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Zuckerberg Has No Way Out of Facebook's Quagmire
- zlo 9y agoWell, Zuck responded
- bazeblackwood 9y agoWith a milquetoast echo of everything we already know.
- mlctl3 9y agoLet's make a new strain of BSD to celebrate this that specializes in machine learning. I naively suggest 'Joy BSD'
- 908087 9y agoHis PR/legal team responded.
- tristanj 9y agoSomething I've been thinking about: why doesn't WeChat, the world's 2nd largest social network with 1B MAU, suffer the issues Facebook is experiencing today? If Facebook became more like WeChat, would they avoid these problems? If Facebook finds it does avoid such problems, will Facebook switch models in the future?
- platinumrad 9y agoTighter integration with the state. Much less of an expectation of privacy (especially with regard to the state) in China.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- asdsa5325 9y agoBecause everyone that uses WeChat understands that their data is being provided, without question, to the Chinese government?
- aylmao 9y agoWeChat is this big because of its dominance in China and it very much operates in cooperation of the government [1]. It was subsidized by the government, it has no international competition because the government doesn't allow similar apps to operate there, and it's an "accepted reality that officials censor and monitor users". Aka, the "privacy and collusion with the state" bar is at a very different level. [1]: https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/1/16721230/wechat-china-app-mini-programs-messaging-electronic-id-system https://www.theverge.com/2018/2/1/16721230/wechat-china-app-...
- dheuudjdjj 9y agoOh I have a little more faith in the man than that. First off, it's not clear that the bad news cycles are actually hurting the bottom line or any other line for that matter. Second, it's not obvious that curing the privacy issues that most capture the public attention will harm the service's utility for the majority of users. I haven't used any fb apps in a while and I haven't seen any of my friends share their app usage either.
- rectang 9y agoIt's fascinating that widespread outrage over privacy finally materializes when data is used for hated political causes. Commerce, law enforcement not so much... but "Trump" or "Obama" and suddenly people care.
- wavefunction 9y agoMore like "British pimping/extortion ring" combined with possible "Russian aynchronous warfare" but yeah you're right, there's nothing wrong with that, is there? It's just the subordination of my democracy and civil rights.
- sverige 9y agoThe Facebook outrage is interesting since it is tied to Trump. When Obama did it, no one cared. For example, there's a video of Jim Messina, Obama's 2012 campaign manager, talking about how they obtained the entire Facebook social graph and used it to target voters. [1] I don't remember any "delete Facebook" campaigns back then. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZmcyHpG31A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZmcyHpG31A
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- cryptoz 9y ago> When Obama did it, no one cared When Obama did what? Nothing here even remotely resembles the methods used by Obama's campaign. "No, Obama Didn’t Employ the Same Strategies as Cambridge Analytica" https://washingtonmonthly.com/2018/03/21/no-obama-didnt-employ-the-same-strategies-as-cambridge-analytica/#.WrJK9WsY5bs.twitter https://washingtonmonthly.com/2018/03/21/no-obama-didnt-empl... HN is so full of already-debunked right-wing talking points, it has to stop. This place is full of as much disinformation as anywhere else. Everything in your post is a straight lie, a specific intent to deceive readers and create a false narrative about balance. Edit: Dang, the flamebait here is the lie, disinformation and chaos created in the statement "When Obama did it, no one cared" which I was responding to. The cause of the flamebait frequently on HN is the frequently-upvoted lies and falsehoods, not my responses. My responses are entirely factual and do not contain lies or disinformation, unlike the flamebait I was responding to. I'm not allowed to reply to you directly because your software won't let me.
- dictum 9y ago(Warning: controversial and conspiratorial opinion; fake news if you will) I used to think Zuckerberg's pandering to the Chinese government was a power grab, an expansionist desire. Now I think it's a hedge strategy. He knows he's not very welcome in some of the circles he's been in for the past few years.
- OrganicMSG 9y agoGiggity.
- Mayzie 9y agoWow, is it just me, or is Bloomberg really on the attack on Facebook? Every article on Facebook from them submitted here and other places like Reddit have always been quite negative, especially the headline.
- fredliu 9y agoDefinitely not just you. And to me, it's not just Bloomberg, looks like most of traditional media companies are out this time.
- rhizome 9y agoThere was inevitably going to be a wave of takes.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- anonnel 9y agoSo someone is trying to get journalisim to be branded as “traditional media” now. The implication is “old and busted”, when in reality they have modern widely distributed websites which are as contemporary as any alternative medias being inferred ... which are what exactly? Twitter? “Journalism media” seems to be an appropriate counter.
- delhanty 9y agoYeah, Facebook/Google/... vs trad media is like lions vs hyenas fighting over a wildebeest carcass on the Seregenti. Personally, I'm rooting for the wildebeest to come back to life and run off.
- anonnel 9y agoFB is far from being a victim of lions or a carcass. If the metaphor you are trying to paint is a struggle is between Journalism Media and Social Media, I totally disagree with the side you’re picking.
- Cacti 9y agoI’m sorry, what quagmire? Most people either aren’t aware of the privacy issues or if they are don’t care. People like using Facebook, or at least are addicted to it.
- cryptoz 9y agoYou don't see the addiction itself as a quagmire? It sure is on its own. And "what quagmire"? You know what quagmire. The one where Facebook has been acting extremely guilty around entering Cambridge Analytica's offices and refusing to leave until police forced them out. The one where Facebook is complicit in the stolen information, whereby they had knowledge of the problem for 2+ years before acting. The one that spoils the trust of investors and users alike. That quagmire.
- rsp1984 9y agoSorry, I don't see it either. Yes, Facebook makes money off of users data, surprise surprise! People know that much, they aren't stupid and the deal worked just fine for both sides so far. The current outrage is about user's data getting into the wrong hands, and a rightful outrage it is. However I don't see how fixing that problem would endanger FB's business model. Quite the contrary actually. The Bloomberg argument is artifical and relies on the assumption that people don't want to share any data about themselves at all, which is just plain wrong. They do, as long as they can be reasonably sure that the data is "only" being used for harmless things such as targeted ads.
- ikeyany 9y ago> You don't see the addiction itself as a quagmire? Some actually consider it a feature. A highly monetizable one at that.
- juststeve 9y agowhat happens if someone swoops in and buys or merges with facebook, what happens to the data?
- sunir 9y agoAssigned to acquirer.
- mudil 9y agoThe whole operating model of the company based on invasion of privacy. Blatant invasion of privacy and data collection by Google and FB is a national security issue. No entity should be allowed to snoop on free citizens more than KGB has ever dreamed about. Orwellian!
- mirimir 9y ago> ... Facebook's de facto anonymity ... Facebook does a pretty good job of authentication, at least for nontechnical users, who are arguably the majority. If you sign up using VPN services or Tor, you get nagged for a mobile number for text verification. So Facebook either knows your IP address or mobile number. I don't consider that "de facto anonymity". Now if you're skilled, and willing to invest some time and money, you can circumvent that. Or you can buy accounts, if you know where to shop. But that's not the case, for most Facebook users.
- Kelbit 9y agoMobile number checks are almost trivial to circumvent - you can get a DID with SMS capability from a VOIP provider for under a buck, just use it once and throw it away.
- mirimir 9y agoThanks, good tip. However, the last time I looked at VoIP providers, they wanted to know who I was. Or at least, they wanted a credit/debit card. But maybe things have changed. And I am an amateur.
- itronitron 9y agoHopefully professional news organizations will realize how little credibility there is to social media numbers (likes, followers, etc.) and finally decide to stop reporting about trends on social media as if it is news.
- tluyben2 9y agoNot sure if offtopic but how does Facebook make money? They talk about micro targetting me but, while I click often on adword ads because they know me, I have literally 0 times seen any interesting or a even remotely relevant ad on facebook? They know everything about me... I did an advertising engine for a big datingsite long ago which was stupid as mud but got vastly superior ads for for my demographic based on the data the site had about me than facebook has ever shown me. So am I just ‘unlucky’ or am I missing something?
- stareatgoats 9y agoFacebook is an addiction for several billion humans. It is in itself a quagmire, but is not going to go away any time soon. And the business of making money off profiling private behavior online, for commercial or other purposes, is not specifically a Facebook thing, it is ingrained into the backbone of the internet itself. It won't go away any time soon. Facebook will of course be responsive to demands by the joint forces of tax-revenue collecting agencies + old media (who are seeing their business models dissipate into the pockets of Facebook, Google and a few more), and so we'll probably see some adjustments which will try to satisfy them; less tax-havens and a trickle of the revenue stream back to the original news creators. But nothing drastic.
- hux_ 9y agoHe should resign. Or this bullshit will keep repeating. As it already has too many times. Tech/Engineering folk are totally unfit to run social companies of the scale of YouTube/twitter/facebook etc. They don't have the skills or the experience or the sense in handling this stuff. They know how to scale things and that's where their expertise ends and contribution should end. They should be run by elected politicians with an advisory board filled with people who understand sociology, psychology, religion, culture, law and security. Those are the people who keep society running not the fucking plumbers.
- lkrubner 9y agoThere is a suddenness to this episode that deserves some examination. For years, Facebook has been violating people's privacy. For years, people went along with it. Perhaps on some level, people were disturbed by it, but they weren't angry enough to do anything about it. If we were discussing economics, then we would call this a Minsky moment[1]. If you substitute "trust" for "money" then this almost fits: "A Minsky moment is a sudden major collapse of asset values which is part of the credit cycle or business cycle. Such moments occur because long periods of prosperity and increasing value of investments lead to increasing speculation using borrowed money." But I think we are also seeing a sudden moral panic, like the one that destroyed MySpace in 2006. danah boyd wrote about that at the time[2]: "Because of their position of power, outsiders are pushing the big red emergency button, screaming danger and creating a complete and utter moral panic. Welcome to a generational divide, where adults are unable to see the practices of their children on kids' terms. If MySpace falters in the next 1-2 years, it will be because of this moral panic." But those children grew up. The 16 year old of 2006 is now 28. So this moral panic is a bit different. It's not adults freaking out about what is being done to kids, it's adults freaking out about what is being done to themselves. Mind you, I think it's obvious that Facebook has behaved very badly, so this episode of castigation is well deserved. But the suddenness of it makes me think there is also an element of panic. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsky_moment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsky_moment [2] https://www.danah.org/papers/FriendsterMySpaceEssay.html https://www.danah.org/papers/FriendsterMySpaceEssay.html
- humanrebar 9y agoI'm not sold on the MySpace thesis. MySpace faltered due to autoplaying audio and video, obnoxious animated gifs, and ridiculous CSS customization powers given to the users. Facebook was cleaner, loaded faster, and had a better "scene" for people in the targeted demographic: college students and eventually recent graduates.
- mistermann 9y agoThe panic, if there is any, is due to reporting in the media.
- _bxg1 9y ago
- GreeniFi 9y agoThere is sadly a very clear reason why China banned Facebook - its use has the potential to destroy social consensus, which is necessary for social cohesion. I’m not surprised Zuck has been hiding, in his heart of hearts, he realizes his invention has sort of destroyed America (and Britain, but I concede he probably cares less about that).
- zrobotics 9y agoHow does that explain WeChat? No, I think they quickly realized the power social media has to shape social consensus, which is what this whole scandal ultimately boils down to. They banned Facebook to eliminate competitors for their home grown (and highly controlled) domestic alternative vs. an American company.
- sixothree 9y agoAt this point I very much want to know what data about me has been collected by private companies. I'm getting sick of not knowing. I'm repulsed by people divining or extrapolating. I want to fucking know.
- drak0n1c 9y agoWhatever you ever filled in or posted to the servers of a private company under your real identity is "data about me that has been collected by private companies". It's not that complicated. Most places now (for compliance reasons) allow you to delete old accounts and old posts either through a button or if you email customer support or the webmaster.
- WheelsAtLarge 9y ago"Zuckerberg Has No Way Out of Facebook's Quagmire." Unfortunately, yes he does. It's called time. Act like you're changing things, do a little change, the least the better, and wait it out. People will bitch about it but eventually, it becomes the new normal. Even if FB fails, which it won't, there's another social network right after it. But I hope I'm wrong.
- jonmc12 9y ago> dreams.. "..we're closing the main Facebook app and web site.." I think a better dream would be if FB open-sourced an advertisement-free Facebook, and provided $1B in grants to build permutations of the UI that all sync data.
- knodi 9y agoPlease keep your bs of "Obama did it too!" for your FoxNews watch friends/family.
- dang 9y agoPlease don't post partisan flamebait here. These threads are bad enough without setting additional fires. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- fooker 9y agoNo way out, you mean other than the largest ever network effect seen in business?