5 ms·

Facebook is a multi-billion dollar corporation with a history of obfuscating the truth and a terrible record on privacy. With the power they have they deserve s

by maym86 8y ago

Facebook is a multi-billion dollar corporation with a history of obfuscating the truth and a terrible record on privacy. With the power they have they deserve scrutiny. I agree that selecting patents isn't a very convincing aproach but it is another data point. Could it just be that NYT is printing a lot of negative articles because they're are a lot of incidents involving Facebook doing something wrong?

dominotw 8y ago
Where was this level of scrutiny before last year? Did fb turn evil in 2017.
- maym86 8y ago
  Just because they didn't do something before why should they do it now? Is that really your argument?
  - dominotw 8y ago
    I am not saying they shouldn't do it now. I am curious why it was not on their radar before 2017. Is that not a valid question? Do they not deserve any scrutiny themselves or can nytimes do no wrong, their intentions always pure. Would you extend same goodwill to foxnews?
    - polyomino 8y ago
      I believe NY tîmes had articles about Facebook and privacy practices prior to 2017. There was the whole debacle where Facebook “locked down” their developer platform. I think it’s reasonable for them to have more scrutiny now as it’s clear they don’t intend to fix their practices.
      - dominotw 8y ago
        > I believe NY tîmes had articles about Facebook and privacy practices prior to 2017. I cant seem to find any. Do you have examples?
        deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
        bogomipz 8y ago
        You didn't look very hard then. There are plenty: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/technology/facebook-offers-privacy-checkup-to-all-1-28-billion-users.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/technology/facebook-offer... https://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/facebook-stirs-privacy-concerns-again/ https://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/facebook-sti... https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/opinion/25tue2.html https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/opinion/25tue2.html
        dominotw 8y ago
        > Where was this level of scrutiny before Fact that you had to look very hard and go all the way to 2010 to find examples proves my point not yours. Going back to 2010 doesn't mean plenty.
        bogomipz 8y ago
        If by looking hard you mean that I had type into a Google search box then yes it was very hard. I simply posted the first few result that were returned by my search query. And publication dates and volume of articles are completely orthogonal.
    - maym86 8y ago
      Did you miss what happened with Facebook in the 2016 election? Did you not see Zucherberg testifying to Congress? Given these stories why would Facebook not deserve increased scrutiny by the NYT (or Fox news)?
dnomad 8y ago
I think it's pretty obvious considering how shallow and frequent the reporting is that this isn't traditional media criticism. There are real issues with Facebook that are not new but they have nothing to do with "creepy patents" or Facebook giving data to Chinese phone makers. (Who, you know, make the phone.) The NYT subjects no other corporation to this sort of scrutiny. In fact it's difficult to the recall any anti-"specific firm" editorials from the Times this year compared to the 4-5 anti-Facebook editorials. All of this suggests that the NYT is waging a campaign and targeting Facebook and it would be good to know why.
- HillaryBriss 8y ago
  I think you may be correct about the NYT and FB. I personally assume that all news outlets are biased one way or another. And I do not believe there's a news outlet anywhere which is totally fair, unbiased and objective. It seems reasonable to guess that the NYT's leadership believes FB is extremely influential in US politics and that it is imperative that FB avoid facilitating another 2016-style presidential campaign. In addition, most of the NYT's readership almost certainly believes that FB helped unfairly swing the election to Trump through illegal Russian funded ads and so forth, and it's good for business for a paper to cater to that readership.
  - briandear 8y ago
    Interestingly, The NY Times is also extremely influential in US politics, so it does seem that reducing Facebook’s influence has a benefit to The NY Times. Anyone have any data on the tracking that The NY Times website uses? Just curious if there is any hypocrisy or conflicts of interest. Most news orgs seem to aggressively track.
aylmao 8y ago
> Facebook is a multi-billion dollar corporation with a history of obfuscating the truth and a terrible record on privacy. With the power they have they deserve scrutiny. Definitely agree. > Could it just be that NYT is printing a lot of negative articles because they're are a lot of incidents involving Facebook doing something wrong? Yes probably, though I've also noticed a certain level of bias. Google and Amazon probably have as many "creepy" patents to infer user behaviour, yet we don't hear as much about them on this space. Hell, Google pretty much invented the whole concept of tracking users across websites, "shadow profiles", and personalized search/ads. Cambride Analytica was bad and Facebook should've veto'd its API users better from the get-go. The next obvious step after that article was a look at Google's own leaky data practices: I've installed too many Android games which ask for essentially full-phone access and I'm sure there's people who, much like with CA, don't consider the implications and just hit "ok". I'm not trying to defend Facebook here, but I do want to point out they're not the only ones who should be getting scrutinized.
- maym86 8y ago
  Agree all the large powerful tech companies need to be scrutinized. Given Zucherberg had to testify at Congress recently it seems reasonable and expected that it would result in a little more focus on them.

by maym86 8y ago

dominotw 8y ago

Where was this level of scrutiny before last year? Did fb turn evil in 2017.

maym86 8y ago
Just because they didn't do something before why should they do it now? Is that really your argument?
- dominotw 8y ago
  I am not saying they shouldn't do it now. I am curious why it was not on their radar before 2017. Is that not a valid question? Do they not deserve any scrutiny themselves or can nytimes do no wrong, their intentions always pure. Would you extend same goodwill to foxnews?
  - polyomino 8y ago
    I believe NY tîmes had articles about Facebook and privacy practices prior to 2017. There was the whole debacle where Facebook “locked down” their developer platform. I think it’s reasonable for them to have more scrutiny now as it’s clear they don’t intend to fix their practices.
    - dominotw 8y ago
      > I believe NY tîmes had articles about Facebook and privacy practices prior to 2017. I cant seem to find any. Do you have examples?
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
      - bogomipz 8y ago
        You didn't look very hard then. There are plenty: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/technology/facebook-offers-privacy-checkup-to-all-1-28-billion-users.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/23/technology/facebook-offer... https://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/facebook-stirs-privacy-concerns-again/ https://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/facebook-sti... https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/opinion/25tue2.html https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/opinion/25tue2.html
        dominotw 8y ago
        > Where was this level of scrutiny before Fact that you had to look very hard and go all the way to 2010 to find examples proves my point not yours. Going back to 2010 doesn't mean plenty.
        bogomipz 8y ago
        If by looking hard you mean that I had type into a Google search box then yes it was very hard. I simply posted the first few result that were returned by my search query. And publication dates and volume of articles are completely orthogonal.
  - maym86 8y ago
    Did you miss what happened with Facebook in the 2016 election? Did you not see Zucherberg testifying to Congress? Given these stories why would Facebook not deserve increased scrutiny by the NYT (or Fox news)?

dnomad 8y ago

I think it's pretty obvious considering how shallow and frequent the reporting is that this isn't traditional media criticism. There are real issues with Facebook that are not new but they have nothing to do with "creepy patents" or Facebook giving data to Chinese phone makers. (Who, you know, make the phone.) The NYT subjects no other corporation to this sort of scrutiny. In fact it's difficult to the recall any anti-"specific firm" editorials from the Times this year compared to the 4-5 anti-Facebook editorials. All of this suggests that the NYT is waging a campaign and targeting Facebook and it would be good to know why.

HillaryBriss 8y ago
I think you may be correct about the NYT and FB. I personally assume that all news outlets are biased one way or another. And I do not believe there's a news outlet anywhere which is totally fair, unbiased and objective. It seems reasonable to guess that the NYT's leadership believes FB is extremely influential in US politics and that it is imperative that FB avoid facilitating another 2016-style presidential campaign. In addition, most of the NYT's readership almost certainly believes that FB helped unfairly swing the election to Trump through illegal Russian funded ads and so forth, and it's good for business for a paper to cater to that readership.
- briandear 8y ago
  Interestingly, The NY Times is also extremely influential in US politics, so it does seem that reducing Facebook’s influence has a benefit to The NY Times. Anyone have any data on the tracking that The NY Times website uses? Just curious if there is any hypocrisy or conflicts of interest. Most news orgs seem to aggressively track.

aylmao 8y ago

> Facebook is a multi-billion dollar corporation with a history of obfuscating the truth and a terrible record on privacy. With the power they have they deserve scrutiny. Definitely agree. > Could it just be that NYT is printing a lot of negative articles because they're are a lot of incidents involving Facebook doing something wrong? Yes probably, though I've also noticed a certain level of bias. Google and Amazon probably have as many "creepy" patents to infer user behaviour, yet we don't hear as much about them on this space. Hell, Google pretty much invented the whole concept of tracking users across websites, "shadow profiles", and personalized search/ads. Cambride Analytica was bad and Facebook should've veto'd its API users better from the get-go. The next obvious step after that article was a look at Google's own leaky data practices: I've installed too many Android games which ask for essentially full-phone access and I'm sure there's people who, much like with CA, don't consider the implications and just hit "ok". I'm not trying to defend Facebook here, but I do want to point out they're not the only ones who should be getting scrutinized.

maym86 8y ago
Agree all the large powerful tech companies need to be scrutinized. Given Zucherberg had to testify at Congress recently it seems reasonable and expected that it would result in a little more focus on them.