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As I understand it the issue is with their recommender system and ad driven business model, not the alt right figures who want to cry about free speech and canc

by m_ke 5y ago

As I understand it the issue is with their recommender system and ad driven business model, not the alt right figures who want to cry about free speech and cancel culture because they can't be racist online while at the same time trying to whipe anything vaguely related to "critical race theory" from existence. The allegations are that Facebook knows that there are people addicted to their products and who have mental issues due to what the platform decides to show them but they refuse to do anything about it because it's good for their real customers. I wrote more about this here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28763413 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28763413

themacguffinman 5y ago
So what? It's not Facebook's responsibility to do anything about that. There isn't strong evidence that Facebook is uniquely addictive and harmful to the extent that it requires state intervention. Beyond that, this is just you judging the choices of others. We don't ask profit-driven porn studios/websites to regulate what porn they produce/show because some people get "addicted" to porn in the sense that they won't live without it. We don't ask Pizza Hut to regulate who they sell and advertise pizza to because they know some people won't live without unhealthy pizza. We don't even ask alcohol stores to avoid selling to alcoholics. Any recreational or enjoyable activity will have people who won't live without it even if it makes them feel bad or has some other costs. In a free society, people still choose for themselves and are responsible for the results of their own choices. If you have strong evidence that Facebook is uniquely addictive and harmful, present it. Otherwise, stop trying to control my ability to engage in ad-driven social media. I don't care what you think is good or bad speech or whether companies profit from it.
- m_ke 5y ago
  1. We do regulate what porn is produced and who can watch it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adult_film_industry_regulations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adult_film_industry_regulation...) 2. There's something called the FDA (https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/11/30/why-dominos-hates-the-new-fda-rules.aspx https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/11/30/why-domino...) that regulates what can be put in food and how it needs to be packaged. 3. There's plenty of laws limiting what alcohol can be sold and when (https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/List_of_alcohol_laws_of_the_United_States_by_state https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/List_of_alcohol_laws_of_th...) Listen to the opening of the testimony today, they're focused on kids. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IhWeVHxdXg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IhWeVHxdXg)
  - themacguffinman 5y ago
    1. Porn production regulations don't have anything to do with addictiveness, the porn industry is totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable viewers as long as they're 18 and over. I have no problem pointing out that porn is not comparable to Facebook and therefore naturally requires an age gate of 18 instead of Facebook's 13. I thought I was pretty clear in pointing out porn as an example where for-profit porn studios profit from views but aren't responsible for potential "addictiveness". If your argument is that Facebook should present an "Are you 18+" page like porn does to keep out minors, then go ahead. 2. The FDA doesn't regulate unhealthy foods that people gorge themselves on. It regulates drugs with strong scientific evidence of extreme addictiveness and harm. Do you have any evidence you'd like to present that would make Facebook even slightly comparable to the kind of stuff the FDA restricts? McDonalds and Pizza Hut are totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable obese people. 3. None of those alcohol laws prevent an alcohol store from selling or being near an alcoholic or anyone who is addicted to alcohol. Alcohol retailers and makers are totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable alcoholics. I'd be interested in a response to my actual point that we don't ask corporations to be responsible for all potentially negative outcomes. Society has always restricted certain extreme harms, your problem is that you have no strong evidence that Facebook and social media rises to that level at all.
    - m_ke 5y ago
      The whistleblower allegations and hearings were mostly about the impact facebook products have on kids. I believe some form of expanded COPPA laws for children under 16 wouldn't hurt. As someone who blocks Facebook's IP ranges and uses an ad blocker to remove any algorithmic recommendations on other websites I also think it would be great to: 1. Have a law forcing companies to have a way to opt out of algorithmic / personalized recommendations 2. Make any form of 3rd party tracking and user profiling opt in only and force companies that track you to have a way to see what is collected and to disable/delete it at any time. Companies like facebook shouldn't be allowed to track me across the web without my permission. Also I wouldn't be against holding them liable for promoting "harmful" content. As in forcing them to moderate the reach of content that calls for harming someone once it gets enough engagement (ex: 100K views). An example of that would be letting Alex Jones post Sandy Hook conspiracies but only showing them to people if they go to his profile and not displaying them in the feed for other users.

by m_ke 5y ago

themacguffinman 5y ago

So what? It's not Facebook's responsibility to do anything about that. There isn't strong evidence that Facebook is uniquely addictive and harmful to the extent that it requires state intervention. Beyond that, this is just you judging the choices of others. We don't ask profit-driven porn studios/websites to regulate what porn they produce/show because some people get "addicted" to porn in the sense that they won't live without it. We don't ask Pizza Hut to regulate who they sell and advertise pizza to because they know some people won't live without unhealthy pizza. We don't even ask alcohol stores to avoid selling to alcoholics. Any recreational or enjoyable activity will have people who won't live without it even if it makes them feel bad or has some other costs. In a free society, people still choose for themselves and are responsible for the results of their own choices. If you have strong evidence that Facebook is uniquely addictive and harmful, present it. Otherwise, stop trying to control my ability to engage in ad-driven social media. I don't care what you think is good or bad speech or whether companies profit from it.

m_ke 5y ago
1. We do regulate what porn is produced and who can watch it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adult_film_industry_regulations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adult_film_industry_regulation...) 2. There's something called the FDA (https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/11/30/why-dominos-hates-the-new-fda-rules.aspx https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/11/30/why-domino...) that regulates what can be put in food and how it needs to be packaged. 3. There's plenty of laws limiting what alcohol can be sold and when (https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/List_of_alcohol_laws_of_the_United_States_by_state https://psychology.wikia.org/wiki/List_of_alcohol_laws_of_th...) Listen to the opening of the testimony today, they're focused on kids. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IhWeVHxdXg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IhWeVHxdXg)
- themacguffinman 5y ago
  1. Porn production regulations don't have anything to do with addictiveness, the porn industry is totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable viewers as long as they're 18 and over. I have no problem pointing out that porn is not comparable to Facebook and therefore naturally requires an age gate of 18 instead of Facebook's 13. I thought I was pretty clear in pointing out porn as an example where for-profit porn studios profit from views but aren't responsible for potential "addictiveness". If your argument is that Facebook should present an "Are you 18+" page like porn does to keep out minors, then go ahead. 2. The FDA doesn't regulate unhealthy foods that people gorge themselves on. It regulates drugs with strong scientific evidence of extreme addictiveness and harm. Do you have any evidence you'd like to present that would make Facebook even slightly comparable to the kind of stuff the FDA restricts? McDonalds and Pizza Hut are totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable obese people. 3. None of those alcohol laws prevent an alcohol store from selling or being near an alcoholic or anyone who is addicted to alcohol. Alcohol retailers and makers are totally free to specifically target and profit from psychologically vulnerable alcoholics. I'd be interested in a response to my actual point that we don't ask corporations to be responsible for all potentially negative outcomes. Society has always restricted certain extreme harms, your problem is that you have no strong evidence that Facebook and social media rises to that level at all.
  - m_ke 5y ago
    The whistleblower allegations and hearings were mostly about the impact facebook products have on kids. I believe some form of expanded COPPA laws for children under 16 wouldn't hurt. As someone who blocks Facebook's IP ranges and uses an ad blocker to remove any algorithmic recommendations on other websites I also think it would be great to: 1. Have a law forcing companies to have a way to opt out of algorithmic / personalized recommendations 2. Make any form of 3rd party tracking and user profiling opt in only and force companies that track you to have a way to see what is collected and to disable/delete it at any time. Companies like facebook shouldn't be allowed to track me across the web without my permission. Also I wouldn't be against holding them liable for promoting "harmful" content. As in forcing them to moderate the reach of content that calls for harming someone once it gets enough engagement (ex: 100K views). An example of that would be letting Alex Jones post Sandy Hook conspiracies but only showing them to people if they go to his profile and not displaying them in the feed for other users.