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Facebook Is a 'Living, Breathing Crime Scene,' Says Former Tech Insider (nbcnews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: With more than 2 billion users, Facebook's reach now rivals that of Christianity and exceeds that of Islam. However, the network's laser focus on profits and user growth has come at the expense of its users, according to one former Facebook manager who is now speaking out against the social platform. "One of the things that I saw consistently as part of my job was the company just continuously prioritized user growth and making money over protecting users," the ex-manager, Sandy Parakilas, who worked at Facebook for 16 months, starting in 2011, told NBC News. During his tenure at Facebook, Parakilas led third-party advertising, privacy and policy compliance on Facebook's app platform. "Facebook is a living, breathing crime scene for what happened in the 2016 election -- and only they have full access to what happened," said Tristan Harris, a former design ethicist at Google. His work centers on how technology can ethically steer the thoughts and actions of the masses on social media and he's been called "the closest thing Silicon Valley has to a conscience" by The Atlantic magazine.
In response to the comments, Facebook issued a statement saying it is a "vastly different company" from when it was founded. "We are taking many steps to protect and improve people's experience on the platform," the statement said. "In the past year, we've worked to destroy the business model for false news and reduce its spread, stop bad actors from meddling in elections, and bring a new level of transparency to advertising. Last week, we started prioritizing meaningful posts from friends and family in News Feed to help bring people closer together. We have more work to do and we're heads down on getting it done."
In response to the comments, Facebook issued a statement saying it is a "vastly different company" from when it was founded. "We are taking many steps to protect and improve people's experience on the platform," the statement said. "In the past year, we've worked to destroy the business model for false news and reduce its spread, stop bad actors from meddling in elections, and bring a new level of transparency to advertising. Last week, we started prioritizing meaningful posts from friends and family in News Feed to help bring people closer together. We have more work to do and we're heads down on getting it done."
Facebook was defiantly helpful to Trump getting elected - but not how people like this think.
People are fed Fake News all the time, from all sorts of sources. None of that really matters to what they choose though.
What they choose, is what they like, modulo what is acceptable.
The one thing that Facebook (and Twitter) allowed for, was for lots of conservatives to realize there are lots of conservatives. That may not seem like a surprise but when for decades TV has hardly ever shown you any, people start to think there are very few around.
When able to connect with other like minded people of any group, people start to realize there are more of them than they think, which is very empowering. It's what made the gay rights movement so successful, it's what made the recent wave of sexual assault allegations from Hollywood so successful.
Like them, conservatives realized there were others who felt the same way, and it energized them. They were a bit more open in voicing support than they might have been. They voted in greater numbers than they would have before. They started questioning what was being fed to them and started thinking.
Like it or not, the same engine that has helped people on the left is helping people on the right. Is that really such a bad thing, that people are able to find other people who like what they do? I find it hard to call that a crime.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
.....continuously prioritized user growth and making money over protecting users
Except Christianity is criticized for controlling thoughts, while Facebook is being criticized for not doing enough though control.
Do we really want Facebook, or any other corporation, to "steer the thoughts and actions of the masses"?
Is it really Facebook's fault that too many people voted the "wrong way" in 2016? Who gets to decide which thoughts are "right"?
Personally, I prefer to not be steered.
1) What crime, exactly, was committed?
Trump won.
More importantly, Trump humiliated Wall Street's chosen candidate (Jeb Bush) in the primary, and then beat their back-up candidate in the general election. Since there was no "legitimate" way for that to happen, it is clear that the American people were "tricked" by criminals, or even worse, Russian criminals.