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We have a moral obligation to stop using facebook products. Ask yourself where do you draw the line? If you don’t think facebook has crossed it, then you don’t
by DitheringIdiot 5y ago
We have a moral obligation to stop using facebook products.
Ask yourself where do you draw the line? If you don’t think facebook has crossed it, then you don’t know enough about facebook.
- jeidz 5y agoThat line of thinking would turn us all into the unabomber. Not that that would be a bad thing per se, obviously…
- computerphage 5y agoIt would be bad.
- jeidz 5y agoThe way things are working, the mental health of everybody keeps deteriorating year after year, so what can I say.
- DitheringIdiot 5y agono it wouldn’t. And yes that would be a bad thing.
- tomohawk 5y agoMost people have never heard the actual story of how the unabomber was created: https://quillette.com/2021/09/13/male-grandiose-humiliated/ https://quillette.com/2021/09/13/male-grandiose-humiliated/
- mavhc 5y agoWhat have they done apart from give me a free product?
- fsflover 5y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27714103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27714103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26846784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26846784 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25730388 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25730388 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24579498 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22178917 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22178917
- mavhc 5y ago1. So they're working to help people avoid becoming extremists? 2. 9 years ago they tested if they were affecting people's emotions 3. Like every communications tool, people use it badly 4. There's a button to stop 3rd party tracking Blaming Facebook for your problems is hiding from your problems. If people are too stupid to avoid becoming extremists, why is that Facebook's fault, that's our fault as society for failing to educate them. Maybe they should unencrypt WhatsApp so they can find the extremists more easily
- fsflover 5y ago> 1. So they're working to help people avoid becoming extremists? Yes, just like in the Orwell's 1984. > 2. 9 years ago they tested if they were affecting people's emotions And never apologized or promised not to do it again. > 3. Like every communications tool, people use it badly Did you read the comments? A quote for you: Facebook recommend users to join groups, follow pages, and even shows content that is not from people you follow. So it isn't just a telephone company that allows you to make phone calls, it's a service that makes an editorial choice about what they show you. > 4. There's a button to stop 3rd party tracking How about stopping the first-party tracking?
- eganist 5y agoTo people reading: A fair and within-guidelines reply was inappropriately brigaged with flags and killed less than 4 minutes after being posted. Turn on show-dead in your profile to read and vouch. Feel free to flag-dead mine. The comment: https://i.imgur.com/mZlmUqE.png https://i.imgur.com/mZlmUqE.png If you're an HN regular, please participate in good faith. Nothing about this comment warranted death by a thousand flags.
- kspacewalk2 5y agoWe have no such moral obligation. Facebook is no better and no worse than a multitude of other companies that trade in attention and data. They've suffered an onslaught of bad PR lately, largely due to their singular success rather then being singularly evil or (on balance) harmful to the world. A lot of this moral panic about Facebook's effect on society is just a projection of our general angst the democratization of media. A lot of our type of people, squishy liberal nerd types, cheered it on when it was starting, supposing that it will be an improvement over the status quo of pre-2010. Information flow will finally be free, and Evil Gatekeepers won't control it, that sort of stuff. Now that we've been disabused of the notion that this is a good development, we get all uppity. Turns out your friends and neighbours always liked fake news, and always will. And so do you. Oops.
- DitheringIdiot 5y agoFacebook’s success and ubiquity is what makes it worse than other companies that trade in attention and data. It’s not a moral panic, the people who run facebook have provably done terrible things. Would other people in their position do those things? Some would, some wouldn’t. There are people who do the right thing, even when it means their company losing a few bucks. It is our responsibility to speak out against terrible companies like facebook. And if you, like me, work in tech, it is your job to not do terrible things. If it’s not our responsibility, then it’s no one’s — and if you believe that, you believe in nothing.
- pacomerh 5y agoThen pick one and do something about it. Just because there's more than one company doing bad things doesn't mean you get to do nothing about it.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]