT stories routinely change, sometimes substantially, between online and print versions, without corrections. There used to be a site that tracked this.
  - zevyoura 9y ago
    You may be thinking of http://newsdiffs.org http://newsdiffs.org Here's the page for the article in question: http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.co...
snowwrestler 9y ago
Your edit is wrong; the NY Times reporter only confirmed the chronology, i.e. that the change happened at a later time than the contact from Facebook PR. She did not confirm that the change was a "result of a request from the Facebook PR team"; in fact she vehemently denied it on Twitter. The story in this blog post is bullshit; it's made up. > I was the NYT reporter who was in contact w/Facebook over our Stamos story yesterday. We didn't remove any references to Sandberg at Facebook's request. (For the record, Facebook made no such request). If anything we added MORE detail to the story between the 1st and 2nd versions https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/976238483122487296 https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/976238483122487296 EDIT to clarify: Nicole Perlroth is the reporter mentioned by name in the blog post who confirmed the chronology. Sheera Frenkel was another reporter on the same NYT byline who tweeted the above. Here's a tweet from Perlroth too: > Echoing Sheera here. @colinkalmbacher needs to correct his blog post to reflect that it is inaccurate, even his attempt at our name spellings. He should also address why he chose to ignore our responses, which contradicted everything he wrote. https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976241288411430912 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976241288411430912

packeted 9y ago

It's also interesting that there is barely a mention of all this in my news feed on Facebook and there have been no links to it as a trending story.

threeseed 9y ago
It is a trending story for me on Facebook. Interestingly the lead article is, "Here's how to see which apps have access to your Facebook - and cut them off".

non_sequitur 9y ago

I don't even like Facebook, but really, is this newsworthy now? I know the media sees it as a chance to dogpile the company that has taken them to the cleaners, but there's a reason people don't trust or like the media anymore and "articles" like these are a big reason why.

symlinkk 9y ago
You don't think evidence of the NYT being bossed around by Facebook is newsworthy?
mannykannot 9y ago
Interference with major news sources is always newsworthy. The absence of a customary explanation of a correction is particularly noteworthy.
koomi 9y ago
Why would Facebook making a major newspaper stealthily edit an article to their liking - as confirmed by one of the authors - not be worthy news? Do you think this is normal behavior for a newspaper?
fnayr 9y ago
Is it unexpected that that one company asked for a newspaper to change their article to remove references that make one of their C level execs look bad? No, not at all. It is somewhat thought provoking though that said newspaper may have felt compelled to comply with the request because of Facebook's power (for instance not wanting to lose favorable placement in feed or trending sections). So to me the newsworthiness of this depends on how likely it is that they changed it because it was simply inaccurate versus something more nefarious (such as above). I believe that may be too subjective to determine at this point so probably no fruitful discussion can come in trying to figure that out.
danso 9y ago
Cambridge Analytica has been the subject of two very high profile investigations in the UK this past week, which caused Facebook to take punitive action against the firm, even though the firm and its misuse of FB data was written about several years ago. One of the revelations this week is that Facebook's CSO had been critical of FB's lack of response to CA and is now leaving the company: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-... Sometimes newsworthy things become newsworthy after the actual time of events. Harvey Weinstein's sexual abuse had been hinted at for years but only this past year did the amount of reporting and attention cause him to face real legal and business problems. Same with Bill Cosby.

danso 9y ago

FWIW, a NYT article undergoes many changes from the time it was originally posted to whatever its final state (usually, the next day, after the print edition). The story in question was just a few paragraphs when it was first posted, and then more details were added. You can use newsdiffs.org to see the various changes: http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/article-history/https%3A/www.nytimes.co... Here is the specific diff where the Sandberg reference was changed: http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytim... That said, if the explicit conflict between Stamos and Sandberg was a prominent detail, then many folks would argue that the NYT should have a clarification or editor's note explaining the change. However, it's worth noting that the reference to the conflict between Sandberg and Stamos is not omitted from the final edition. Original: > Mr. Stamos had been a strong advocate inside the company for investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook, often to the consternation of other top executives, including Sheryl Sandberg, the social network’s chief operating officer, according to the current and former employees, who asked not to be identified discussing internal matters. Final: > Mr. Stamos joined Facebook from Yahoo in June 2015. He and other Facebook executives, such as Ms. Sandberg, disagreed early on over how proactive the social network should be in policing its own platform, said the people briefed on the matter. In his statement, Mr. Stamos said his relationship with Ms. Sandberg was “productive.” The latter reference seems to be just as damning to Sandberg when it comes to her complacency in policing the FB platform, though it doesn't say that her disagreement with Stamos was specifically about the Russia question. You could still argue that this merits a clarification, i.e. A previous version of this story stated that Ms. Sandberg disagreed with Mr. Stamos in his advocacy for "investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook". However, Mr. Stamos said that he and Sandberg disagreed in general with how proactive Facebook should be in policing its own platform, but the two never specifically debated the issue with respect to revelations of Russian interference.

Karrot_Kream 9y ago
Thanks for posting about newsdiffs.org. I didn't know about this, it's awesome!

deleted 9y ago

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Analemma_ 9y ago

For everyone who cheered when Thiel took down Gawker, this is what you've wrought. Look up the definition of "chilling effect" sometime: even if Gawker's behavior wasn't defensible, now that newspapers know Facebook has a board member willing to go to war with news organizations that don't get in line, they have to self-censor to stay alive.

twblalock 9y ago
The coverage of Facebook has been quite negative, including from the NYT. So I'm not sure what self-censorship you're referring to.

danso 9y ago

My main argument for incompetence vs. malice is not necessarily that the NYT is too good to be corruptible/pressured, but because the purported gain (in favor of FB) is so small. Let's assume the NYT can be influenced to change/kill stories. After all, the Obama administration was able to get the NYT to delay/suppress stories on national security grounds [0], and this doesn't count all the stories that have been starved because of discouragement/apathy by editors. But these are stories that have been stopped before they saw the light of day. This reference to Sandberg was published in a widely-publicized (i.e. banner breaking news headline on nytimes.com) breaking news story. To censor it for any reason is going to be a difficult and embarrassing and noticeable decision, and one that is going to piss off someone in the editorial chain (e.g. the reporter, or her editor). So if Sandberg has the ability to pressure the NYT to revoke this reference, why would she do it now? The story is already a major clusterfuck for Facebook because it ties the abrupt dismissal of Facebook's entire security team to allegations about Russian/CA malfeasance on FB's platform. How much face does Sandberg save when the entire company is eating shit, with Sandberg at the helm and being conspicuously absent from making a public statement? If Sandberg had editorial power, don't you think she would've exercised it by having prior review of the entire story? If the NYT editors were so afraid of her that they'd cave in to pressure to retroactively edit a story in her favor, don't you think they would've brought this story to her attention before publishing it as a breaking news item and spreading it all over Twitter? NYT famously has one of the most anal-retentive social media policies among all media organizations. If Sandberg had real influence, NYT reporters would not be tweeting this kind of stuff about her: https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/975899584550465537 https://twitter.com/sheeraf/status/975899584550465537 https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/975793549076611072 https://twitter.com/MikeIsaac/status/975793549076611072 FWIW, the author of the NYT article in question has responded to the claims made by the submitted Law & Crime article: https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976156184909553664 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976156184909553664 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976157825331216384 https://twitter.com/nicoleperlroth/status/976157825331216384 [0] https://www.wnyc.org/story/nyt-reporter-james-risen-reporting-during-war-terror/ https://www.wnyc.org/story/nyt-reporter-james-risen-reportin...

mannykannot 9y ago
I do not see that there is any relevance to this case in the NYT being sensitive to national security issues - that is clearly not an issue here. And if issues of importance have routinely been "starved because of discouragement/apathy by editors" (as opposed to possibly flawed judgements of importance), then it would be helpful to your argument if you could enumerate them. No-one is suggesting that Sandberg had the editorial power of reviewing all Facebook-related articles before they were published, so the question of why she did not suppress this article before it first appeared does not arise. NYTs failure to seek permission beforehand can adequately be explained by a) it didn't expect the response it got and b) if it were in the habit of seeking such approval, it would destroy its brand, and its reason for existence. The issue is that the NYT caved in to a demand without even following its normal policy of explaining a correction, and this is a serious matter regardless of whether Sandberg or Facebook were ill-advised to follow this course of action. The article's author's responses look to me like an attempt at damage control, in that they talk around the central issue with heavy use of weasel words. If the original was deleted because it was superseded by a clearer follow-up, why is the follow-up notably unclear on this very issue?

deleted 9y ago

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donohoe 9y ago

As someone who worked at the NYT for 8 years and saw the inner workings I want to say the main assesrtions of this article are FALSE. Seriously. WTF

stochastic_monk 9y ago
Please be clearer. Which claims do you not think are true, and what reasons/evidence do you have behind your assertions? Do you mean the assertion that NYT made these changes in response to being reached by Facebook's PR team? (This is difficult to prove but suggested by the facts we have.) Do you mean the assertion that the NYT regularly changes headlines in response to criticism of those being covered? (This is alleged, but I have no proof of this.) Do you mean the assertion that Facebook contacted the Times after the article was published? (I highly doubt that this is false, and it being true suggests that the first point was true.)
- donohoe 9y ago
  I was on the subway so I couldn’t dig deep. In short, the opening paragraph, which the article leans on struck a nerve. The New York Times offers powerful third parties the ability to edit away–that is, to delete from the internet–unfavorable coverage appearing in the paper of record’s online edition. It’s false. The editorial process is pretty rigorous. No company has a magic “edit” button. The article goes through rounds of edits post-publish. It’s a established process and not done as-hoc.
  - fancyfacebook 9y ago
    Nobody at Facebook pushed a button, but the article was edited to remove an unflattering reference to Sheryl Sandberg after a phone call from Facebook PR. Also, just because you work(ed) at a company it does not mean you are fully aware of everything that goes on there, so don't make blanket statements about what can or can't happen. Employees are often some of the least informed about the inner workings of an organization, as they tend to dismiss uncomfortable findings out of hand and refuse to read about them.

tptacek 9y ago

This story doesn't appear to back up the headline. Unless I've missed something, it says that Facebook PR reached out to the NYT, and that the article was edited. That might mean Facebook "demanded" changes, or it might mean that they pointed out errors or additional facts that warranted the correction.

danso 9y ago
You are correct based on what's written. The author implies that Facebook PR reached out to NYT -- but doesn't claim what Facebook PR wanted or how the NYT reacted. This fact (the NYT agrees that FBPR contacted them) is juxtaposed with the observation that people are mad the NYT removed this graf from the original 300-word breaking news story: > Mr. Stamos had been a strong advocate inside the company for investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook, often to the consternation of other top executives, including Sheryl Sandberg, the social network’s chief operating officer, according to the current and former employees... This is definitely an interesting graf, but I don't (and neither do the NYT reporters, ostensibly) think that it's the key part of the story, not even of the 300-word blurb. In any case, this blurb was updated (rather, replaced) by a 1,300 article at the end of the day: http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/technology/facebook-alex-stamos.html http://newsdiffs.org/diff/1652560/1652801/https%3A/www.nytim... The critics of NYT think that the "consternation" line should not have been erased because it apparently is so directly damning of how Sandberg was resistant to deal with Russian interference. The NYT reporters have disagreed; they see the 1000+ words adding far more evidence of how Stamos tried to warn FB. In any case, the article author is trying to associate 3 unrelated events together: - NYT made a major update/rewrite of its article about Facebook - People are mad that the most damning line against Sandberg (re: Russia) was watered down - Facebook PR contacted NYT after the first version of the story/blurb was published. The OP has a hypothesis. But no evidence to support it. "Facebook Forces NYT" is not the right headline because the author never purports to prove or claim that Facebook forced NYT to do anything.

wcr3 9y ago

Garbage Pet Site Doles Out Libertarian Snackables. where's my freelancer check you animals?

davidf18 9y ago

Trump was right. Fake News from NYT. NYT revenues are partially derived from Facebook, posing a conflict of interest problem. We need a special audited, non-noncorruptable news source that people can consult when they want transparency in their news. The truth is that in domains that I understand well, the NYT is frequently biased or leaves out important facts.

botskonet 9y ago

The NY Times twitter accounts are saying this is false: https://twitter.com/NYTimesPR/status/976499121799483394 https://twitter.com/NYTimesPR/status/976499121799483394