5 ms·

“Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement following Haugen's testimony that the company's work had been "taken out of context and used to construct a fa

“Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement following Haugen's testimony that the company's work had been "taken out of context and used to construct a false narrative."” Funny how Zuck blames a whistleblower for doing the exact same thing his company does to make billions.

akudha 5y ago
It is not funny, it is just boring at this point. Every single response from the mega corps to anything (leaks, whistleblowers, fines, hacks...whatever) is predictable, soulless, boring, useless. Or some combination of those. Not one of the responses is constructive, useful or accepting responsibility. They don't even say something might be wrong and that they will work on it, they don't even pretend to care, even that is too much these days
- btheshoe 5y ago
  Zuckerberg is ... kind of right though, and fb's response to the whole scandal seems mostly reasonable. Fb internal research was 1) of poor quality and 2) selectively presented. Scientific literature on the whole is divided wrt impact of social media use on mental health.
- abandonliberty 5y ago
  This might just be the japanophile in me, but I get the impression they handle things very differently. From executives taking ownership & consequences for failure, first DDG example: https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-good-at-surviving-crises https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-goo... to longer term thinking: "a lot of Japanese companies think about 100 or 200 years from now and envision the kind of future they want to create. During the tsunami disaster, the key mindset of executives was: We have to empathize with others. And companies ought to do the same thing now, during the current crisis, empathizing with those who are suffering and trying to figure out how to help.” https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-good-at-surviving-crises https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-goo...
mjburgess 5y ago
> the exact same thing his company does to make billions. Is that what his company does? Or is that what some of his users do? Facebook fundamentally makes money from its users liking stuff, thus signalling preferences, so it can then advertise to users with those preferences. I dont think that has anything to do with the "malignant social" behaviour of the human species. It is very hard to provide a social communication platform to a species addicted to sharing stories, and not to "science".
Tenoke 5y ago
Do you really believe that Facebook is actively tailoring posts to create a false narrative rather than just people posting things and Facebook showing you those you might engage with more?
- causi 5y ago
  Sounds like a distinction without a difference to me. If I make a robot and instruct it to "unobtrusively retrieve bank notes" I'm still picking pockets.
- evgen 5y ago
  Facebook's newsfeed algorithms are actively tailoring the content that is surfaced in your newsfeed in a manner that encourages 'engagement', but this quest for engagement creates false narratives and an inaccurate understanding of reality. People engage with combative and controversial content that supports their biases or triggers a few discrete emotional centers like disgust, outrage, and strong in-group/out-group distinctions. I also do more that just 'believe' this, I know it to be true for a fact.
  - tyrfing 5y ago
    Isn't this website, post, and comment an example as well? Content ranked by engagement, and a comment on controversial content that supports bias.
    - sleepybrett 5y ago
      All the content is still plainly visible with no extra clicks or screens. In the standard interface I often miss hackernews comment rankings unless they are highly negative (causing the comment to be grey). The comments are also broadly divided by topic (the post itself) whereas a facebook feed is a firehose of 'anything that might engage the user'. These two facts alone heavily dispute your argument in my opinion.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Facebook's newsfeed algorithms are actively tailoring the content that is surfaced in your newsfeed in a manner that encourages 'engagement', but this quest for engagement creates false narratives and an inaccurate understanding of reality Except that the “algorithms” are executed by humans and not always concretely defined, this has been true of every ad-supported commercial news medium ever, for the same reason as it is for Facebook: the business model is securing attention of an audience to sell ads to them.
andrei_says_ 5y ago
“We can’t change the facts so let’s focus on changing what words mean”

akudha 5y ago

It is not funny, it is just boring at this point. Every single response from the mega corps to anything (leaks, whistleblowers, fines, hacks...whatever) is predictable, soulless, boring, useless. Or some combination of those. Not one of the responses is constructive, useful or accepting responsibility. They don't even say something might be wrong and that they will work on it, they don't even pretend to care, even that is too much these days

btheshoe 5y ago
Zuckerberg is ... kind of right though, and fb's response to the whole scandal seems mostly reasonable. Fb internal research was 1) of poor quality and 2) selectively presented. Scientific literature on the whole is divided wrt impact of social media use on mental health.
abandonliberty 5y ago
This might just be the japanophile in me, but I get the impression they handle things very differently. From executives taking ownership & consequences for failure, first DDG example: https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-good-at-surviving-crises https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-goo... to longer term thinking: "a lot of Japanese companies think about 100 or 200 years from now and envision the kind of future they want to create. During the tsunami disaster, the key mindset of executives was: We have to empathize with others. And companies ought to do the same thing now, during the current crisis, empathizing with those who are suffering and trying to figure out how to help.” https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-good-at-surviving-crises https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-japan-s-businesses-are-so-goo...

mjburgess 5y ago

> the exact same thing his company does to make billions. Is that what his company does? Or is that what some of his users do? Facebook fundamentally makes money from its users liking stuff, thus signalling preferences, so it can then advertise to users with those preferences. I dont think that has anything to do with the "malignant social" behaviour of the human species. It is very hard to provide a social communication platform to a species addicted to sharing stories, and not to "science".

Tenoke 5y ago

Do you really believe that Facebook is actively tailoring posts to create a false narrative rather than just people posting things and Facebook showing you those you might engage with more?

causi 5y ago
Sounds like a distinction without a difference to me. If I make a robot and instruct it to "unobtrusively retrieve bank notes" I'm still picking pockets.
evgen 5y ago
Facebook's newsfeed algorithms are actively tailoring the content that is surfaced in your newsfeed in a manner that encourages 'engagement', but this quest for engagement creates false narratives and an inaccurate understanding of reality. People engage with combative and controversial content that supports their biases or triggers a few discrete emotional centers like disgust, outrage, and strong in-group/out-group distinctions. I also do more that just 'believe' this, I know it to be true for a fact.
- tyrfing 5y ago
  Isn't this website, post, and comment an example as well? Content ranked by engagement, and a comment on controversial content that supports bias.
  - sleepybrett 5y ago
    All the content is still plainly visible with no extra clicks or screens. In the standard interface I often miss hackernews comment rankings unless they are highly negative (causing the comment to be grey). The comments are also broadly divided by topic (the post itself) whereas a facebook feed is a firehose of 'anything that might engage the user'. These two facts alone heavily dispute your argument in my opinion.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Facebook's newsfeed algorithms are actively tailoring the content that is surfaced in your newsfeed in a manner that encourages 'engagement', but this quest for engagement creates false narratives and an inaccurate understanding of reality Except that the “algorithms” are executed by humans and not always concretely defined, this has been true of every ad-supported commercial news medium ever, for the same reason as it is for Facebook: the business model is securing attention of an audience to sell ads to them.

andrei_says_ 5y ago

“We can’t change the facts so let’s focus on changing what words mean”