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from a long enough view, every decision a business makes is commercially motivated, so simplifying a decision down to picking a side based on commercial motivat

from a long enough view, every decision a business makes is commercially motivated, so simplifying a decision down to picking a side based on commercial motivations isn't really helpful. Optimizing for immediate growth, long term growth, good PR, capital outlay, or maintaining a relationship with a valuable customer are all "commercial motivations" but usually in conflict with each other. it's pretty hard to find a business decision that can be reduced down to "should we make money, or not make money?"

ljw1001 8y ago
Is Facebook in danger of not making money? I think the decision is a bit easier: should we make as much money as we possibly can, or should we forgo some profit to mitigate the assault on privacy and democracy that is the by-product of our business model.
- notatoad 8y ago
  My point was that "should we make as much money as we possibly can" is simplifying the question beyond the point of usefulness. Yes, facebook wants to make as much money as they possibly can. But it's not obvious that selling political ads to russians is the best money-making scheme. You can't simplify the issue down to there being one action that is more profitable and one that is less so. the world is more complicated than that. Forgoing some profit in the short term in order to gain some trust from the userbase may be more profitable in the long run. Or maybe it won't be. It's a decision that facebook's leadership has to make, and it's not as simple as "we'll take the option that makes more money". Burning down my house would net me a nice payout from the insurance company, but it's probably not a good financial decision in the longer term. when looking at corporate motivations, it's easy to say they're going to pick the most evil choice if it's the profitable one, but business leaders aren't all stupid, and picking the evil choice is often stupid.
drewmol 8y ago
while money is not null if make money getdata(users) getmoney(data) else getdata(users) getdata(money) set make money
gaius 8y ago
from a long enough view, every decision a business makes is commercially motivated Sure, but Facebook doesn’t look any further into the future than “the next click”.

ljw1001 8y ago

Is Facebook in danger of not making money? I think the decision is a bit easier: should we make as much money as we possibly can, or should we forgo some profit to mitigate the assault on privacy and democracy that is the by-product of our business model.

notatoad 8y ago
My point was that "should we make as much money as we possibly can" is simplifying the question beyond the point of usefulness. Yes, facebook wants to make as much money as they possibly can. But it's not obvious that selling political ads to russians is the best money-making scheme. You can't simplify the issue down to there being one action that is more profitable and one that is less so. the world is more complicated than that. Forgoing some profit in the short term in order to gain some trust from the userbase may be more profitable in the long run. Or maybe it won't be. It's a decision that facebook's leadership has to make, and it's not as simple as "we'll take the option that makes more money". Burning down my house would net me a nice payout from the insurance company, but it's probably not a good financial decision in the longer term. when looking at corporate motivations, it's easy to say they're going to pick the most evil choice if it's the profitable one, but business leaders aren't all stupid, and picking the evil choice is often stupid.

drewmol 8y ago

while money is not null if make money getdata(users) getmoney(data) else getdata(users) getdata(money) set make money

gaius 8y ago

from a long enough view, every decision a business makes is commercially motivated Sure, but Facebook doesn’t look any further into the future than “the next click”.