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> the customer data wasn't used by any government, but by a political party. ... to become the government.

• Consultant32452 9y ago
  Ignoring scale of emotional reaction here for a moment, do you believe that the actual on-the-ground outcomes of this will be greater or lesser in scope than the Snowden files? I feel like there was a lot of bluster about the government tracking private citizens illegally but nothing really happened. Conversely, this time the wrong political candidate won using social media data, and now we might get some valuable privacy regulation. The best outcome would be privacy from both private and government, but if I had to choose I'd pick privacy from government. It appears I'm either in the significant minority or it's just easier to kick private corporations than it is to kick the government.
  • squiggleblaz 9y ago
    I don't like the choice. It's a matter of being ~abused. With analytics, many large companies are so powerful they can manipulate my emotions and decisions. Effectively they can choose what I will do. It's true that people and small companies have always done that, but I'm on a relatively level playing field with them. With these massive corporations, I can do pretty close to nothing about it. And in many cases we're talking about companies so big they're as powerful or more powerful that whole countries. The government could arrest someone I love and hold them under administrative detention because they'd decided "type of person X" is bad for the Party. But Facebook manipulate people's emotions - someone with that kind of power could encourage those who they don't like to commit suicide or acts of terror. It's not obvious to me that 1984 would have be different if we realised that the Party was democratically elected every four years and had merely manipulated everyone using a private service into voluntarily acting that way.
    • Consultant32452 9y ago
      There's an important difference between corporations and governments. Corporations rarely get a monopoly and in the event that they do they don't last forever. Once a government gets power it almost always keeps it forever.
      • isostatic 9y ago
        May Cameron Brown Blair Major Thatcher That's a lot of change in 30 years to be "forever" In the u.s Trump Obama Bush Ii Clinton Bush I
        • Consultant32452 9y ago
          Perspective is everything I guess. For the issues I care about most the difference between those US Presidents is largely cosmetic. So I would have presented them as evidence in my favor.
          • isostatic 9y ago
            A key reason they stay in power is because of private companies and people who fund both campaigns, something which America seems to think is fine.
      • amirmc 9y ago
        Consumer tech corporations, do seem to end up with monopolies — and they'll fight, lobby, and pay (through acquisitions) to keep them. It's a complete red-herring to argue that they don't last forever since that's utterly irrelevant to the impact they can have while they are around. Google's been around for almost 20 years now, FB didn't kill it. FB has been around for 14 years and can sway elections. If you want privacy from government, then you'll only get it if you can be private from corporations. They basically run things anyway via lobbyists.
        • Consultant32452 9y ago
          FB today can't sway elections any more than CBS of the past could.