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Have we gotten to the point where "bad for Facebook" ~= "good for society"? It's both a good indicator for progress and a sad place to be as a community.

baggachipz 3y ago
Far as I can tell, Facebook is fully metastatic at this point. Any benefit is far outweighed by the costs to society, mental health, and privacy.
Levitz 3y ago
We'd be better off without Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram. Anything that hurts these businesses probably helps society. There is just no big benefit to justify the amount of damage done to mental health and privacy.
- josephd79 3y ago
  You forgot Snap.
  - hulitu 3y ago
    And Google, and Microsoft and ...
    - xbar 3y ago
      I will assume sarcasm. For sake of not letting a bogus argument go unanswered: Google and Microsoft offer generic tools that have very broad social benefit outside the monetization of user data. That said, I would prefer it if the FTC would address data monetization practices at all tech companies--it is a fine business model, but it is troublesome as a necessary addition to my spreadsheet or the operating system for my desktop/laptop/phone-sized computer.
  - MyelinatedT 3y ago
    Snap is more of a messaging app afaict. I'm pretty sure the biggest harms from social media come from algorithmic targeting of content, echo chamber creation, and the ability to hugely amplify fringe opinions and destabilise debate. If your only concern is data handling, though, then fair enough.
    - josephd79 3y ago
      I do not use Snap but I'm pretty sure it has algo delivered content as well, just like Tiktok and insta.
    - a13o 3y ago
      Children become addicted to Snapchat streaks and their peers in school shun them socially based on whether they have big streaks with popular kids or not. It's like Lord of the Flies mixed with an episode of Black Mirror. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-talk-tween/201703/caution-your-tween-may-be-stressing-over-snap-streaks https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-talk-tween/2017...
      - fiveeveralone 3y ago
        Is the social pressure for kids to be popular somehow new or?
        a13o 3y ago
        Do you rephrase my comment reductively because you're okay with corporations monetizing children via addictive dark patterns, in defiance of recommendations from child psychologists? or
        a13o 3y ago
        https://www.apa.org/topics/social-media-internet/health-advisory-adolescent-social-media-use https://www.apa.org/topics/social-media-internet/health-advi...
      - 3y ago
- toastal 3y ago
  And GitHub. That site is 50% social media trying to get you to engage and algorithms to suggest new Node.js projects for you.
  - afavour 3y ago
    I use GitHub every day for work and have run into exactly none of what you describe.
    - toastal 3y ago
      You’ve never encountered the explore tab, or the recommended projects sidebar, or read the news of users ‘star hacking’ to get more attention to their projects, or chosen one library over another because it had more ‘stars’, or seen the promotion of ‘fork me on GitHub’ banners, or seen examples of ‘link your GitHub account’ right next to ‘link your Twitter account’ as a means of self-promotion?
adql 3y ago
When that wasn't true ?
pdimitar 3y ago
...Wait, so you thought there was ever a point when "good for Facebook" == "good for society"? IMO "bad for Facebook" ~= "good for society" has always been true. It's not a "sad place to be as community", they are a corp and their bait-and-switch was expected ever since they got created, at least from the people who don't idolize corporations that is. It was extremely obvious they'll position themselves as helpful, pull tons of people in, and will then start to make use of all that precious data. It would boggle my mind if somebody was actually surprised by this.
- ethbr0 3y ago
  I'd say Facebook was on-the-whole good when it was limited to .edu users. It had a purpose, it solved it better than previous options, and (critically!) it had a ceiling on total addressable userbase. Once it metastisized into "extract maximum revenue from maximum number of people," I think its soul was lost to greed.
  - usrusr 3y ago
    Oh, even long after Facebook has turned sour as a company there have still been very good things running on top of Facebook as infrastructure for linking up disconnected local groups and individuals with shared interests. But eventually they burnt so much goodwill trying to justify their stock valuation that at least were I am, all those informal groups have moved away from Facebook. Some managed to substitute the infrastructure quite well, some suffer quite noticeably. But none of them would consider going back. And openness to newcomers, discoverability, that has all suffered quite considerably.
  - ryandrake 3y ago
    To be fair, many, many corporations start out as a tiny kernel of something that solves a problem for people, and then metastasize into "extract maximum revenue from maximum number of people" cancer once Wall Street takes over. So, honestly, you can generalize this to "bad for corporations" ~= "good for society." A topic for another discussion is why society allows corporations to become parasitic and cancerous without any checks or balances.
birracerveza 3y ago
Yes we did, just around 2014 or so. Probably before that.
briffle 3y ago
Oh man, i'm going to have to start looking at Meta just like I do phone and cable companies...
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

baggachipz 3y ago

Far as I can tell, Facebook is fully metastatic at this point. Any benefit is far outweighed by the costs to society, mental health, and privacy.

Levitz 3y ago

We'd be better off without Facebook, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram. Anything that hurts these businesses probably helps society. There is just no big benefit to justify the amount of damage done to mental health and privacy.

josephd79 3y ago
You forgot Snap.
- hulitu 3y ago
  And Google, and Microsoft and ...
  - xbar 3y ago
    I will assume sarcasm. For sake of not letting a bogus argument go unanswered: Google and Microsoft offer generic tools that have very broad social benefit outside the monetization of user data. That said, I would prefer it if the FTC would address data monetization practices at all tech companies--it is a fine business model, but it is troublesome as a necessary addition to my spreadsheet or the operating system for my desktop/laptop/phone-sized computer.
- MyelinatedT 3y ago
  Snap is more of a messaging app afaict. I'm pretty sure the biggest harms from social media come from algorithmic targeting of content, echo chamber creation, and the ability to hugely amplify fringe opinions and destabilise debate. If your only concern is data handling, though, then fair enough.
  - josephd79 3y ago
    I do not use Snap but I'm pretty sure it has algo delivered content as well, just like Tiktok and insta.
  - a13o 3y ago
    Children become addicted to Snapchat streaks and their peers in school shun them socially based on whether they have big streaks with popular kids or not. It's like Lord of the Flies mixed with an episode of Black Mirror. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-talk-tween/201703/caution-your-tween-may-be-stressing-over-snap-streaks https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-talk-tween/2017...
    - fiveeveralone 3y ago
      Is the social pressure for kids to be popular somehow new or?
      - a13o 3y ago
        Do you rephrase my comment reductively because you're okay with corporations monetizing children via addictive dark patterns, in defiance of recommendations from child psychologists? or
        a13o 3y ago
        https://www.apa.org/topics/social-media-internet/health-advisory-adolescent-social-media-use https://www.apa.org/topics/social-media-internet/health-advi...
    - 3y ago
toastal 3y ago
And GitHub. That site is 50% social media trying to get you to engage and algorithms to suggest new Node.js projects for you.
- afavour 3y ago
  I use GitHub every day for work and have run into exactly none of what you describe.
  - toastal 3y ago
    You’ve never encountered the explore tab, or the recommended projects sidebar, or read the news of users ‘star hacking’ to get more attention to their projects, or chosen one library over another because it had more ‘stars’, or seen the promotion of ‘fork me on GitHub’ banners, or seen examples of ‘link your GitHub account’ right next to ‘link your Twitter account’ as a means of self-promotion?

adql 3y ago

When that wasn't true ?

pdimitar 3y ago

...Wait, so you thought there was ever a point when "good for Facebook" == "good for society"? IMO "bad for Facebook" ~= "good for society" has always been true. It's not a "sad place to be as community", they are a corp and their bait-and-switch was expected ever since they got created, at least from the people who don't idolize corporations that is. It was extremely obvious they'll position themselves as helpful, pull tons of people in, and will then start to make use of all that precious data. It would boggle my mind if somebody was actually surprised by this.

ethbr0 3y ago
I'd say Facebook was on-the-whole good when it was limited to .edu users. It had a purpose, it solved it better than previous options, and (critically!) it had a ceiling on total addressable userbase. Once it metastisized into "extract maximum revenue from maximum number of people," I think its soul was lost to greed.
- usrusr 3y ago
  Oh, even long after Facebook has turned sour as a company there have still been very good things running on top of Facebook as infrastructure for linking up disconnected local groups and individuals with shared interests. But eventually they burnt so much goodwill trying to justify their stock valuation that at least were I am, all those informal groups have moved away from Facebook. Some managed to substitute the infrastructure quite well, some suffer quite noticeably. But none of them would consider going back. And openness to newcomers, discoverability, that has all suffered quite considerably.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  To be fair, many, many corporations start out as a tiny kernel of something that solves a problem for people, and then metastasize into "extract maximum revenue from maximum number of people" cancer once Wall Street takes over. So, honestly, you can generalize this to "bad for corporations" ~= "good for society." A topic for another discussion is why society allows corporations to become parasitic and cancerous without any checks or balances.

birracerveza 3y ago

Yes we did, just around 2014 or so. Probably before that.

briffle 3y ago

Oh man, i'm going to have to start looking at Meta just like I do phone and cable companies...

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]