6 ms·

He is a CEO in damage control mode. The cynic in me wants me to ignore everything he says right now. The ashes of the privacy debate will be swept under the rug

He is a CEO in damage control mode. The cynic in me wants me to ignore everything he says right now. The ashes of the privacy debate will be swept under the rug the once the fire is out. History says making money is more important to fb than being ethical.

username223 9y ago
The cynic in me thinks he spent a few days using the world's biggest surveillance/analytics apparatus to gauge public sentiment, then came up with talking points and proposals that would cause minimal damage to his business. For example, it sounds good that there will be some notification for the 50 million people whose data was scraped without their knowledge. Will that be a simple email, or a page buried deep in the FB settings menu? How about all of the other companies doing exactly the same scraping? Are their victims notified as well? And then there was the "after the first billion, people can't afford it, so surveillance is the answer" line. Really? From a man who extracted $50 billion from that business? Here's a thought: pay them.
- adventured 9y ago
  Your end criticism of Zuckerberg has a very big problem: he's going to give away his fortune, the ~$69 billion, like Gates and Buffett before him. Here's what would have to really scare you, if I'm gauging your views correctly: Zuckerberg actually believes in what he's doing and based on his behavior the last 14 years he isn't very interested in the money. He has never acted like a Saudi prince or gilded age tycoon. He never hoarded Facebook equity, he took vast perpetual dilution (despite entirely controlling the Facebook corporation), and produced thousands of millionaires. He spread the wealth around, that's why he only owns ~14% of a company that went public less than six years ago. Larry Ellison by contrast, still owns 27% of Oracle after 40 years. How about all of those millionaires that got rich on Facebook stock? All those teacher pensions that got massive returns on it? The thousands of Facebook employees that have yielded 1%er salaries and wealth. The tens of thousands of average investors that rode the Facebook giant and made most of the money on it. Zuckerberg made a lot of money. Everybody else combined made more by a factor of ~8x or more. What's their guilt in having profited on all of this? Hitting someone with the wealth seeker tag, is the easy way out. The easiest, cheapest negative label there is: the profit motive. Unfortunately for your premise, criticizing him about money, makes very little sense.
  - knuththetruth 9y ago
    >Your end criticism of Zuckerberg has a very big problem: he's going to give away his fortune, the ~$69 billion, like Gates and Buffett before him. Nope. He explicitly structured his foundation as an LLC to not do that so he, his wife, and I imagine his children, can use his wealth however he sees fit. The reputation of Gates and Buffet’s pledges were just something he capitalized on to make himself appear as benevolent.
  - Lio 9y ago
    He did, however, use his vast wealth to buy up his neighbor’s houses just to knock them down. Ostensibly to protect his own privacy whilst at the same time declairing that other people’s “privacy is history”. Even people who don’t have Facebook accounts. http://time.com/money/4346766/mark-zuckerberg-houses/ http://time.com/money/4346766/mark-zuckerberg-houses/
  - 220V_USKettle 9y ago
    So, what is your opinion of Zuck's Hawaiin real estate acquisition behaviors?
    - forgot-account 9y ago
      I’m not a big fan of Zuck, but that’s just how real estate acquisition has to happen in Hawaii due to very odd state property laws.
  - differentView 9y ago
    "They actually believe I'm going to give away my fortune like Warren Buffet. Dumb fucks!" -- Mark Zuckerberg, probably
  - galieos_ghost 9y ago
    giving pledge is just a way to evade estate tax and get good publicity from plebes who don't know better.
  - 908087 9y ago
    His "charity" is not a charity at all. It's a personal influence machine, which he has been using to hire political operatives and influence policy.
Waterluvian 9y ago
I'm not sure ethics is ever a real factor in large scale business. If it's there, it's there as a PR move. The only wall companies push up against is that of the law.
- newnewpdro 9y ago
  > The only wall companies push up against is that of the law. Even then it's a matter of weighing the risks vs. rewards. Back in the early days of HFT I knew of companies blatantly violating SEC regulations because the rewards were so large any legal consequence should they get busted was insignificant.
Khaine 9y ago
Facebook has never been ethical. Zuckerberg doesn't believe in privacy. I remember that from from inception to 2010 every move facebook did eroded the default privacy settings of users[1]. [1] http://mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/ http://mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/
- 908087 9y ago
  Zuckerberg absolutely does believe in privacy - for himself. If he didn't, he wouldn't be doing things like buying the homes that surround his, and building massive walls around his Hawaiian privacy retreat.
- ahartmetz 9y ago
  There is no reason to believe anything he says. Look at his actions, does he share everything about him with the world?
jonbarker 9y ago
Have to say I respect the guy for what he built up to around 2008 but I have to call this one. He's basically following the old tobacco 'four dogs' strategy if you follow his statements. Some examples from just the past couple of months of statements mostly from last night (all paraphrased): 1) First of all, I don't have a dog. -> 'The idea that someone affected an election with ads on fb is pretty crazy.' 2) And if I had a dog, it doesn't bite. -> 'Facebook is a force in the world for good, because it connects everyone, and my job is to work on something my kids will be proud of, as long as facebook is important.' (benefits outweigh the harms, equating FB with the internet). This is dubious. 3) And if I had a dog and it did bite, then it didn't bite you. -> 'Security is a problem that is never solved, so we like everyone else will always be working on it forever.' Implication: if I weren't working on internet security, someone else would be, and security design problems would still be a threat to internet users, so stop complaining about the state of internet security, because odds are it hasn't affected you, and by the way, look how much I am investing in it by hiring thousands of people to do content moderation on everyone's behalf. 4) And if I had a dog and it did bite, and it bit you, then you provoked the dog. -> '#deletefacebook is obviously not good, but nobody is acting on it in any meaningful numbers' (calling everyone's bluff and in my interpretation actually daring everyone to try and create a more secure and beneficial internet experience without facebook). Please reply with modifications; I think the essential gist is there.

username223 9y ago

The cynic in me thinks he spent a few days using the world's biggest surveillance/analytics apparatus to gauge public sentiment, then came up with talking points and proposals that would cause minimal damage to his business. For example, it sounds good that there will be some notification for the 50 million people whose data was scraped without their knowledge. Will that be a simple email, or a page buried deep in the FB settings menu? How about all of the other companies doing exactly the same scraping? Are their victims notified as well? And then there was the "after the first billion, people can't afford it, so surveillance is the answer" line. Really? From a man who extracted $50 billion from that business? Here's a thought: pay them.

adventured 9y ago
Your end criticism of Zuckerberg has a very big problem: he's going to give away his fortune, the ~$69 billion, like Gates and Buffett before him. Here's what would have to really scare you, if I'm gauging your views correctly: Zuckerberg actually believes in what he's doing and based on his behavior the last 14 years he isn't very interested in the money. He has never acted like a Saudi prince or gilded age tycoon. He never hoarded Facebook equity, he took vast perpetual dilution (despite entirely controlling the Facebook corporation), and produced thousands of millionaires. He spread the wealth around, that's why he only owns ~14% of a company that went public less than six years ago. Larry Ellison by contrast, still owns 27% of Oracle after 40 years. How about all of those millionaires that got rich on Facebook stock? All those teacher pensions that got massive returns on it? The thousands of Facebook employees that have yielded 1%er salaries and wealth. The tens of thousands of average investors that rode the Facebook giant and made most of the money on it. Zuckerberg made a lot of money. Everybody else combined made more by a factor of ~8x or more. What's their guilt in having profited on all of this? Hitting someone with the wealth seeker tag, is the easy way out. The easiest, cheapest negative label there is: the profit motive. Unfortunately for your premise, criticizing him about money, makes very little sense.
- knuththetruth 9y ago
  >Your end criticism of Zuckerberg has a very big problem: he's going to give away his fortune, the ~$69 billion, like Gates and Buffett before him. Nope. He explicitly structured his foundation as an LLC to not do that so he, his wife, and I imagine his children, can use his wealth however he sees fit. The reputation of Gates and Buffet’s pledges were just something he capitalized on to make himself appear as benevolent.
- Lio 9y ago
  He did, however, use his vast wealth to buy up his neighbor’s houses just to knock them down. Ostensibly to protect his own privacy whilst at the same time declairing that other people’s “privacy is history”. Even people who don’t have Facebook accounts. http://time.com/money/4346766/mark-zuckerberg-houses/ http://time.com/money/4346766/mark-zuckerberg-houses/
- 220V_USKettle 9y ago
  So, what is your opinion of Zuck's Hawaiin real estate acquisition behaviors?
  - forgot-account 9y ago
    I’m not a big fan of Zuck, but that’s just how real estate acquisition has to happen in Hawaii due to very odd state property laws.
- differentView 9y ago
  "They actually believe I'm going to give away my fortune like Warren Buffet. Dumb fucks!" -- Mark Zuckerberg, probably
- galieos_ghost 9y ago
  giving pledge is just a way to evade estate tax and get good publicity from plebes who don't know better.
- 908087 9y ago
  His "charity" is not a charity at all. It's a personal influence machine, which he has been using to hire political operatives and influence policy.

Waterluvian 9y ago

I'm not sure ethics is ever a real factor in large scale business. If it's there, it's there as a PR move. The only wall companies push up against is that of the law.

newnewpdro 9y ago
> The only wall companies push up against is that of the law. Even then it's a matter of weighing the risks vs. rewards. Back in the early days of HFT I knew of companies blatantly violating SEC regulations because the rewards were so large any legal consequence should they get busted was insignificant.

Khaine 9y ago

Facebook has never been ethical. Zuckerberg doesn't believe in privacy. I remember that from from inception to 2010 every move facebook did eroded the default privacy settings of users[1]. [1] http://mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/ http://mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/

908087 9y ago
Zuckerberg absolutely does believe in privacy - for himself. If he didn't, he wouldn't be doing things like buying the homes that surround his, and building massive walls around his Hawaiian privacy retreat.
ahartmetz 9y ago
There is no reason to believe anything he says. Look at his actions, does he share everything about him with the world?

jonbarker 9y ago

Have to say I respect the guy for what he built up to around 2008 but I have to call this one. He's basically following the old tobacco 'four dogs' strategy if you follow his statements. Some examples from just the past couple of months of statements mostly from last night (all paraphrased): 1) First of all, I don't have a dog. -> 'The idea that someone affected an election with ads on fb is pretty crazy.' 2) And if I had a dog, it doesn't bite. -> 'Facebook is a force in the world for good, because it connects everyone, and my job is to work on something my kids will be proud of, as long as facebook is important.' (benefits outweigh the harms, equating FB with the internet). This is dubious. 3) And if I had a dog and it did bite, then it didn't bite you. -> 'Security is a problem that is never solved, so we like everyone else will always be working on it forever.' Implication: if I weren't working on internet security, someone else would be, and security design problems would still be a threat to internet users, so stop complaining about the state of internet security, because odds are it hasn't affected you, and by the way, look how much I am investing in it by hiring thousands of people to do content moderation on everyone's behalf. 4) And if I had a dog and it did bite, and it bit you, then you provoked the dog. -> '#deletefacebook is obviously not good, but nobody is acting on it in any meaningful numbers' (calling everyone's bluff and in my interpretation actually daring everyone to try and create a more secure and beneficial internet experience without facebook). Please reply with modifications; I think the essential gist is there.