Dear Mark.
September 8, 2016 5:07 PM Subscribe
I thought the same thing when there were accusations of bias against conservatives in the trending topics. Facebook is under no obligation whatsoever to avoid bias, except insofar as it affects their bottom line.
People are free to criticize the product, certainly there are things Facebook does that are open to debate, but it's not *obligated* to do anything but make money.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:20 PM on September 8, 2016 [7 favorites]
People are free to criticize the product, certainly there are things Facebook does that are open to debate, but it's not *obligated* to do anything but make money.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:20 PM on September 8, 2016 [7 favorites]
Most effortful mod sass ever?
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 5:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 5:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
As I imagine a million other people are doing right now, I've just posted that story on Facebook.
posted by beagle at 5:23 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by beagle at 5:23 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
I mean, sure, Facebook may not be legally obligated to exercise its editorial control in any particular way, but that doesn't mean it's free from ethical obligations. I happen to believe that all people and organizations have responsibilities, including for-profit companies, and that the profit motive does not abrogate Facebook's responsibility to society.
posted by a mirror and an encyclopedia at 5:25 PM on September 8, 2016 [61 favorites]
posted by a mirror and an encyclopedia at 5:25 PM on September 8, 2016 [61 favorites]
This is the bed you made for yourselves when you chose to engage with Facebook instead of sticking to media formats you exclusively control.
Except to disengage from Facebook increasingly means to disengage from a large portion of your potential audience, and as I have learned as an individual, from your friends and family, especially if you are geographically removed from where most of them live. Arguments that Facebook can do what it will because it is a private actor presume that Facebook doesn't have a dominating share of an increasingly oligopolistic media market. Many people get almost all of their interpersonal interaction and news exclusively through Facebook. At what point do we say that they have some obligation to act as a common carrier, or failing that, be dissolved into smaller pieces?
posted by [expletive deleted] at 5:26 PM on September 8, 2016 [44 favorites]
Except to disengage from Facebook increasingly means to disengage from a large portion of your potential audience, and as I have learned as an individual, from your friends and family, especially if you are geographically removed from where most of them live. Arguments that Facebook can do what it will because it is a private actor presume that Facebook doesn't have a dominating share of an increasingly oligopolistic media market. Many people get almost all of their interpersonal interaction and news exclusively through Facebook. At what point do we say that they have some obligation to act as a common carrier, or failing that, be dissolved into smaller pieces?
posted by [expletive deleted] at 5:26 PM on September 8, 2016 [44 favorites]
I really didn't expect to enter this thread and see the first couple of comments boiling down to "Fuck you, Facebook can do what it wants, sucker!"
posted by languagehat at 5:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [48 favorites]
posted by languagehat at 5:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [48 favorites]
The article claims:
posted by foobaz at 5:40 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
The napalm-girl is by far the most iconic documentary photography from the Vietnam war.I think Eddie Adams' Saigon execution photo has a strong claim to that title too.
posted by foobaz at 5:40 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
At what point do we say that they have some obligation to act as a common carrier, or failing that, be dissolved into smaller pieces?
At no point?
I mean...you do remember life before facebook, right? People did manage to get by. Facebook is not THE INTERNET. If facebook disappeared tomorrow, it wouldn't remove your ability to keep in touch with your cousins.
It's not like facebook is...I don't know, PENICILLIN. It's not even a reasonably priced epi-pen.
posted by the bricabrac man at 5:41 PM on September 8, 2016 [40 favorites]
At no point?
I mean...you do remember life before facebook, right? People did manage to get by. Facebook is not THE INTERNET. If facebook disappeared tomorrow, it wouldn't remove your ability to keep in touch with your cousins.
It's not like facebook is...I don't know, PENICILLIN. It's not even a reasonably priced epi-pen.
posted by the bricabrac man at 5:41 PM on September 8, 2016 [40 favorites]
I think there are three ways this can go.
1) Facebook can keep doing shit wrong and not keeping the platform mostly open and it will fail
2) Facebook can get their shit together and make a product that is more universally beneficial and grow.
3) The platform continues to grow but they also continue to be ham fisted shitbag, then we take it away from them and make it into an open public utility.
posted by MrBobaFett at 5:45 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
1) Facebook can keep doing shit wrong and not keeping the platform mostly open and it will fail
2) Facebook can get their shit together and make a product that is more universally beneficial and grow.
3) The platform continues to grow but they also continue to be ham fisted shitbag, then we take it away from them and make it into an open public utility.
posted by MrBobaFett at 5:45 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
"Except to disengage from Facebook increasingly means to disengage from a large portion of your potential audience, and as I have learned as an individual, from your friends and family, especially if you are geographically removed from where most of them live. "
On the one hand, Facebook is now a life requirement, like Internet, cellphones, and air. We are stuck with it forever unless a huge number of people drop it, which they won't because of see above.
On the other hand, Facebook and other social media can easily ruin your life in a second.
I have been told certain people will no longer talk to me unless I use Facebook. So I don't talk to them any more. I know it's a requirement for them, but the place is just too dangerous.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:48 PM on September 8, 2016 [33 favorites]
On the one hand, Facebook is now a life requirement, like Internet, cellphones, and air. We are stuck with it forever unless a huge number of people drop it, which they won't because of see above.
On the other hand, Facebook and other social media can easily ruin your life in a second.
I have been told certain people will no longer talk to me unless I use Facebook. So I don't talk to them any more. I know it's a requirement for them, but the place is just too dangerous.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:48 PM on September 8, 2016 [33 favorites]
People are free to criticize the product, certainly there are things Facebook does that are open to debate, but it's not *obligated* to do anything but make money.
This equates Facebook and El Chapo, for example.
I tend to agree with that equation, but I am a little surprised to see it stated here so baldly.
posted by jamjam at 5:51 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
This equates Facebook and El Chapo, for example.
I tend to agree with that equation, but I am a little surprised to see it stated here so baldly.
posted by jamjam at 5:51 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
Corporations are not people.
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
Yeah, but everybody's addicted to it now for some reason, and they barely do anything else that isn't connected to it in some way. I tried to kill my account and realized within about 24 hours there was no longer any easy, alternative way to find out about huge numbers of local events--many of them no longer even announced through other channels--and so many social activities connected to Facebook groups. It's like an octopus with tentacles groping around in every aspect of our brains and lives. It's not all bad, but it's impact and scope is massive. And yeah, it does make people's social lives more complex and difficult to manage, and it can destroy relationships like no chaos engine I've ever seen. Even the glam rock age probably didn't break up as many marriages and other romantic partnerships, from what I've seen anecdotally...
posted by saulgoodman at 5:53 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
posted by saulgoodman at 5:53 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
I mean, sure, Facebook may not be legally obligated to exercise its editorial control in any particular way, but that doesnt mean its free from ethical obligations. I happen to believe that all people and organizations have responsibilities, including for-profit companies, and that the profit motive does not abrogate Facebooks responsibility to society.Exactly. And without asking the government and ultimately the police to force Facebook to publish what you want, the alternative way is to persuade them to do what you want. This may involve getting Mark Zuckerberg to sympathize with a letter addressed to him, or it may involve creating enough controversy and public disapproval that Facebook's income starts being affected.
posted by Rangi at 5:54 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
this will simply promote stupidity and fail to bring human beings closer to each other.
Isn't this a line from FaceBook's Mission Statement?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:55 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
Isn't this a line from FaceBook's Mission Statement?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:55 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
Something is twinging in my memory about their being a legal thing whee a privately provided service becomes so ubiquitous that courts basically decide it is akin to a public service and has social responsibilities that it must fulfill, profitably or not. But I can't remember what an example of this happening was and I don't know what the legal principle is called.
Can any lawyers tell me if I'm making this up?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 5:56 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
Can any lawyers tell me if I'm making this up?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 5:56 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
As much as I loathe Facebook, and grudgingly use it (though less), I do not wish to see it forced open. If we can't create a better alternative, if a bulk of its users can't finally break free due to Facebook's continued crapulence then we collectively deserve it.
posted by jzb at 5:57 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by jzb at 5:57 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
Facebook justifies itself on "social good"/warm fuzzy grounds. The editor is no fool - I would be astonished if he truly believed that Zuckerberg had a heart to be touched - but he is attempting to shame Facebook by forcing a contrast between what Facebook says about itself and what it does. That is, he is using his social power to the best of his ability against Facebook.
posted by Frowner at 5:58 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
posted by Frowner at 5:58 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
Dob't get me wrong, Facebook's ever increasing control over how people get information is troubling, but the answer isn't to nicely ask a billionaire to stop exerting editorial control over the news you post, it's to encourage people to not rely exclusively on Facebook for their news. Like people have said, Facebook is not the Internet. Facebook has become the primary hub for millions of people, but that's because it's easy, not because it's the only way. Don't act like Facebook has somehow made other forms of social interaction impossible.
Some companies have done well as a medium for information, for the most part Google is reliable about surfacing useful knowledge in searches, because Google doesn't try to hold you inside its ecosystem. Facebook, like AOL before it has an interest in keeping you inside its walls and will feed you what it thinks you want to see. From Facebook's point of view a picture of a Vietnamese bombing victim IS child pornography, because they're both things that Facebook doesn't want in its newsfeed.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:58 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
Some companies have done well as a medium for information, for the most part Google is reliable about surfacing useful knowledge in searches, because Google doesn't try to hold you inside its ecosystem. Facebook, like AOL before it has an interest in keeping you inside its walls and will feed you what it thinks you want to see. From Facebook's point of view a picture of a Vietnamese bombing victim IS child pornography, because they're both things that Facebook doesn't want in its newsfeed.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:58 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
Don't let the fact that above I mentioned that facebook is a private company and has no ethical responsibility mislead you. That was an indictment, not a defense. By all means, let's nationalize Facebook along with a lot of other public goods!
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 5:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
Something is twinging in my memory about their being a legal thing whee a privately provided service becomes so ubiquitous that courts basically decide it is akin to a public service and has social responsibilities that it must fulfill, profitably or not.
I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. You may be thinking of the 1946 case Marsh v. Alabama, but the courts have declined to extend it to other circumstances.
posted by jedicus at 6:00 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. You may be thinking of the 1946 case Marsh v. Alabama, but the courts have declined to extend it to other circumstances.
posted by jedicus at 6:00 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
of all the industries to nationalize, we're really going to die on the Facebook hill?
posted by indubitable at 6:03 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
posted by indubitable at 6:03 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
Isn't the idea beautiful?
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 6:04 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 6:04 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
also, someone should buy this guy an account. I bet his flameout on MetaTalk would be epic.
posted by indubitable at 6:05 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
posted by indubitable at 6:05 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
It takes a particularly narrow, repressed mind to look at that picture and see kiddie porn. That Facebook prefers to acquiesce to the demands/alarm of these people is a very sad state of affairs. It becomes worse when Facebook brooks no discussion or appeal of the matter. We bend to the cranks, period, and you'll be quiet about it.
I'm old enough to remember when that photo was published. No one in the media thought twice about printing it. It's odd to think we were, perhaps, more adult/educated about such things 40+ years ago.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:08 PM on September 8, 2016 [32 favorites]
I'm old enough to remember when that photo was published. No one in the media thought twice about printing it. It's odd to think we were, perhaps, more adult/educated about such things 40+ years ago.
posted by Thorzdad at 6:08 PM on September 8, 2016 [32 favorites]
I have not used Facebook for at least 8 years now. I was growing increasingly annoyed at the types of information that was mined from my account as well as the kind of high-school-esque nature of it. I haven't looked back. But I'm now starting to worry about Twitter. It also has been making lots of horrible choices with regards to how it responds to harassment, privacy, information, etc. I love twitter as a platform but corporations got to corporate and so it seems inevitable that the user/consumer is on the shit end of that relationship. We're just numbers and dollar signs.
posted by Fizz at 6:12 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
posted by Fizz at 6:12 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
Also, all you people clamoring for the nationalization of Facebook are seeming to forget the First Amendment. Facebook is free to publish whatever it likes without government interference, even if that interference could honestly be beneficial. Do you really want the government in the business of deciding what should and shouldn't be published? Please remember that this is the same government in danger of being run by an orange man.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:17 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:17 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
If facebook disappeared tomorrow, it wouldn't remove your ability to keep in touch with your cousins.
I lost touch with a lot of people over the years when services closed down - msn messenger, IRC servers, several boards or associated pages (like home of the underdogs) or yakalike (a plugin that added chat to any website).
There's a lot of people I wouldn't have any others way to reach if Facebook or Twitter went offline tomorrow. A friend of mine has a bare bones Facebook account because after disabling it a few times, he was always missing out on something because he was "unreachable". Now, he only uses something to connect to chat, and doesn't even bother with the rest, but that is the connection to a lot of his friends. It's the world we live in.
posted by lmfsilva at 6:19 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
I lost touch with a lot of people over the years when services closed down - msn messenger, IRC servers, several boards or associated pages (like home of the underdogs) or yakalike (a plugin that added chat to any website).
There's a lot of people I wouldn't have any others way to reach if Facebook or Twitter went offline tomorrow. A friend of mine has a bare bones Facebook account because after disabling it a few times, he was always missing out on something because he was "unreachable". Now, he only uses something to connect to chat, and doesn't even bother with the rest, but that is the connection to a lot of his friends. It's the world we live in.
posted by lmfsilva at 6:19 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
Mr. Encyclopedia, I don't think anyone is arguing for the Government to decide what can and cannot be published on Facebook.
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:20 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by MrBobaFett at 6:20 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
happy fun september time capsule:
A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace
BY JOHN PERRY BARLOW
It was 20 years ago. Is there a "time flies" emoji?
posted by bukvich at 6:25 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace
BY JOHN PERRY BARLOW
It was 20 years ago. Is there a "time flies" emoji?
posted by bukvich at 6:25 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
At what point do we say that they have some obligation to act as a common carrier, or failing that, be dissolved into smaller pieces?
posted by lastobelus at 6:28 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
At no point?Hmmm, I think we are pretty lucky that turned out not to be the consensus with the telephone. Or would you be cool with AT&T being within their legal right to terminate your calls any time you said a certain word?
posted by lastobelus at 6:28 PM on September 8, 2016 [8 favorites]
Facebook is not the telephone, the internet is the telephone. Facebook is a chat line.
posted by bongo_x at 6:30 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
posted by bongo_x at 6:30 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
You think the invention of facebook is analogous to the invention of the phone?
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
posted by the bricabrac man at 6:31 PM on September 8, 2016 [7 favorites]
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
posted by the bricabrac man at 6:31 PM on September 8, 2016 [7 favorites]
Also, all you people clamoring for the nationalization of Facebook are seeming to forget the First Amendment.
First, I wasn't clamouring for nationalization, eminent domain (i.e. expropriation) or anything of the sort. The thing I was asking about was when the company that owns something keeps owning it, keeps running it, keeps making money off of it, but is basically told: This thing you're running is so important to the public that we can require you to follow rules in operating it so that it operates in the public interest. So it wouldn't be "you have to publish this picture" but "You have to consider the public interest in deciding what to publish, and though you can have rules, those rules must be flexible or appealable when they don't apply (i.e. yeah, you an say no naked kids, but need a mechanism for pointing out that this is a whole different thing).
And the First Amendment only applies in the US. This is one thing I was thinking about -- if it were declared to have such a status in some countries but not others, would they have to have human-administered actions etc. for people in some countries and be allowed to run algorithms in others? How would this work? They already have to follow different rules in different countries, obviously.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:32 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
First, I wasn't clamouring for nationalization, eminent domain (i.e. expropriation) or anything of the sort. The thing I was asking about was when the company that owns something keeps owning it, keeps running it, keeps making money off of it, but is basically told: This thing you're running is so important to the public that we can require you to follow rules in operating it so that it operates in the public interest. So it wouldn't be "you have to publish this picture" but "You have to consider the public interest in deciding what to publish, and though you can have rules, those rules must be flexible or appealable when they don't apply (i.e. yeah, you an say no naked kids, but need a mechanism for pointing out that this is a whole different thing).
And the First Amendment only applies in the US. This is one thing I was thinking about -- if it were declared to have such a status in some countries but not others, would they have to have human-administered actions etc. for people in some countries and be allowed to run algorithms in others? How would this work? They already have to follow different rules in different countries, obviously.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:32 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
It's not like facebook is...I don't know, PENICILLIN. It's not even a reasonably priced epi-pen.
I've heard too many anecdotes about companies requiring applicants to link to their Facebook pages, and refusing to consider those who don't, to believe that it's not necessary for many people. I think I even saw something about potential jurors sometimes having to provide their Facebook pages as well. What do they do if you don't have one?
It is considered at the very least a default, and not using it can be pretty inconvenient at the very least. The job requirement thing I'd put at near-penicillin importance.
I can and do just abstain from Facebook entirely, but it's a pain in the ass sometimes, and for some people, I don't think it's quite as optional as it is for me.
posted by ernielundquist at 6:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
I've heard too many anecdotes about companies requiring applicants to link to their Facebook pages, and refusing to consider those who don't, to believe that it's not necessary for many people. I think I even saw something about potential jurors sometimes having to provide their Facebook pages as well. What do they do if you don't have one?
It is considered at the very least a default, and not using it can be pretty inconvenient at the very least. The job requirement thing I'd put at near-penicillin importance.
I can and do just abstain from Facebook entirely, but it's a pain in the ass sometimes, and for some people, I don't think it's quite as optional as it is for me.
posted by ernielundquist at 6:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
I've never had a facebook account, and maybe a couple of times has it ever come up, as in someone asked me if I had one (my mom being one).
Reading about how it's necessary to modern life is just bizarre. I've rarely even looked at it.
posted by bongo_x at 6:48 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
Reading about how it's necessary to modern life is just bizarre. I've rarely even looked at it.
posted by bongo_x at 6:48 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
You think the invention of facebook is analogous to the invention of the phone?
This was in response to you saying that at no point should Facebook be treated as a common carrier. According to this Pew survey, around a quarter of US adults get their news exclusively through Facebook. Given what we already know about how much control Facebook exercises over what you see, it's not unreasonable to say they already have more influence over the information people are exposed to than Ma Bell could have exercised at the height of her monopoly power. But you said at no point. So you would be fine with Facebook being free to opaquely shape and subtly manipulate the sole aggregation of news for 50% of the public? What about 90%?
posted by [expletive deleted] at 6:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
This was in response to you saying that at no point should Facebook be treated as a common carrier. According to this Pew survey, around a quarter of US adults get their news exclusively through Facebook. Given what we already know about how much control Facebook exercises over what you see, it's not unreasonable to say they already have more influence over the information people are exposed to than Ma Bell could have exercised at the height of her monopoly power. But you said at no point. So you would be fine with Facebook being free to opaquely shape and subtly manipulate the sole aggregation of news for 50% of the public? What about 90%?
posted by [expletive deleted] at 6:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
You think the invention of facebook is analogous to the invention of the phone?
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
Then maybe don't take the time to cast aspersions without really engaging?
The phone isn't a perfect metaphor but it's semi-apt at a low resolution. Facebook is a person to person communication medium. It isn't the only one but neither was/is the phone. The analogy gets better if you think of FB as one of several consumer facing carriers on top of various telephony technologies -- maybe not "the phone" but, say, analogous to Sprint. There may be alternatives in the larger market in that space but we might still decide as a society that carriers have certain obligations. Or newspapers. Or broadcast outlets.
Of course, those aren't perfect analogies either. The real underlying point is that there are all kinds of ways to decide on the obligations various entities have for the common welfare along with whatever personal pursuits they're engaged in, and in western democracies we've definitely decided that various media operations have certain obligations. The fact that FB is part of a new media landscape makes analogies to past media imperfect, but doesn't invalidate the idea that media obligations might be important.
posted by wildblueyonder at 7:03 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
Then maybe don't take the time to cast aspersions without really engaging?
The phone isn't a perfect metaphor but it's semi-apt at a low resolution. Facebook is a person to person communication medium. It isn't the only one but neither was/is the phone. The analogy gets better if you think of FB as one of several consumer facing carriers on top of various telephony technologies -- maybe not "the phone" but, say, analogous to Sprint. There may be alternatives in the larger market in that space but we might still decide as a society that carriers have certain obligations. Or newspapers. Or broadcast outlets.
Of course, those aren't perfect analogies either. The real underlying point is that there are all kinds of ways to decide on the obligations various entities have for the common welfare along with whatever personal pursuits they're engaged in, and in western democracies we've definitely decided that various media operations have certain obligations. The fact that FB is part of a new media landscape makes analogies to past media imperfect, but doesn't invalidate the idea that media obligations might be important.
posted by wildblueyonder at 7:03 PM on September 8, 2016 [13 favorites]
You think the invention of facebook is analogous to the invention of the phone?
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
It's possible you are confusing the invention of something with how it comes to be used. The idea of common carrier (with respect to telecomunications) did not suddenly appear upon the invention of the telephone. It evolved out of the idea that a particular service had become fundamental enough to society that a different, further-reaching set of rules governing what discretion those who profitted from offering that service ought to have over how and to whom they offer it was now warranted.
The discussion is whether or at what point we reach an analogous situation with facebook, not whether facebook is physically analogous to the telephone.
I'd've thought that should've been rather obvious.
posted by lastobelus at 7:08 PM on September 8, 2016 [23 favorites]
I just don't even have the time to refute something that ....*deep breath*... not right.
It's possible you are confusing the invention of something with how it comes to be used. The idea of common carrier (with respect to telecomunications) did not suddenly appear upon the invention of the telephone. It evolved out of the idea that a particular service had become fundamental enough to society that a different, further-reaching set of rules governing what discretion those who profitted from offering that service ought to have over how and to whom they offer it was now warranted.
The discussion is whether or at what point we reach an analogous situation with facebook, not whether facebook is physically analogous to the telephone.
I'd've thought that should've been rather obvious.
posted by lastobelus at 7:08 PM on September 8, 2016 [23 favorites]
There's a happy middle ground where you use Facebook casually to remain a bit involved in some circles, but you don't live your life there, you don't fill your friend's news feeds, you don't post pictures of everything you do... basically, you don't fill up Facebook with yourself-as-commodity-for-someone-else. To the extent that it's practically required, it's a presence requirement, not an engagement requirement.
I get the motive to call it a sort of 'cultural common carrier', but I think that's surrendering to its momentum and blessing the status quo and actually extending Facebook's life as the de facto public square. I'm extremely sceptical of our ability to urge or legislate Facebook into being a good citizen, and I'd rather people were more reserved about using it like it's the only club worth joining.
posted by fatbird at 7:33 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
I get the motive to call it a sort of 'cultural common carrier', but I think that's surrendering to its momentum and blessing the status quo and actually extending Facebook's life as the de facto public square. I'm extremely sceptical of our ability to urge or legislate Facebook into being a good citizen, and I'd rather people were more reserved about using it like it's the only club worth joining.
posted by fatbird at 7:33 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
Today I got to take a tour of the Wikimedia Foundation office and it was so good for my soul. Living in the Bay Area, I am constantly inundated with the actual evils of the internet: the privacy pillaging, the monitizing, the sexism and racism, the framing of biased and destructive algorithms as politically neutral and socially positive.
At Wikipedia, I got to remember there is an internet that is not about profit. A signifcant percentage of the staff is specifically dediated to improving access to the tool, to making it work in developing countries and for women and people of color in the US. It's a utopian piece of technology that still believes everyone should have access to sharing and learning new information. And it's an organization that recognizes it's weaknesses and failings and puts money and staff time into working to improve those problems. Did you know Wikimedia recently tried to sue the NSA? (Imagine Facebook doing that.)
Wow, it was so great to just have that part of my brain and heart woken up again - technology does not have to be used to get obscenely rich and make the world more narrow and less informed! Tech workers can care about the problems with their tools, and meaningfully try to solve those problems. It gave me some hope.
posted by latkes at 7:42 PM on September 8, 2016 [26 favorites]
At Wikipedia, I got to remember there is an internet that is not about profit. A signifcant percentage of the staff is specifically dediated to improving access to the tool, to making it work in developing countries and for women and people of color in the US. It's a utopian piece of technology that still believes everyone should have access to sharing and learning new information. And it's an organization that recognizes it's weaknesses and failings and puts money and staff time into working to improve those problems. Did you know Wikimedia recently tried to sue the NSA? (Imagine Facebook doing that.)
Wow, it was so great to just have that part of my brain and heart woken up again - technology does not have to be used to get obscenely rich and make the world more narrow and less informed! Tech workers can care about the problems with their tools, and meaningfully try to solve those problems. It gave me some hope.
posted by latkes at 7:42 PM on September 8, 2016 [26 favorites]
Open letters make me tense.
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by The corpse in the library at 7:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
I am impressed that the first couple comments missed the point of this letter so thoroughly. It seemed clear that the author, Espen Egil Hansen, is using an overly credulous, face-value interpretation of the window dressing mission statement of “make the world more open and connected”. He clearly points out in the letter that Facebook's hamhanded actions make an immediate lie of its stated goals, and lays out a strong case that Facebook is damaging communication instead of fostering it by foisting a narrow corporatized editorial window on what is and is not acceptable. It seems reasonable to assume that the audience for this letter is not Mark Zuckerberg or the board of directors, but rather the public at large, in pointing out the problems of Facebook as online content focal point.
The last cartoon is incredibly powerful and on point, and I love it.
posted by Existential Dread at 8:02 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
The last cartoon is incredibly powerful and on point, and I love it.
posted by Existential Dread at 8:02 PM on September 8, 2016 [10 favorites]
I think that many/most people use Facebook as though it were a common carrier, and for that reason it should be regulated like one.
But I also know that such regulation is a fantasy so I've managed to get some of my family members into a private slack and I keep up with them that way, and everyone seems to like it much more. Personally, for the last several months I've been viewing Facebook with the newsfeed blocked and never posting, I just check in periodically for messages (because some people will talk to me no other way), and for a couple groups. I haven't missed it yet.
On preview:
Facebook is damaging communication instead of fostering it by foisting a narrow corporatized editorial window on what is and is not acceptable.
This and and their social experiments with people's newsfeeds are what drove me away.
posted by antinomia at 8:09 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
But I also know that such regulation is a fantasy so I've managed to get some of my family members into a private slack and I keep up with them that way, and everyone seems to like it much more. Personally, for the last several months I've been viewing Facebook with the newsfeed blocked and never posting, I just check in periodically for messages (because some people will talk to me no other way), and for a couple groups. I haven't missed it yet.
On preview:
Facebook is damaging communication instead of fostering it by foisting a narrow corporatized editorial window on what is and is not acceptable.
This and and their social experiments with people's newsfeeds are what drove me away.
posted by antinomia at 8:09 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
I'd stress out more about Facebook, except i basically expect it to go the way of all social networks in a few years.
posted by signal at 8:10 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
posted by signal at 8:10 PM on September 8, 2016 [5 favorites]
On the one hand, Facebook is now a life requirement, like Internet, cellphones, and air. We are stuck with it forever unless a huge number of people drop it, which they won't because of see above.
Facebook is not a life requirement. Is it actually necessary to clarify that? Have you all gone mad?
posted by adept256 at 8:18 PM on September 8, 2016 [16 favorites]
Facebook is not a life requirement. Is it actually necessary to clarify that? Have you all gone mad?
posted by adept256 at 8:18 PM on September 8, 2016 [16 favorites]
I feel I am obliged to make a comment about how I don't have a Facebook account.
posted by Pong74LS at 9:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
posted by Pong74LS at 9:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
At Wikipedia, I got to remember there is an internet that is not about profit. A signifcant percentage of the staff is specifically dediated to improving access to the tool, to making it work in developing countries and for women and people of color in the US. It's a utopian piece of technology that still believes everyone should have access to sharing and learning new information.
People here should realize of course, that even more than Facebook, Wikipedia is a candidate for nationalization? It's ubiquity and importance as a research tool makes it far more important to be nationalized than some social media app.
So let's propose an international agency to run Wikipedia, formed by the the big players in the datasphere: The United States, China, the EU, and Russia. With government appointed administrators reviewing every edit, they can make sure the information is accurate and appropriate.
The neat thing is, all the arguments in this thread in favor of nationalizing Facebook, apply to Wikipedia. Check it out:
I mean, sure, Wikipedia may not be legally obligated to exercise its editorial control in any particular way, but that doesn't mean it's free from ethical obligations. I happen to believe that all people and organizations have responsibilities, including for-profit companies, and that the profit motive does not abrogate Facebook's responsibility to society.
There, you see?
I wonder what other internet entities we'll have to put under government control? Google of course, so much influence is too dangerous to keep in private hands, right? And also of course LiveJournal, Wordpress, Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr...all should be placed safely under government control. And above all, we'll need to put in restrictions to make sure someone doesn't come up with a new Google or Facebook. Sounds good?
posted by happyroach at 9:28 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
People here should realize of course, that even more than Facebook, Wikipedia is a candidate for nationalization? It's ubiquity and importance as a research tool makes it far more important to be nationalized than some social media app.
So let's propose an international agency to run Wikipedia, formed by the the big players in the datasphere: The United States, China, the EU, and Russia. With government appointed administrators reviewing every edit, they can make sure the information is accurate and appropriate.
The neat thing is, all the arguments in this thread in favor of nationalizing Facebook, apply to Wikipedia. Check it out:
I mean, sure, Wikipedia may not be legally obligated to exercise its editorial control in any particular way, but that doesn't mean it's free from ethical obligations. I happen to believe that all people and organizations have responsibilities, including for-profit companies, and that the profit motive does not abrogate Facebook's responsibility to society.
There, you see?
I wonder what other internet entities we'll have to put under government control? Google of course, so much influence is too dangerous to keep in private hands, right? And also of course LiveJournal, Wordpress, Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr...all should be placed safely under government control. And above all, we'll need to put in restrictions to make sure someone doesn't come up with a new Google or Facebook. Sounds good?
posted by happyroach at 9:28 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
Yeah overregulation is a thing that happens sometimes
posted by LogicalDash at 10:09 PM on September 8, 2016
posted by LogicalDash at 10:09 PM on September 8, 2016
What I find fascinating is how Facebook seems to have given such a limited amount of thought to these topics, while they have the largest personalization platform. Arguably, instead of deciding that it will not allow for naked bodies, it could only show them to those people it knows will not be offended by them*. It's already doing that on other topics, by prioritizing certain content in your feed based on your perceived interests and strength of network.
It seems to me that they're very good at recognizing that people and communities are different and have different tolerance to certain kind of content, but when it comes to nakedness, they make a very arbitrary decision, centered around their own, internal belief of what is good or bad.
* I'm not advocating for Facebook to do so - just noting how centered their choices in when to do targeting and personalization and when not to do them seem to be
posted by motdiem2 at 10:14 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
It seems to me that they're very good at recognizing that people and communities are different and have different tolerance to certain kind of content, but when it comes to nakedness, they make a very arbitrary decision, centered around their own, internal belief of what is good or bad.
* I'm not advocating for Facebook to do so - just noting how centered their choices in when to do targeting and personalization and when not to do them seem to be
posted by motdiem2 at 10:14 PM on September 8, 2016 [6 favorites]
Sorry, BentFranklin, you are not correct. When I was in college 40 years ago, my father went into business for himself and incorporated, with himself and his immediate family as the only officers (I was a Vice President!). The reason to do so was specifically to limit his (and our) personal liability, separating our personal assets from the corporate assets (which there weren't much of). The business failed, filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, but we kept all our family assets. That's what Incorporation does; it creates an "artificial person" and puts a nice firewall between it and the 'officers and directors'. That's how Donald Trump's companies "went bankrupt" four times and he emerged with more money himself every time (as an 'employee' he paid himself first, a very common practice). Corporations of all sizes have been known to "perform all manner of depraved actions" and getting to the people responsible is usually impossible. Especially in publicly held corporations which have shares sold on stock markets, the officers and directors can only lose the portion of the stock they own; the other people who bought stock suffer the rest of the loss. And when there is enough stock with enough value spread around enough people, (plus all the employees, suppliers and contractors whose livelihood depends on the continued operation of the company) that's when a corporation becomes "too big to fail". The public stock prices can vary widely from the actual value of assets and liabilities of the corporation. And you can only get real personal risk if you go into personal debt using your stock at a current value as collateral. Nice deal if you can get it.
posted by oneswellfoop at 11:19 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by oneswellfoop at 11:19 PM on September 8, 2016 [3 favorites]
or you could just pass privacy laws that would put Facebook and Google into receivership.
posted by ennui.bz at 11:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by ennui.bz at 11:21 PM on September 8, 2016 [4 favorites]
Certain privacy laws could theoretically destroy the ability of companies like Facebook and Google and Twitter to make money through 'targeted advertising' but they wouldn't eliminate all income (there are always advertisers that just want to sell to everybody and others who'd reluctantly keep doing some advertising without the targeting), and any such laws would be challenged by a literal army of lawyers from all the affected companies. Even if Facebook shrunk considerably, they could continue to exercise their First Amendment rights to deny their users' First Amendment rights. It's their walled garden; if you don't like it, find someplace else on the Internet to socialize. Which I, for one, already do... I have no presence on Facebook or Twitter, and limit my Google activities to using a gmail account for very unimportant email.
posted by oneswellfoop at 11:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by oneswellfoop at 11:38 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
I don't think anyone at Facebook is especially prudish, motdiem2, but they get a lot of grief from those who are, and they choose the path of least resistance. That being said, your solution sounds very doable (and obvious, now that you've stated it so clearly).
posted by Harald74 at 11:50 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Harald74 at 11:50 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
or you could just pass privacy laws that would put Facebook and Google into receivership.
OK, great. Now a company with international scope is the property of the US government. What say does the rest of the world have in this? If Facebook publishes something illegal in China, isn't that now a diplomatic incident? How would the EU and other governments react to a major internet information provider becoming a US propaganda tool?
And with Google and Facebook property of the US Government it would be trivial for Congress to demand decency standards of their own, or to require that foreign nationals using the service get vetted by Homeland security and pay a tariff. Imagine Ted Cruz with power over Facebook and Google.
I mean seriously, do people proposing these ideas ever actually think about consequences?
posted by happyroach at 11:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
OK, great. Now a company with international scope is the property of the US government. What say does the rest of the world have in this? If Facebook publishes something illegal in China, isn't that now a diplomatic incident? How would the EU and other governments react to a major internet information provider becoming a US propaganda tool?
And with Google and Facebook property of the US Government it would be trivial for Congress to demand decency standards of their own, or to require that foreign nationals using the service get vetted by Homeland security and pay a tariff. Imagine Ted Cruz with power over Facebook and Google.
I mean seriously, do people proposing these ideas ever actually think about consequences?
posted by happyroach at 11:52 PM on September 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
We are accelerating - culture and technology is shifting and reshaping so quickly now that the whole argument seems mute to me. In the long run Facebook will be farts in the wind, the tiniest little blip not just in human affairs but our own lives. 10, 15 years from not we will be doing things completely differently and Mark Zuckerberg will not have much to do with it.
I am in China now, no Facebook except via VPN. Don't really miss it at all. Now all my biz is through Wechat. Tomorrow something else, whatevs.
posted by Meatbomb at 11:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
I am in China now, no Facebook except via VPN. Don't really miss it at all. Now all my biz is through Wechat. Tomorrow something else, whatevs.
posted by Meatbomb at 11:59 PM on September 8, 2016 [2 favorites]
moot
posted by Meatbomb at 12:05 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by Meatbomb at 12:05 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
Where'd you get the crystal ball from, Meatbomb? Because I recall people saying similar things 8-10 years ago, yet here we are! Definitely wasn't anyone (outside of Facebook's corporate structure) predicting the ubiquity it has come to enjoy in much of the world.
posted by Dysk at 2:03 AM on September 9, 2016
posted by Dysk at 2:03 AM on September 9, 2016
Mr.Encyclopedia, reminder: the first amendment to the US Constitution has no legal standing in Norway, which is outside the United States.
I repeat: Norway is not part of the United States. There is an irritating tendency on the part of many Americans to assume that the US Constitution is the wellspring of all laws. It ain't.
Facebook is global, has been for most of its existence. It has to abide by local standards in each territory. Trying to enforce US norms on FB in Norway, or—equally valid—Iranian norms on FB in France, is a non-starter.
(This is also why calls to regulate FB are doomed. Who's going to do the regulating, and in accordance with what legal code?)
posted by cstross at 2:30 AM on September 9, 2016 [19 favorites]
I repeat: Norway is not part of the United States. There is an irritating tendency on the part of many Americans to assume that the US Constitution is the wellspring of all laws. It ain't.
Facebook is global, has been for most of its existence. It has to abide by local standards in each territory. Trying to enforce US norms on FB in Norway, or—equally valid—Iranian norms on FB in France, is a non-starter.
(This is also why calls to regulate FB are doomed. Who's going to do the regulating, and in accordance with what legal code?)
posted by cstross at 2:30 AM on September 9, 2016 [19 favorites]
Maybe a more realistic strategy than government intervention is to develop a standard shareable format for social media content so that you can generate it in one app/program but read it in another, so we can share content without having to all use the same place. That might enable real competition; if it became popular Facebook would have to accomodate it and thereby lose the effective monopoly that is the real problem.
I'm probably talking nonsense; please note also I said 'more realistic'. Not 'realistic'.
posted by Segundus at 3:27 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
I'm probably talking nonsense; please note also I said 'more realistic'. Not 'realistic'.
posted by Segundus at 3:27 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
As a frequently traveling while brown person I felt compelled to reopen a basic FB a/c after years of absence away from it purely from increasing attitude of "No FB presence implies suspicous behaviour"
is this default setting still one of a private service which can do whatever it likes?
Is this the control over our lives today?
posted by infini at 5:14 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
is this default setting still one of a private service which can do whatever it likes?
Is this the control over our lives today?
posted by infini at 5:14 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
It seems like over the past few decades the logic of capitalism has been applied more and more widely, to the point where it’s so universal that we hardly even notice it. It doesn’t even seem strange anymore when a conversation about, say, education, is entirely framed in terms of consumer choice and economic opportunity. But it still creeps me out when I see people talk as though maximising shareholder value was self-evidently the only thing we could ever expect a company to do. And the idea that a company might have some responsibility to its workers, or customers, or the environment, or broader society, is treated like some kind of soft-headed children’s story.
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 5:15 AM on September 9, 2016 [13 favorites]
posted by Bloxworth Snout at 5:15 AM on September 9, 2016 [13 favorites]
Y'all know Facebook has funded an initiative to bring free Internet to The Indian and African continents that is has the added benefit of driving up Facebook's slowing growth numbers, right? It's a little more than just a stupid app on your phone where people argue incessantly with each other.
Facebook is vertically integrating the Internet into an engagement-driven ad platform and we're arguing about free speech.
We're losing our internet people, it's being incorporated, consolidated and vertically integrated.
As that happens you will lose the most important public utility the Internet brings: democratization of access to information.
Google gives me free internet here in Austin and thank god they aren't trying to tie me into the Google platform and route me into a limited set of services that promote Google+ adoption.
On the flip side, I would love to see someone other than Facebook even trying to light up the African continent with ubiquitous "free internet" but that ain't happenin.
So in my opinion, the parts of Facebook that are trying to vertically integrate the Internet need to brought under a multinational non profit oversight board that includes representation from ARIN, ICANN, The Internet Society and the IEEE to audit, report and provide guidance to that effort.
I have checked my Facebook since June. And when I did it was over a fiber connection paid for by Google. That kinda freaks me out just a tad to be honest, and that is why we need to take a different view of these companies, IMO because Facebook, on the Indian and African continents, is literally tying to be a part of the public infrastructure there. That's meaningful.
posted by Annika Cicada at 5:41 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
Facebook is vertically integrating the Internet into an engagement-driven ad platform and we're arguing about free speech.
We're losing our internet people, it's being incorporated, consolidated and vertically integrated.
As that happens you will lose the most important public utility the Internet brings: democratization of access to information.
Google gives me free internet here in Austin and thank god they aren't trying to tie me into the Google platform and route me into a limited set of services that promote Google+ adoption.
On the flip side, I would love to see someone other than Facebook even trying to light up the African continent with ubiquitous "free internet" but that ain't happenin.
So in my opinion, the parts of Facebook that are trying to vertically integrate the Internet need to brought under a multinational non profit oversight board that includes representation from ARIN, ICANN, The Internet Society and the IEEE to audit, report and provide guidance to that effort.
I have checked my Facebook since June. And when I did it was over a fiber connection paid for by Google. That kinda freaks me out just a tad to be honest, and that is why we need to take a different view of these companies, IMO because Facebook, on the Indian and African continents, is literally tying to be a part of the public infrastructure there. That's meaningful.
posted by Annika Cicada at 5:41 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
(The board IMO should include the global entirely of IANA, using ARIN was USAist of me. Apologies)
posted by Annika Cicada at 5:45 AM on September 9, 2016
posted by Annika Cicada at 5:45 AM on September 9, 2016
I see from the Guardian that Facebook deletes Norway PM's post ...
after the Norwegian Prime Minister posted the photo.
posted by Azara at 5:45 AM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
after the Norwegian Prime Minister posted the photo.
posted by Azara at 5:45 AM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
I've watched the Internet slowly drift away from its distributed underpinnings. Usenet was replaced with website forums, website forums replaced with Reddit and Facebook. It seems almost everyone other than happyroach thinks the only answer is to ask Facebook nicely to be less of an ad-fueled content mill or otherwise turn it into the Department of Homeland Socialization. Yes, there are people that judge you if you're so weird as to not have Facebook or Snapchat or whatever the latest fad is but that's a social problem. The one good thing this article does is point out Facebook's actions don't fit its lofty ideals, but only insofar as to spread the knowledge that as a platform for speech Facebook is deeply troubled.
Facebook's efforts to spread itself into the parts of the world with the least Internet penetration is troubling, not inspiring. The more deeply embedded people are in Facebook's ecosystem the more thoroughly they can control what is news. Is Facebook really so ubiquitous that people can't imagine life without it any more? I promise you none of the things Facebook replaced are gone, and I'm sorry if there are people that refuse to interact with you outside Facebook but maybe that's their problem not yours? I'm willing to bet these people still know how to use a telephone so maybe that's an option. Like I said before there's lots of people in my Facebook feed I'd no longer interact with without Facebook but those interactions are invariably low-quality so I'd miss nothing without it.
And lastly yes, I understand that the First Amendment doesn't apply in Norway, but Facebook is an American country so it's a good starting point. Anyway, Article 100 of the Norwegian constitution guarantees the same basic rights as the First Amendment so my argument still stands.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 7:05 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
Facebook's efforts to spread itself into the parts of the world with the least Internet penetration is troubling, not inspiring. The more deeply embedded people are in Facebook's ecosystem the more thoroughly they can control what is news. Is Facebook really so ubiquitous that people can't imagine life without it any more? I promise you none of the things Facebook replaced are gone, and I'm sorry if there are people that refuse to interact with you outside Facebook but maybe that's their problem not yours? I'm willing to bet these people still know how to use a telephone so maybe that's an option. Like I said before there's lots of people in my Facebook feed I'd no longer interact with without Facebook but those interactions are invariably low-quality so I'd miss nothing without it.
And lastly yes, I understand that the First Amendment doesn't apply in Norway, but Facebook is an American country so it's a good starting point. Anyway, Article 100 of the Norwegian constitution guarantees the same basic rights as the First Amendment so my argument still stands.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 7:05 AM on September 9, 2016 [4 favorites]
"Except to disengage from Facebook increasingly means to disengage from a large portion of your potential audience, and as I have learned as an individual, from your friends and family, especially if you are geographically removed from where most of them live. "
[...]
On the one hand, Facebook is now a life requirement, like Internet, cellphones, and air. We are stuck with it forever unless a huge number of people drop it, which they won't because of see above.
An additional reason people won't drop it is that so many have jumped on the opportunity to use it to sell things. Whether it's an Etsy shop or never-ending garage sale stuff or the latest pyramid scheme, there are so many people who mix personal posts with ads. The sobering thing is that Facebook seems to be weighting those posts – I unfollowed an old school friend who had started using personal posts about her elementary school daughter to advertise her pyramid scheme stuff (omg ugh), and yet... every once in a while FB will say "hey remember her!" and show yet another personal-that's-an-ad. FB does NOT remind me of other friends I've unfollowed for reasons other than selling stuff. And boy, the few friends who create and sell stuff that I do still follow? Sure enough it's their posts advertising new products that are at the top. (They make neat stuff, but yeah.) It's started to get to where I have to go look at friends' pages specifically to see what they post, and this is in spite of having all the latest shiny settings for who I want to see.
It's really depressing, because I live overseas and most of my good friends use FB sporadically, nothing else. That's just how they roll. They don't want to blog, they feel uncomfortable with email threads, so FB has been a good medium. Except now we can barely see each other on it any more. I've started blogging again, though need to post more often, in large part because people still interact there or will shoot an email after seeing a new post. Which is pretty great after 22 years online. I keep hoping for a renewal of interest in blogs; everything's there to make it happen. Domain names and hosting are relatively cheap, blog software is top-notch nowadays, it hardly takes any longer than posting to FB. Plus then you own it and more or less get to do what you want with it. One of my schadenfreude blogger joys is getting requests from companies who want me to delete apparently-good-faith comments left by previous SEO types because now it's hurting their Google position, and saying "Nope." Extra spice on the schadenfreude when they write back going "omgomgomg u don't undrestaaanad its hurting our teh googlez" and I'm like, "oh yes I do. That's why it's nope."
Anyway, yeah. MetaFilter and a few international news sites are where I get my news. I almost never click on anything FB (except George Takei's but often enough I'll go looking for the source behind his links too). FB news is so skewed it's laughable. Remains to be seen whether a tipping point will be reached where people will start seeing it less as a site to communicate and more as one to passively consume with actual communication happening elsewhere – there are definitely signs of the latter happening. A lot of my friends are quietly turning to Instagram, and text messages what with prices dropping.
posted by fraula at 7:15 AM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
[...]
On the one hand, Facebook is now a life requirement, like Internet, cellphones, and air. We are stuck with it forever unless a huge number of people drop it, which they won't because of see above.
An additional reason people won't drop it is that so many have jumped on the opportunity to use it to sell things. Whether it's an Etsy shop or never-ending garage sale stuff or the latest pyramid scheme, there are so many people who mix personal posts with ads. The sobering thing is that Facebook seems to be weighting those posts – I unfollowed an old school friend who had started using personal posts about her elementary school daughter to advertise her pyramid scheme stuff (omg ugh), and yet... every once in a while FB will say "hey remember her!" and show yet another personal-that's-an-ad. FB does NOT remind me of other friends I've unfollowed for reasons other than selling stuff. And boy, the few friends who create and sell stuff that I do still follow? Sure enough it's their posts advertising new products that are at the top. (They make neat stuff, but yeah.) It's started to get to where I have to go look at friends' pages specifically to see what they post, and this is in spite of having all the latest shiny settings for who I want to see.
It's really depressing, because I live overseas and most of my good friends use FB sporadically, nothing else. That's just how they roll. They don't want to blog, they feel uncomfortable with email threads, so FB has been a good medium. Except now we can barely see each other on it any more. I've started blogging again, though need to post more often, in large part because people still interact there or will shoot an email after seeing a new post. Which is pretty great after 22 years online. I keep hoping for a renewal of interest in blogs; everything's there to make it happen. Domain names and hosting are relatively cheap, blog software is top-notch nowadays, it hardly takes any longer than posting to FB. Plus then you own it and more or less get to do what you want with it. One of my schadenfreude blogger joys is getting requests from companies who want me to delete apparently-good-faith comments left by previous SEO types because now it's hurting their Google position, and saying "Nope." Extra spice on the schadenfreude when they write back going "omgomgomg u don't undrestaaanad its hurting our teh googlez" and I'm like, "oh yes I do. That's why it's nope."
Anyway, yeah. MetaFilter and a few international news sites are where I get my news. I almost never click on anything FB (except George Takei's but often enough I'll go looking for the source behind his links too). FB news is so skewed it's laughable. Remains to be seen whether a tipping point will be reached where people will start seeing it less as a site to communicate and more as one to passively consume with actual communication happening elsewhere – there are definitely signs of the latter happening. A lot of my friends are quietly turning to Instagram, and text messages what with prices dropping.
posted by fraula at 7:15 AM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
> Facebook is not a life requirement. Is it actually necessary to clarify that? Have you all gone mad?
I refer you to ernielundquist's comment:
> I've heard too many anecdotes about companies requiring applicants to link to their Facebook pages, and refusing to consider those who don't, to believe that it's not necessary for many people.
But hey, people can just do without jobs, amirite?
posted by languagehat at 7:49 AM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
I refer you to ernielundquist's comment:
> I've heard too many anecdotes about companies requiring applicants to link to their Facebook pages, and refusing to consider those who don't, to believe that it's not necessary for many people.
But hey, people can just do without jobs, amirite?
posted by languagehat at 7:49 AM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
Annika the previous thread on FB's freebies in India will offer some insights on how that turned out. And hte African story is available here . Apparently, using FreeB is a signal that you're too poor to afford data so there's an interesting pushback happening.
Zambia was the first African country where Facebook launched its free app in mid-2014. During my recent fieldwork with mobile internet users, Free Basics was not frequently cited as a platform that Zambians were enthusiastically embracing. Some users indicated that the app had a stigmatising effect, with its use indicating to friends that ‘you are broke’ and have no resources to purchase data. Others argued that the app did not allow much interaction as with the absence of photos, one was never quite sure what photo or video was being commented on. This supports the conclusions of a survey recently carried out by the Alliance for Affordable Internet in eight countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America, which found that less than four per cent of respondents were using zero-rated data services such as Free Basics.
Meanwhile, back in Angola.
posted by infini at 7:50 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
Zambia was the first African country where Facebook launched its free app in mid-2014. During my recent fieldwork with mobile internet users, Free Basics was not frequently cited as a platform that Zambians were enthusiastically embracing. Some users indicated that the app had a stigmatising effect, with its use indicating to friends that ‘you are broke’ and have no resources to purchase data. Others argued that the app did not allow much interaction as with the absence of photos, one was never quite sure what photo or video was being commented on. This supports the conclusions of a survey recently carried out by the Alliance for Affordable Internet in eight countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America, which found that less than four per cent of respondents were using zero-rated data services such as Free Basics.
Meanwhile, back in Angola.
posted by infini at 7:50 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
Anyone here have the time to make me a pony?
An app that uses my Facebook account to retrieve and show me ONLY private messages from a susbset of my 'friends', event invitations from the same people, and nothing else.
posted by Doroteo Arango II at 8:48 AM on September 9, 2016
An app that uses my Facebook account to retrieve and show me ONLY private messages from a susbset of my 'friends', event invitations from the same people, and nothing else.
posted by Doroteo Arango II at 8:48 AM on September 9, 2016
Facebook's editorial algorithm, now unencumbered by humans, trended an article about a 9/11 conspiracy theory this morning.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:57 AM on September 9, 2016
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:57 AM on September 9, 2016
I am in work and I have been in quite a number of different jobs over the past 2-3 years and have never even been asked for my social media information, let alone screened using it. Which is a good thing too, because I don't have any.
Why, it's almost as if different fields of work have different norms!
posted by Dysk at 9:16 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
Why, it's almost as if different fields of work have different norms!
posted by Dysk at 9:16 AM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
I have a facebook account. I kept it very simple, just that initial wall. To keep most from finding me without a bit of work, I used a different birthday, 27 years younger than my real birthday, not my birthday but rather a date that's real important to me.
My greeting on that wall is something like this: "Hi! I don't like this facebook thing at all, I keep up with friends by email. My email address is xxx@xxx.com. If you'd like to connect with me, hey, shoot me an email."
I'm real clear that I don't want friends or walls or whatever on facebook, to send me an email to hear from me, that I'd love to hear from them. (A straight-up lie, that last bit is.)
Over 65 ppl have asked me to 'friend' them or 'connect' them or whatever it is.
Not one of them sent an email.
Fuck. Off.
~~~~~
I've seen grown ppl act like seventh graders when some facebook thing doesn't go their way, when someone unfriends them or however that works. I've seen grown-ass ppl be obsessed with how many friends they have on facebook. I've seen grown-ass ppl stage their life so that it looks good from outside, pictures of them smiling and waving on their latest trip to walmart, or their latest trip to the john. It's ludicrous. It's ridiculous. Comical.
~~~~~
I've got musician and artist friends who also loathe facebook but they've *got* to have it. It's just a fact of their lives. If I were in some public-facing gig like they are I know I'd have to change my tune; if you're public you've pretty much got to have a presence there.
~~~~~
The fact is that I don't want to hear from some fool I was in third grade with or whatever. The ppl that I want in my life, they are in my life. I don't need nor want anyone else chasing me down.
Now, get off of my lawn.....
posted by dancestoblue at 11:02 AM on September 9, 2016 [7 favorites]
My greeting on that wall is something like this: "Hi! I don't like this facebook thing at all, I keep up with friends by email. My email address is xxx@xxx.com. If you'd like to connect with me, hey, shoot me an email."
I'm real clear that I don't want friends or walls or whatever on facebook, to send me an email to hear from me, that I'd love to hear from them. (A straight-up lie, that last bit is.)
Over 65 ppl have asked me to 'friend' them or 'connect' them or whatever it is.
Not one of them sent an email.
Fuck. Off.
~~~~~
I've seen grown ppl act like seventh graders when some facebook thing doesn't go their way, when someone unfriends them or however that works. I've seen grown-ass ppl be obsessed with how many friends they have on facebook. I've seen grown-ass ppl stage their life so that it looks good from outside, pictures of them smiling and waving on their latest trip to walmart, or their latest trip to the john. It's ludicrous. It's ridiculous. Comical.
~~~~~
I've got musician and artist friends who also loathe facebook but they've *got* to have it. It's just a fact of their lives. If I were in some public-facing gig like they are I know I'd have to change my tune; if you're public you've pretty much got to have a presence there.
~~~~~
The fact is that I don't want to hear from some fool I was in third grade with or whatever. The ppl that I want in my life, they are in my life. I don't need nor want anyone else chasing me down.
Now, get off of my lawn.....
posted by dancestoblue at 11:02 AM on September 9, 2016 [7 favorites]
I've heard too many anecdotes about companies requiring applicants to link to their Facebook pages, and refusing to consider those who don't, to believe that it's not necessary for many people.
I heard about this one guy once...
posted by bongo_x at 11:08 AM on September 9, 2016
I heard about this one guy once...
posted by bongo_x at 11:08 AM on September 9, 2016
I once interviewed for a job and, in the application paperwork, there was a section asking for all of your social media logins, including, of course, Facebook. Not your screen name, mind you. Your login info, including password.
posted by Thorzdad at 12:13 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Thorzdad at 12:13 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
Not your screen name, mind you. Your login info, including password.
posted by Thorzdad at 2:13 PM on September 9
(Standing up) "Thank you for letting me know ahead of time that your organization is a scum hole. Have a nice life!" (Exit.)
posted by dancestoblue at 12:53 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Thorzdad at 2:13 PM on September 9
(Standing up) "Thank you for letting me know ahead of time that your organization is a scum hole. Have a nice life!" (Exit.)
posted by dancestoblue at 12:53 PM on September 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
Well, due to life circumstances, I barely have any social support and family support in my daily life and while it's a thin gruel, the little bit of contact I can maintain with distant friends and family is another reason I'm finding it hard to unplug. Hell, I'm in the middle of one of the worst personal crises in my life and just came to understand the most trusted person in my life has been actively working to damage my reputation and hurt me, and I don't have any really close, intimate friends around on the daily, and no immediate family left. I need some social connection to other people or I'm going to end up one of those random isolated old people they find dead and eaten by black slime mold. I'm only barely exaggerating how bleak my circumstances feel right now. Without Facebook, I would be almost completely isolated, and I seem to be sort of weirdly algorithmically isolated on FB, too. It *only* seems to want to connect me with my old friends and acquaintances from high school or people with more conservative politics than mine now.
I don't know. Goddamn it.
posted by saulgoodman at 1:18 PM on September 9, 2016 [6 favorites]
I don't know. Goddamn it.
posted by saulgoodman at 1:18 PM on September 9, 2016 [6 favorites]
Facebook restores censored nude ‘napalm girl’ photo due to “historical importance”
"gets" "an" "education" in "history"
posted by infini at 1:56 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
"gets" "an" "education" in "history"
posted by infini at 1:56 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
Translation: If this was a current war photo it would still be censored.
posted by Mitheral at 2:49 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by Mitheral at 2:49 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
But hey, people can just do without jobs, amirite?
A job with a company like that inevitably becomes worse than no job at all. You didn't really want to work atECorp Trump Corporation, did you?
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:57 PM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
A job with a company like that inevitably becomes worse than no job at all. You didn't really want to work at
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:57 PM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
Maybe a more realistic strategy than government intervention is to develop a standard shareable format for social media content so that you can generate it in one app/program but read it in another, so we can share content without having to all use the same place.It's already underway! The biggest efforts I know about are happening under the umbrella of the Social WG of W3C. The super abridged history from where I sit is:
- There was Twitter.
- There was identi.ca, which was basically free software Twitter. It had some federation features, but they were rough and ad hoc.
- identi.ca begat pump.io (from the same original developer, Evan Prodromou), which was roughly intended to be "identi.ca v2" in two ways: it "does most of what people really want from a social network" (not just Twitter-style microblogging), and it aimed to get federation right.
- The Social WG started to standardize the efforts started by pump.io.
There's other free software in this space. GNU MediaGoblin aims to provide decentralized media sharing. (I contributed a few patches a while back.)
It seems almost everyone other than happyroach thinks the only answer is to ask Facebook nicely to be less of an ad-fueled content mill or otherwise turn it into the Department of Homeland Socialization.I think I'm also in the group you're talking about, and I don't see it as an either-or thing. We can tackle the problem from both ends. They might even complement each other nicely: if it looked like there were fewer business opportunities to control the world's socialization, that could help spur development of decentralized software for all of us.
posted by brett at 5:00 PM on September 9, 2016 [2 favorites]
bongo_x: That's not just something I overheard once. It's pretty well documented that employers are regularly asking for Facebook info from applicants, to the point that many states have had laws proposed limiting employers' right to demand access to employees' social media accounts.
And speculation about people who don't use Facebook got bad enough that Psychology Today addressed some of the speculation. (I'm not going to link to those stories, but there are a couple in that article.)
Whether it's affected you personally or not, it's pretty clear that it happens, and that Facebook has gone beyond being a totally optional thing for many people.
posted by ernielundquist at 5:07 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
And speculation about people who don't use Facebook got bad enough that Psychology Today addressed some of the speculation. (I'm not going to link to those stories, but there are a couple in that article.)
Whether it's affected you personally or not, it's pretty clear that it happens, and that Facebook has gone beyond being a totally optional thing for many people.
posted by ernielundquist at 5:07 PM on September 9, 2016 [3 favorites]
Okay, here's why I said what I did, as cited in this thread:
* employers forcing people to have accounts AND TURN OVER THEIR PASSWORDS, FOR GOD'S SAKE
* having problems job hunting because employers check your Facebook and object if you don't have one
* If you are self-employed and run your own business, you have to have one because otherwise people won't patronize you
* friends and family who refuse to talk with you in any other way, such as phones, texting, or e-mail
* businesses and events who will only post information on their Facebook page that you can only see when logged into Facebook
* Juries want your Facebook now?! (Okay, I did jury duty a few months ago and this didn't happen to me, thank god.) I bet John Grisham is all over this.
* "As a frequently traveling while brown person I felt compelled to reopen a basic FB a/c after years of absence away from it purely from increasing attitude of "No FB presence implies suspicous behaviour"
* Nobody's mentioned dating in this thread yet, but I'm sure Facebook stalking and checking is right up there.
Now I admit I'm a hypocrite when I said that because right now as of September 10, 2016, I can still get away with not participating in Facebook. My industry does not give any kind of a shit if I have Facebook and does not check to see if I do even when I job hunt within it. My work does not care. My work actually disabled the social media accounts for it because our target audience has zero interest in following the boring work we do on social media, so nobody is forcing me to tweet for a living to get clicks or whatever. (If I was still in my former industry, this would probably not be the case.) I'm not running a side business now, though I've off and on considered it. I haven't done a whole lot of job hunting outside my industry because I haven't found jack squat I wanted to apply for, but since I never heard back from the few places I tried, maybe that's why. I don't date. And I'm white, so that suspicious brown person thing hasn't applied. And as long as I'm willing to give up old/potential friendships because I won't do Facebook, well, that's the price I'm paying and I truly don't think those people miss me anyway.
However, I don't think that state of affairs is going to last much longer. If my job forces me to start tweeting and Facebooking for a living, I'd have to. (Hopefully not, but if I ever could get a job in another industry, it would happen.) If I ever get off my ass and decide to do a side business, I'll have to. I have a Facebook page that I got bored with after two days and I haven't logged into in years (you want my password? Beats me what it is) so specifically if someone insists on checking it (see above), it exists. However, it's not exactly current on What's Up With Me So You Can Stalk Me, either. I'd delete it, but...see above. And right now, for a lot of other people, it is mandatory. I do think it is going to be mandatory for everybody very soon. I'll hold out as long as I can, but short of some techapocalypse wiping out the Internet, I'll have to cave. No question. There's too many industries going along with this and forcing the issue and that's only going to get worse. And if it affects your ability to make money and survive...then it's mandatory, in my opinion.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:54 AM on September 10, 2016 [2 favorites]
* employers forcing people to have accounts AND TURN OVER THEIR PASSWORDS, FOR GOD'S SAKE
* having problems job hunting because employers check your Facebook and object if you don't have one
* If you are self-employed and run your own business, you have to have one because otherwise people won't patronize you
* friends and family who refuse to talk with you in any other way, such as phones, texting, or e-mail
* businesses and events who will only post information on their Facebook page that you can only see when logged into Facebook
* Juries want your Facebook now?! (Okay, I did jury duty a few months ago and this didn't happen to me, thank god.) I bet John Grisham is all over this.
* "As a frequently traveling while brown person I felt compelled to reopen a basic FB a/c after years of absence away from it purely from increasing attitude of "No FB presence implies suspicous behaviour"
* Nobody's mentioned dating in this thread yet, but I'm sure Facebook stalking and checking is right up there.
Now I admit I'm a hypocrite when I said that because right now as of September 10, 2016, I can still get away with not participating in Facebook. My industry does not give any kind of a shit if I have Facebook and does not check to see if I do even when I job hunt within it. My work does not care. My work actually disabled the social media accounts for it because our target audience has zero interest in following the boring work we do on social media, so nobody is forcing me to tweet for a living to get clicks or whatever. (If I was still in my former industry, this would probably not be the case.) I'm not running a side business now, though I've off and on considered it. I haven't done a whole lot of job hunting outside my industry because I haven't found jack squat I wanted to apply for, but since I never heard back from the few places I tried, maybe that's why. I don't date. And I'm white, so that suspicious brown person thing hasn't applied. And as long as I'm willing to give up old/potential friendships because I won't do Facebook, well, that's the price I'm paying and I truly don't think those people miss me anyway.
However, I don't think that state of affairs is going to last much longer. If my job forces me to start tweeting and Facebooking for a living, I'd have to. (Hopefully not, but if I ever could get a job in another industry, it would happen.) If I ever get off my ass and decide to do a side business, I'll have to. I have a Facebook page that I got bored with after two days and I haven't logged into in years (you want my password? Beats me what it is) so specifically if someone insists on checking it (see above), it exists. However, it's not exactly current on What's Up With Me So You Can Stalk Me, either. I'd delete it, but...see above. And right now, for a lot of other people, it is mandatory. I do think it is going to be mandatory for everybody very soon. I'll hold out as long as I can, but short of some techapocalypse wiping out the Internet, I'll have to cave. No question. There's too many industries going along with this and forcing the issue and that's only going to get worse. And if it affects your ability to make money and survive...then it's mandatory, in my opinion.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:54 AM on September 10, 2016 [2 favorites]
« Older “Very often I am writing about writing,” he says. | Judge sentencing affected by football results Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
Aha, I have located the flaw in this argument. Facebook is for turning information about people into money for shareholders. Just today my wife got an advertisement on Facebook for clothing designs aimed at people who used to live in one specific state but now live in another specific state. The advertiser bought a list of everyone who fell in this category, and I suspect they do the same for every other combination of states.
Facebook is an unprecedentedly popular service people use, but it's not a free open medium for information and never has been. This is the bed you made for yourselves when you chose to engage with Facebook instead of sticking to media formats you exclusively control.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:17 PM on September 8, 2016 [51 favorites]