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Mark Zuckerberg's Real Campaign: Save Facebook (axios.com)
From an Axios report: Mark Zuckerberg started 2017 scoffing at the idea of Russia election manipulation on Facebook, and looked like he was contemplating his own possible run for the presidency. Facebook's CEO ends 2017 a very changed man: scrambling to curtail (some of) the manipulation he now acknowledges exists, and to save the most powerful platform in human history. A Facebook exec tells us: "This is the year people will see we get that there's real work to do. We have to change."
Is Damaging Society and Personal Relationships ACROSS THE GLOBE! (Cough, Cough, Bullshit) LET IT BURN! Go OUTSIDE and see your Friends FACE TO FACE!
Decided on a Facebook hiatus this month. Frankly, I don’t really feel I miss much and I posted frequently. Sometimes, you think “this is cool, I should share it”. That feeling usually drops away after 10 minutes. I conclude that it really wasn’t that important then.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
The world would be a better place without Facebook and Twitter. It would result in less outrage politics, less radicalization of loaners, less keeping up with Jonses, less depressed people, less echo chambers, safer roads, better sleep. If deleting Facebook and Twitter was a pill, we would all be taking it instead of vitamins.
and looked like he was contemplating his own possible run for the presidency
Until he figured out that he's one of the most hated people in the world, even among the heaviest of Facebook users.
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
"... scrambling to curtail (some of) the manipulation he now acknowledges exists"
facebook founder, users, employees, and critics, all seem to live in a bubble, spouting nonsense back and forth, about a non-incident, backed with no independently verifiable evidence, made up entirely of unverified allegations about, relatively minuscule ad spending by unidentified americans with, fuzzy at best, connections several nodes removed from anything real named kremlin.
sad.
Mark Zuckerberg started 2017 scoffing at the idea of Russia election manipulation on Facebook...
No transparent conflict of interest in that position... [/sarcasm] Of course that is what he would say. Otherwise he and his company are complicit in a crime.
...and looked like he was contemplating his own possible run for the presidency.
$diety save us!
Hmm .... reading between the lines, I would guess that Zuckerberg's real concern is that engagement metrics are falling for Facebook users. I can't imagine that he gives a flip one way or the other about "fake news" or manipulation, as long as people use Facebook.
Just this morning, I unfollowed yet another friend who couldn't resist screaming at everyone with yet another political post. It's getting very, very tiring. Facebook has caused friends of mine to stop speaking (in person) to each other. It's a great platform for seeing family photos, but beyond that I no longer see much utility in using a platform that exists to promote and monetize "us vs. them" mindsets.
Facebook can't die quickly enough.
That The Facebook needs saving is encouraging news... that seems to indicate its popularity and influence is waning.
Even if this is true, it's sad to realize the genie is out of the bottle on this type of social media platform, and something else will replace or compete with Zuck's digital progeny.
Here's to hoping we don't get a replacement that's actually worse, on the order of trading Saddam Hussein for ISIS.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Facebook absolutely depends on bad behavior in order to maintain the amount of power it has. The only "campaign to save Facebook" that we can realistically expect is a PR campaign. Actual positive change would harm FB's shareholders.
It seems that the SJW crowd has jumped the proverbial shark one time too many, and has done grave damage to their own side. Their outrage machine has started to settle bar fights with grenades, and they are catching most of the resultant shrapnel.
I remember reading a story about a man who was Facebook mobbed by a woman who accused him of being a pedophile because her kids were in part of a selfie he took. She later apologized and admitted that she was an idiot. The best way to deal with a troll mob is really simple:
1. Lock the account of EVERYONE who shared it.
2. Force them to read a notice that they participated in a troll mob based on defamatory/abusive content.
3. Threaten them that if it happens again within 90 days, they'll be locked out for 30 days.
4. If it happens three times in a year they get a lifetime ban from all Facebook social networks and using Facebook Connect to login to third party services.
Facebook is pure garbage. I've never created an account but I see lots of my friends waste huge piles of time on it. The best thing for Facebook would be to blank the filesystems of every server they have and use their massive amounts of equipment towards something more noble, like protein folding simulations which may actually cure disease.
Mark Zuckerberg is a useless tool who will hopefully be a footnote in history and nothing more.
Hasn't it turned into MySpace? Only teens and olds posting pictures of their lunch? All the millennials seem to have departed for Reddit and Instagram.
"Mark Zuckerberg admits in a New Yorker profile that he mocked early Facebook users for trusting him with their personal information. A youthful indiscretion, the Facebook founder says he's much more mature now, at the ripe age of 26." http://gawker.com/5636765/face...
"This is the year people will see we get that there's real work to do. We have to change."
Hopefully by going the MySpace way.
Facebook needs to do far more than just curtail fake news. It tries to curtail "hate speech", however does not have a clear policy on what exactly constitutes "hate speech". As a result, Facebook moderators routinely curtails the free expression of conservative ideas. Just because a person disagrees with you does not make it "hate speech". Just because you do not like what a person has posted does not make it "hate speech". In truth, very little of what gets labeled as "hate speech" is truly "hate speech". Facebook should remember that it MUST embrace the concept of ideological neutrality or it will be working hand in hand with those that produce fake news.
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Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed.
-Dave
Let him scramble and let him fail. Facebook never did anything really innovative anyway. It's like one giant, topicless bulletin board where everyone posts shit about their lives most people don't want to read anyway. Facebook ruined the concept of friendship and relegated it to something far less meaningful and rich. Instead the platform has been divisive, promotes hatred, and promotes revisionist history. I'm now 60 days free from that giant clusterfuck known as Facebook. Facebook is psychologically toxic!
Fake news spreads very fast. People will post things that they agree with (or find interesting) without thinking and checking to see if it is true. One harmless but false post that I recently seen on Facebook posted by a couple of my FB friends is that in 2018 1/1, 2/2, 3/3, ...12/12 will all occur on a Sunday. It is a fun fact if it was true, but with just a little bit of thinking it is easy to realize that it is false. Yet I have a couple of FB friends who posted it without thinking. Posting without thinking and checking is a problem Facebook can not solve.
By the time a human looks at the post and determines it is fake news, the post has been reposted hundreds of times. An algorithm can find some fake news posts but how many false positives would there be. People would also figure ways around (or game) the algorithm, so it would be an ongoing battle. And what determines fake new? Is it one misleading statement? Does a slanted story with only one side counts as fake news? Is an opinion that is misleading fake news? It is hard.
Then there is the issue of censorship. Is it right for Facebook to ban posts? Should Facebook mark posts as possible fake news and put it far down in its curated list of posts? I think something can be done, but it is not an easy problem to solve, and it will never be completely solved.
Shoot, about 75% of the stuff I see are things like this: Apple will lose xxx share...click here for the details New campaign to take down xxxx politician, click for the details and on and on. Click bait, to get people to go to a website, in order to run up the click count, so the website can charge more for advertising.
They have no business being involved at all. If Facebook facilitated their actions then there is a good chance Facebook was complicit in attempted election rigging and quite possibly in violation of federal election laws.
Your link points to donations or contributions to campaigns. None of this involves ads on Facebook. AKA : you're a purveyor of Fake news now.
There are plenty of articles on this very topic.
WaPo. LmAo. No seriously, again, state the statutes, not a vague link to "Donations by foreign nationals are prohibited". None occurred here and thus those statutes are irrelevant to the discussion.
Russians buying ads is by definition an attempt to influence the election.
Sure, but you're missing the point (which of course I expected of a biased individual out to "get Drumpf!"). They influenced BOTH SIDES. The goal was not to get a particular candidate elected, it was simply to create chaos. And you're now colluding with them, as you bought into their divisive rethoric and are the source of the chaos.
I understand you desperately want the Trump presidency to be illegitimate. It's not. It's 100% legit. How about you start rooting for your country instead of trying to destroy its institutions from within ?
"Not to mention all the idiots who use words like boxen."
Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, @06:49PM
Same death as USENET, myspace, and all other forum type systems. They eventually become so polluted with spam they are unbearable and useless. The only reason Facebook is still used by anyone is because old people are afraid of losing their contact list and pictures. Young people don't care about archival or contact lists and are willing to throw it away and start over any day so they jump around and try new social networks.
Audience. Once upon a time, my audience was here on slashdot with the journals. Everyons moved, and most ended up on Facebook. I never really got the point of Reddit... I have an account, but the site just doesn’t speak to me. I’m getting old. I can just keep my thoughts to myself... or at least learn to.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
He should read the story of what happened to Ma Bell when the government decided that she was too large.
Passionately Indifferent
If Facebook is in danger of destruction, I want to know: how can we help? Help destroy it, that is. I am a moral person, after all.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
I never really got the point of Reddit... I have an account, but the site just doesn't speak to me.
I'm with you there. Reddit drives me crazy. I can never follow the threads of discussion there.
But then think about this. You really think that ALL of Facebook has the same opinion? That anything published on Facebook becomes unanimous thought? FB is a big collection of trolls, clickbaits and, sometimes, real influencers. But there is no way in hell a unique point of view on Facebook.
Each religious current can differ slightly, but they tend to agree on some general principles. And MOST religious currents tend to have some very well positionned influencers in governments, police and law enforcement agencies. Sometimes they even run the government (mostly in middleeast countries) This is what makes them extremely powerful, compared to the small FB folks who tend to disappear after short lived glory.
Power does not mean majority. Look at who's REALLY deciding about what's going on in your life. Banks, governments, big businesses. Yes FB can have a little influence, but "The most powerful platform in human history"? This gave me a good laugh.
The entire fake news thing is sad and embarrassing. It's people admitting that they cannot think critically, and will believe just about anything. They're crying "Do something! Do something!" when all they have really ever had to do is think critically for a few moments and the problem is solved.
Corruption is rampant and legal in this county. Our representatives are so openly owned that nobody even blinks an eye, its no longer news. So normal that nobody even bothers to fact check anymore. Politicians are all dirty as hell, of course they did %THING. Corruption and bad behavior are so normal that people just assume it's true. Even our MSM.
Meanwhile, our media is so sanitized and washed out that other countries are able to manipulate our population with fucking memes, lies, and cartoons. This is a problem for our giant divisive media companies, not more corrupt politicians.
Really fucking sad.
Assume every politician is dirty as hell, and every single person you meet is out for your wallet and assets. Voting won't help, and you can't run for office without selling your soul to corporations.
The only play left is to remember everything in America is a fucking scam and act accordingly. Even the fucking news.
You are being ripped off every second of every day, so that advertisers can help rip you off even more tomorrow.
How many of those photos and videos of cats on Facebook are Russian while hiding their true identity and nationality? Are we being covertly influenced by Russian cats?
Debate is a form of harassment. Do not question my truth.
The critical thing is that most of the people in Crimea are Russian and want to be part of Russia.
We should never have made such a fuss about it. Because screaming about marginal cases weakens your ability to scream if Russia becomes truly aggressive. It also strengthens Putin politically.
There is a feeling that national borders are sacrosanct, even though they are often the result of arbitrary historical processes and have little to do with ethnic boundaries. Particularly where colonial powers were concerned. Borders should follow ethnic lines, and locals should be able to chose. Kurdistan should exist.
Imagine what the USA would be today if the southern states had been allowed to succeed.
So what does one person's political orientation have to do with anything here? Both left and right have their share of unscientific people, just unscientific about different things. Unscientific right-wingers don't believe that AGW is going on and is serious, unscientific left-wingers don't believe genetic modification can be safe. (Anti-vaxxers can be found on both sides.)
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
> But just like reading no lower than 2 on Slashdot, I can
> unfollow friends on Facebook and no one gets booboo feelings.
Are you *SURE* they won't get upset? https://modenook.com/facebook-...
> In nearby Mountain City, Tennessee, a couple is dead because they
> unfriended the wrong person. A woman's father murdered the couple,
> leaving their infant alive in the mother's arms, because they unfriended his
> daughter on Facebook. You can read about that story here on The Tennessean.
https://www.aol.com/2011/11/03...
> Police in Des Moines, Iowa, have arrested 30-year-old Jennifer Christine
> Harris (pictured left) for allegedly setting her neighbor's house on
> fire, according to the Des Moines Register. The suspected motive?
> Retribution for being "de-friended" on the popular social networking site.
I agree with Mark Zuckerberg on one thing. Facebook users are indeed dumb fucks.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
I recently quit expecting someone to be appreciable just because people elected him POTUS
If that's what Zuckerwhateverhisnameis actually believes, then a couple of Ayatollahs, several Muftis, a Bodhisatva or two, the Bishop of Rome and the head of the Orthodox church are waiting in a dark alley for him with baseball bats. After a re-education at their hands (and slippers, and censers), they'll throw his pain-wracked self into the Pit of Protestants, where numbers and insecurity will really make him seriously at-risk.
Many people want to hide themselves in a crowd - which is what platforms are for. It's also why they're becoming increasingly eroded, as the cult of the Overinflated Ego becomes the working paradigm for more and more people. Facebook may well be a major player to the overinflation of egos, but it's far from entering an empty playing field, and the competition have centuries more practice at practical human psychology.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"