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Facebook Employees Ask Mark Zuckerberg If They Should Try To Stop a Donald Trump Presidency (gizmodo.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Mark Zuckerberg didn't shy from condemning several of Trump's views at his company's developer conference earlier this week. Things are getting tenser now. Gizmodo's Michael Nunez is reporting about a political discussion inside Facebook wherein employees appear to be asking Zuckerberg whether the company should try to "help prevent President Trump in 2017." Every week, Facebook employees vote in an internal poll on what they want to ask Zuckerberg in an upcoming Q&A session. A question from the March 4 poll was: "What responsibility does Facebook have to help prevent President Trump in 2017?"An excerpt from the report which talks about Facebook's position :But what's exceedingly important about this question being raised -- and Zuckerberg's answer, if there is one -- is how Facebook now treats the powerful place it holds in the world. It's unprecedented. More than 1.04 billion people use Facebook. It's where we get our news, share our political views, and interact with politicians. It's also where those politicians are spending a greater share of their budgets. And Facebook has no legal responsibility to give an unfiltered view of what's happening on their network.
Skynet us already, all these decisions are taking away valuable Candy Crush playing time!
Particles, stuff that matters.
Facebook is just a forum they should stay neutral and let the Democratic process work. While people may not agree with Trump it doesn't mean stop him from running for president. After all we are the same population whop allowed 2 terms for "W"
Don't confuse elitist CA politics with a consensus view.
--WooooHoooo--
NY Times and other national newspapers had a similar reach within the US only a short while ago... And their electoral endorsements mattered — and were actively sought-out by the politicians. Maybe, not so much any more, but there was never anything illegal or even unethical about it. You have an opinion — you voice it. If you happen to have a bigger megaphone, good for you...
Why can the media endorse a candidate, but not other corporations?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
It will be fun listening to all the right-wing nut-bars after Trump goes down in flames.
Trump is not "right-wing". He draws his strongest support from independents, and tends to do poorly in more partisan closed primaries. Many of his views are anathema to the right-wing, and many conservative talk radio hosts detest him. Talk radio is credited with his defeat in the Wisconsin primaries. Trump is a populist, with a mish-mash of views, without any ideological consistency.
This is a political "just so" story, describing a possible line of argument about how "a legal responsibility to protect and maximize the value of their shareholders" might be interpreted. It is not a necessary, or even likely, conclusion.
There is abundant data showing that political spending has, on average, an extremely large ROI, exceeding 100-1. Regulatory rulings can cause tens of billions of dollars to change hands. It is an easy case to make that efforts to influence political races is not just wise, but incumbent on a corporation explicitly to protect shareholder value.
And in an age where unlimited corporate political spending on its own influence operations is legal, and where the content delivered by a news channel is legally regarded as "entertainment", with no sanction for out-right fabrications being passed off as fact, it is hard to know what sort of activity by a corporation would be impermissible.
Pretty much the only think illegal these days is paying Congressfolk a sum of money for a specific vote. It is fine though to keep them on retainer, paying regularly to their "leadership PAC" (from which the can keep all of the proceeds), and telling them periodically how they should vote, with the politician knowing that the sugar stops if the lobbyist is not obeyed. Not for sale, but all them are being rented.
Second class citizen of the New Gilded Age
without any ideological consistency.
I think that's a good thing. Or rather, it would be nice if policy decisions were made based on technical merit rather than passing some ideological test.
Having worked at Facebook- there's H1Bs there, but pay isn't a problem at FB. In fact they were one of the few large companies not caught up in the wage fixing lawsuits. They had no problem paying me a ridiculous amount of money in equity. The company has issues, but pay isn't one of them.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
Trump only exists as a candidate because the Republicans have done such a bad job of representing the average working-class guy who votes Republican. (Conservative is almost meaningless now, as is Liberal, Right, and Left) He's certainly populist, but his supporters aren't populist idealogs for the most part there's just not a better answer being discussed.
Most people understand that "no immigration at all" and "totally open borders" are both really stupid ideas, but those are the only choices people are talking about, so if you have a low-skill job threatened by immigration, it's easy to chose between the two.
I think you're right that that's the only thing Trump has been consistent on this election (and even his populism is fairly recent).
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Why would the average working-class guy even vote for the Republicans? They are, unashamedly, the supporters of the employers of the average working-class guy.
Because parties are coalitions of a wide set of positions they support? Except in recent years, that's just not true any more, and both parties exist only to serve big-money donors and the voters interests don't matter to either side except as rhetoric. That's why both Trump and Bernie keep getting so many primary votes.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Halting immigration from countries with known terror problems is perfectly reasonable
He didn't say that. He said halting immigration from Muslims, regardless of country of origin.
You're an idiot if you think no immigration is any different than limited immigration.
See, this is what I mean. You're probably against admitting invading armies, or convicted child rapists escaped from jail, or people with a declared (not assumed) intent to commit terrorism. You probably against admitting so many people so fast that it would unquestionably cause mass starvation from simple lack of infrastructure to move people and food around the first year.
You take the obviously wrong extreme position not because you've actually thought about it, but because you want to declare "see, I'm one of the good people, I hold the correct belief"! As do those who state the opposite end, of course.
Black and white answers are for children.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.