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Obviously, this is an error that needs to be rectified. However, the way that the article regards Facebook's actions is an abject misrepresentation. He states t
by ruswick 14y ago
Obviously, this is an error that needs to be rectified. However, the way that the article regards Facebook's actions is an abject misrepresentation. He states that Facebook is "stealing" from him, when, in fact, no conscious theft took place. In all likelihood, this was simply a bug.
Moreover, he asserts that, given Facebook's actions (or lack thereof) regarding his account, Facebook is "about people's money." First, this assertion is itself pretty nebulous. Moreover, it implies that Facebook is willingly shirking their users and advertising customers for the sake of profit, evidence of which has yet to be seen. From everything that has been presented, it can be reasonably assumed that they simply made a mistake with these charges, and that no malicious intent was involved.
It's unfortunate that Facebook made an error that cost someone money, but this article is clearly perverting the story and making undefended, specious assertions to provoke outrage or drive pageviews.
- Mahn 14y agoHe's indeed overreacting. Apparently that works though, because it made it to the front page.
- uptown 14y agoHow much should they take from him before he's allowed to be upset?
- Mahn 14y agoNo one says he's not allowed to be upset, Facebook DID do a mistake here, and it is legitimate to be angry about it. But calling names and posting a public tantrum about it is not the way to get it fixed; Facebook is not "stealing", they just did a mistake they need to correct, and if they don't react there are ways to request a chargeback or report fraud.
- uptown 14y agoWho called anybody a name?
- Mahn 14y agoFiguratively speaking. "facebook steals, facebook doesn't care about people, all facebook cares is money" is stretching it a bit for what should essentially have been "facebook makes a mistake involving money and neglects to correct it".
- bsenftner 14y agoAnd that would get no one's attention. I think he did the right thing, otherwise he would still be ignored and still be receiving charges.
- Gravityloss 14y agoBut according to his post, he did try other ways first.
- throwaway420 14y agoThe problem here isn't that a mistake occurred. Mistakes do happen and on occasion its something you'll have to deal with. Most reasonable people don't blow up over minor errors. The problem here is that the company in question apparently offers no realistic means of providing customer support. When you're providing a free service, I can understand not wanting to spend money offering some form of customer service. But when you're charging money for a service, not having any customer service that can help you isn't nice at all, to put it mildly.
- niggler 14y ago"In all likelihood, this was simply a bug." I never understood this mentality. "This was simply a bug" is acceptable for noneconomic trivial situations, but as soon as money changes hands the issues become serious. Contracts were signed, and its possible (I haven't seen the FB contracts) that terms were violate. And I'm pretty sure the courts won't care if it was "simply a bug" if FB doesn't refund the money.
- ruswick 14y agoI'm not saying that what occurred was not bad, merely that it was not necessarily malicious and did not constitute theft.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- malloc2x 14y agoDon't know what jurisdiction you're in, but fraudulent transactions[1] == "theft" in the colloquial/moral sense where I'm from. Malice is not requisite to defraud. [1] I charge you for services but do not provide them.
- ruswick 14y agoWhere I'm from, theft requires intent. Fraud requires intent. If money is lost through unintentional error, there may be legal repercussions, but it will almost assuredly be a civil suit. I don't see how it would be untenable to charge anyone at Facebook with an actual crime for this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraud http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraud http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theft
- philh 14y agoIt's not entirely simple, because when they realise the mistake, they have to correct it. I don't know how to unpack the question of whether Facebook has realised the mistake, and I don't know what Facebook's internal state is.
- thedufer 14y agoA bug can cost someone money, yes. And it happens to the best of us. But having no way to get a refund (or even to get a response about whether they'll refund) certainly calls for outrage.
- uptown 14y agoI never quite understand people that get upset when somebody writes a post like this. In the post he says he's tried to rectify the problem by contacting Facebook directly - and he's been ignored. So why not publish something publicly as another means of exposing the problem in a way that might get the resolution he hopes for? From what I can tell - he didn't submit this story here. He didn't title his blog post with the same title used on HackerNews. He just related his personal experience with their latest marketing campaign about Facebook putting people first. [edit]: The original title used on HN was: "Facebook is all about people. All about people's money." This has since been changed.
- niggler 14y ago"From what I can tell - he didn't submit this story here" The user that submitted the article is "ibrahimcesar" and the contact address in the post is "email@ibrahimcesar.com", so there's a nonzero chance the author submitted the story here.
- uptown 14y agoYup - you're right. I must have misread things initially.