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“They came to office in the days following election recruiting & were very candid that they allowed us to do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to d

“They came to office in the days following election recruiting & were very candid that they allowed us to do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to do because they were on our side" The willingness to excuse Facebook selling your privacy because you agree with a political point of view is part of the problem.

cryptonector 9y ago
That sort of rank partisanship can barely be hidden. It's discrediting. FB is clearly in the worse here, even if they were entirely within their rights while Cambridge Analytica was entirely not. What's legal is not always what's right.
- InTheArena 9y ago
  this. It's becoming clear exactly what the cost of social surveillance is in our lives. This is just one of many significant problems with it. There have always been jackasses willing to sacrifice morals (or rightness) in favor of power. Social networks just make it easier to ignore signals that should humanize power.
- mistermann 9y ago
  What's even more interesting to me is that /u/WalterGR is so biased that on this topic, unless he's lying, his brain literally cannot differentiate between identical and similar, and he is far from the only person behaving like this. Since we're on HN, odds are he's otherwise a fairly smart person. This isn't just a typical argument about a matter of opinion - identical and similar are two distinctly different words, but he will be simply unable to see the relevance of that to what he has written above. I've been on the internet a long time, and there have been flame wars and various disagreements since forever, but there is something very, very different happening with people's minds now. EDIT: Once again, immediate downvotes with no rebuttal. Shocking. And while this is frustrating, and a bit scary for the future that critical thinking is almost nowhere to be found, the childish partisanship combined with self-important delusions is an interesting insight into the psyche of young university educated Westerners. > Neither of those citations say that what the Obama campaign did violated Facebook's policies. > The "But the Obama campaign did something similar!" is an argument based on false equivalence, used to muddy the conversation. e·quiv·a·lence iˈkwivələns/ noun noun: equivalence; plural noun: equivalences the condition of being equal or equivalent in value, worth, function, etc. sim·i·lar ˈsim(ə)lər/ adjective adjective: similar 1. resembling without being identical. "a soft cheese similar to Brie" synonyms: alike, (much) the same, indistinguishable, almost identical, homogeneous, homologous; More
  - sctb 9y ago
    > ...his brain literally cannot differentiate between identical and similar... You're way out of civil and substantive territory with things like this. Please resist the temptation. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - mistermann 9y ago
      I sincerely believe this is something new and interesting. Suggesting someone has acted based on a subconscious psychological affect is less insulting than accusing someone of conscious or deliberate error (which happens routinely on HN), is it not? Which has the harsher punishment, second degree murder or first? Serious question. Would you deny that there has been a noticeable decline in objectivity of commentary in the last year? I can agree singling one person out could be considered harsh, but make an honest effort to ignore the perceived "rudeness", is the failure of basic logic not a little striking here? If the topic wasn't controversial, do you think a similar situation would arise? I take what you say seriously, and kindly ask for the same consideration in return.
      - sctb 9y ago
        I'm sorry, but I don't follow all of that. The main issue with the original comment is simple: it is not within the guidelines on Hacker News to say that another user's brain is malfunctioning, or other things of that sort. > Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
        mistermann 9y ago
        The point is, it's a double standard. The guideline you quote used to be broadly followed, but is now broken regularly. And his brain isn't malfunctioning, it's just behaving the way the human brain works, the vast majority of people on HN are quite broadly knowledgeable, I highly doubt you're that ignorant of human psychology, more likely you don't care for my opinion. Besides, read my edit above - whether it was accidental or deliberate, the person was being incredibly intellectually dishonest. It wasn't too long ago that that counted for something on this website. I suppose it still does, but what's new is that it is trumped by political correctness. If you're going to bother with a reply, how about you address my "intellectually dishonest" charge? Demonstrate how I am incorrect.
WalterGR 9y ago
Both the articles you cite concede that some meeting some time somewhere at which somebody from Facebook said "they allowed us to do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to do because they were on our side" doesn't mean that the Obama campaign violated Facebook policies. It's an important distinction. If we trust The Daily Mail article: Davidsen said that she felt the project was 'creepy' - 'even though we played by the rules, and didn't do anything I felt was ugly, with the data' If we trust the IBD article: The only difference, as far as we can discern, between the two campaigns' use of Facebook, is that in the case of Obama the users themselves agreed to share their data with the Obama campaign, as well as that of their friends. The users that downloaded the Cambridge app, meanwhile, were only told that the information would be used for academic purposes. Nor was the data to be used for anything other than academic purposes. It's an important distinction, to be sure, and Facebook is right to be attacked for its inability to control how its user data were being gathered and shopped around. (Though it should be pointed out that it wasn't a Cambridge Analytica app, and Cambridge Analytica obtained the data from a 3rd party who wasn't authorized to provide it.)
- creaghpatr 9y ago
  In any case, Zuckerberg's senate testimony should reveal the circumstances under which facebook data was shared or not shared with the Obama and Trump campaigns. After all, both campaigns (and most major US political campaigns) surely had embedded Facebook employee account managers helping them spend as much money as effectively as possible, while scrutinizing their account usage.
  - Karunamon 9y ago
    That is assuming the testimony doesn't wind up being an hours long repetition of the words "I do not recall". I'm not all that familiar with Facebook's org chart, but there might even be some plausible deniability with the CEO getting involved with day-to-day API access requests. (Who, me, cynical?)

cryptonector 9y ago

That sort of rank partisanship can barely be hidden. It's discrediting. FB is clearly in the worse here, even if they were entirely within their rights while Cambridge Analytica was entirely not. What's legal is not always what's right.

InTheArena 9y ago
this. It's becoming clear exactly what the cost of social surveillance is in our lives. This is just one of many significant problems with it. There have always been jackasses willing to sacrifice morals (or rightness) in favor of power. Social networks just make it easier to ignore signals that should humanize power.
mistermann 9y ago
What's even more interesting to me is that /u/WalterGR is so biased that on this topic, unless he's lying, his brain literally cannot differentiate between identical and similar, and he is far from the only person behaving like this. Since we're on HN, odds are he's otherwise a fairly smart person. This isn't just a typical argument about a matter of opinion - identical and similar are two distinctly different words, but he will be simply unable to see the relevance of that to what he has written above. I've been on the internet a long time, and there have been flame wars and various disagreements since forever, but there is something very, very different happening with people's minds now. EDIT: Once again, immediate downvotes with no rebuttal. Shocking. And while this is frustrating, and a bit scary for the future that critical thinking is almost nowhere to be found, the childish partisanship combined with self-important delusions is an interesting insight into the psyche of young university educated Westerners. > Neither of those citations say that what the Obama campaign did violated Facebook's policies. > The "But the Obama campaign did something similar!" is an argument based on false equivalence, used to muddy the conversation. e·quiv·a·lence iˈkwivələns/ noun noun: equivalence; plural noun: equivalences the condition of being equal or equivalent in value, worth, function, etc. sim·i·lar ˈsim(ə)lər/ adjective adjective: similar 1. resembling without being identical. "a soft cheese similar to Brie" synonyms: alike, (much) the same, indistinguishable, almost identical, homogeneous, homologous; More
- sctb 9y ago
  > ...his brain literally cannot differentiate between identical and similar... You're way out of civil and substantive territory with things like this. Please resist the temptation. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - mistermann 9y ago
    I sincerely believe this is something new and interesting. Suggesting someone has acted based on a subconscious psychological affect is less insulting than accusing someone of conscious or deliberate error (which happens routinely on HN), is it not? Which has the harsher punishment, second degree murder or first? Serious question. Would you deny that there has been a noticeable decline in objectivity of commentary in the last year? I can agree singling one person out could be considered harsh, but make an honest effort to ignore the perceived "rudeness", is the failure of basic logic not a little striking here? If the topic wasn't controversial, do you think a similar situation would arise? I take what you say seriously, and kindly ask for the same consideration in return.
    - sctb 9y ago
      I'm sorry, but I don't follow all of that. The main issue with the original comment is simple: it is not within the guidelines on Hacker News to say that another user's brain is malfunctioning, or other things of that sort. > Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - mistermann 9y ago
        The point is, it's a double standard. The guideline you quote used to be broadly followed, but is now broken regularly. And his brain isn't malfunctioning, it's just behaving the way the human brain works, the vast majority of people on HN are quite broadly knowledgeable, I highly doubt you're that ignorant of human psychology, more likely you don't care for my opinion. Besides, read my edit above - whether it was accidental or deliberate, the person was being incredibly intellectually dishonest. It wasn't too long ago that that counted for something on this website. I suppose it still does, but what's new is that it is trumped by political correctness. If you're going to bother with a reply, how about you address my "intellectually dishonest" charge? Demonstrate how I am incorrect.

WalterGR 9y ago

Both the articles you cite concede that some meeting some time somewhere at which somebody from Facebook said "they allowed us to do things they wouldn’t have allowed someone else to do because they were on our side" doesn't mean that the Obama campaign violated Facebook policies. It's an important distinction. If we trust The Daily Mail article: Davidsen said that she felt the project was 'creepy' - 'even though we played by the rules, and didn't do anything I felt was ugly, with the data' If we trust the IBD article: The only difference, as far as we can discern, between the two campaigns' use of Facebook, is that in the case of Obama the users themselves agreed to share their data with the Obama campaign, as well as that of their friends. The users that downloaded the Cambridge app, meanwhile, were only told that the information would be used for academic purposes. Nor was the data to be used for anything other than academic purposes. It's an important distinction, to be sure, and Facebook is right to be attacked for its inability to control how its user data were being gathered and shopped around. (Though it should be pointed out that it wasn't a Cambridge Analytica app, and Cambridge Analytica obtained the data from a 3rd party who wasn't authorized to provide it.)

creaghpatr 9y ago
In any case, Zuckerberg's senate testimony should reveal the circumstances under which facebook data was shared or not shared with the Obama and Trump campaigns. After all, both campaigns (and most major US political campaigns) surely had embedded Facebook employee account managers helping them spend as much money as effectively as possible, while scrutinizing their account usage.
- Karunamon 9y ago
  That is assuming the testimony doesn't wind up being an hours long repetition of the words "I do not recall". I'm not all that familiar with Facebook's org chart, but there might even be some plausible deniability with the CEO getting involved with day-to-day API access requests. (Who, me, cynical?)