4 ms·

Mark Zuckerberg Can Still Fix This Mess

7 points by Irishsteve 9y ago

common_ 9y ago
> Facebook does contribute to efforts to improve our digital lives, including one on youth education at the center I co-founded. Why isn't this disclosed at the top of the article?
- DataWorker 9y ago
  You can safely assume that any pro Facebook editorials are being written by those with vested interests. This is true for most companies in the media/advertising sphere. It’s always been more incestuous than the general public is led to believe.
africasiaeuro 9y ago
Zuck has big canons like nytimes to assist him, fact remains nobody trusts his outfit anymore.
volak 9y ago
What's so bizarre to me about this whole ongoing story is the complete lack of perspective and common sense. You give facebook all your information willingly and for free - and then people are surprised when facebook sells the information? Facebook's business is not to protect your information.. its to sell your information to advertisers. You're paying to use their platform to connect with your "friends" by giving up your rights to whatever they can scrape off your phone. This is not a surprise. Mr. Zuckerberg will appear before the panel and promise data-security changes but at the end of the day facebook is still a business for advertisers wanting your shopping lists, contacts, interests, and personal profile to sell you stuff. The only thing that will change will be facebook's vetting process so only "friendly" corporations like walmart and BP have access to everything Cambridge Analytica had.
- jarjoura 9y ago
  The nuance you’re missing here is that advertisers can only ask Facebook to show to such and such from high level categories. Gay Male 18-35, San Francisco, into dogs, for example. That’s it. Facebook will then bill that advertiser based on how many people see that ad. The advertiser has no idea who you are or even if they got your attention to the ad they just paid for.
  - volak 9y ago
    My only point is - your entire statement is basically "trust facebook" - no one should trust facebook. Personal information is the product facebook sells - it should surprise no one when that data is sold.
  - sp332 9y ago
    That's only true until someone clicks on the ad. Then the advertiser gets to put a cookie in that browser that says "the ad Facebook only shows to gay 18-35 SF dog owners got clicked in this browser."
- nightski 9y ago
  If that is true, and there is no way for Facebook to survive AND give users more control over what, how, and when their data is shared then they may actually be in trouble.
  - volak 9y ago
    True - 100%
- _tulpa 9y ago
  >You're paying to use their platform to connect with your "friends" by giving up your rights to whatever they can scrape off your phone. The general public (especially in developing countries) don't understand this at all. In many countries facebook/messenger/whatsapp is unmetered thanks to facebook subsidies, which makes 'giving up your rights' the cheapest way (sometimes the only affordable way) to pay for a service to communicate with people. Facebook is bundled with pretty much every Android phone ever. People without facebook accounts have profiles, they're just not generally visible. They've put a shitload of money and effort into forcing themselves into the position as a totally pervasive social arbitration platform, where the social cost of opting out makes it impossible even if you ignore the fact that your friends are probably still participating and happily handing over your data for you. What's bizzarre is how people who do know these things still seem to expect 'perspective and common sense' from a totally uninterested and mostly uneducated public, and how people who do know these things can ignore just how creepy and predatory Facebooks practices are.

7 points by Irishsteve 9y ago

> Facebook does contribute to efforts to improve our digital lives, including one on youth education at the center I co-founded. Why isn't this disclosed at the top of the article?

DataWorker 9y ago
You can safely assume that any pro Facebook editorials are being written by those with vested interests. This is true for most companies in the media/advertising sphere. It’s always been more incestuous than the general public is led to believe.

africasiaeuro 9y ago

Zuck has big canons like nytimes to assist him, fact remains nobody trusts his outfit anymore.

volak 9y ago

What's so bizarre to me about this whole ongoing story is the complete lack of perspective and common sense. You give facebook all your information willingly and for free - and then people are surprised when facebook sells the information? Facebook's business is not to protect your information.. its to sell your information to advertisers. You're paying to use their platform to connect with your "friends" by giving up your rights to whatever they can scrape off your phone. This is not a surprise. Mr. Zuckerberg will appear before the panel and promise data-security changes but at the end of the day facebook is still a business for advertisers wanting your shopping lists, contacts, interests, and personal profile to sell you stuff. The only thing that will change will be facebook's vetting process so only "friendly" corporations like walmart and BP have access to everything Cambridge Analytica had.

jarjoura 9y ago
The nuance you’re missing here is that advertisers can only ask Facebook to show to such and such from high level categories. Gay Male 18-35, San Francisco, into dogs, for example. That’s it. Facebook will then bill that advertiser based on how many people see that ad. The advertiser has no idea who you are or even if they got your attention to the ad they just paid for.
- volak 9y ago
  My only point is - your entire statement is basically "trust facebook" - no one should trust facebook. Personal information is the product facebook sells - it should surprise no one when that data is sold.
- sp332 9y ago
  That's only true until someone clicks on the ad. Then the advertiser gets to put a cookie in that browser that says "the ad Facebook only shows to gay 18-35 SF dog owners got clicked in this browser."
nightski 9y ago
If that is true, and there is no way for Facebook to survive AND give users more control over what, how, and when their data is shared then they may actually be in trouble.
- volak 9y ago
  True - 100%
_tulpa 9y ago
>You're paying to use their platform to connect with your "friends" by giving up your rights to whatever they can scrape off your phone. The general public (especially in developing countries) don't understand this at all. In many countries facebook/messenger/whatsapp is unmetered thanks to facebook subsidies, which makes 'giving up your rights' the cheapest way (sometimes the only affordable way) to pay for a service to communicate with people. Facebook is bundled with pretty much every Android phone ever. People without facebook accounts have profiles, they're just not generally visible. They've put a shitload of money and effort into forcing themselves into the position as a totally pervasive social arbitration platform, where the social cost of opting out makes it impossible even if you ignore the fact that your friends are probably still participating and happily handing over your data for you. What's bizzarre is how people who do know these things still seem to expect 'perspective and common sense' from a totally uninterested and mostly uneducated public, and how people who do know these things can ignore just how creepy and predatory Facebooks practices are.