Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

581–590 of 662 posts

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#581

Post by walterbell »

newyankee wrote: post #576
odammit wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only originally signed up because I was single and dating and girls found it “creepy” I didnt have a Facebook. Peer pressure, man.

You know it is almost impossible to get arranged married in India without a fb profile as average joes think i have something to hide when i do not have an active profile, i have not even deleted it completely yet i am apparently 'suspect' in the eyes of the urban society that overshares

Have the offline social networks (parents & relatives) really ceded screening to online social networks? Or they consider online profile as one of many signals in their offline matching algo?

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#582

Post by tripzilch »

propman wrote: post #26

I don't get what changed? We've knows Facebook tracks everything, we've known Google does the same thing. If you've ever developed anything in messenger even today, it's amazing how much information is given. We know all these sites track everything you do outside of Facebook too. Everyone has been trying to get them to stop, we know it's illegal to build a profile on someone but Facebook gets around that by building…

People didn't want to believe that FB and Google (and the rest) tracking and collecting all that data would really cause harm. Denial (because something is really useful and/or a large part of communication with all your friends+family runs through it) is a strong force.

What changed is that this breach made it harder for people to pretend all that tracking and data harvesting "will probably turn out fine".

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#584

Post by astro_robot »

apotheothesomai wrote: post #63
iliketosleep wrote: post #31

It's quite ironic that this is the man who sold WhatsApp and its enormous userbase to facebook, creating a total lock in to the facebook ecosystem for many who do not even use facebook. He would have known what kind of a company facebook is, so I don't understand the contradiction between selling Whatsapp to them and now caring about these issues. Anyway, I am still glad he's getting behind the #deletefacebook moveme…

Jan's commitment to privacy motivated WhatsApp. Jan and Acton always have believed in it strongly. That said, if your company has 50 people, and FB offers nearly $20B. How exactly do you tell those people that you refused an acquisition that huge, because you personally feel that FB is bad. Could you deprive an engineer who has worked his ass off for 4 years >$100M? Anyway, I was contracting for WhatsApp, when the ac…

I get that it's hard to pass up on the money. Once you take it though it's hard to not look hypocritical. Especially since he gave them a large amount of the data that was abused.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#585

Post by yters »

chasing wrote: post #566
yters wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's bad, but it should be bad uniformly, not just when the president is disliked by the technocrats. Same with the Russian meddling. Both sides of the aisle are in the Russian pockets, but only Trumps' admin gets the focus. If we are going to clean house, we need to clean the whole house.

> Both sides of the aisle are in the Russian pockets, but only Trumps' admin gets the focus. This is 100% bullshit. Trump's apparent relationship with Russia goes lightyears beyond whatever made-up conservative fever-dream about Obama or Clinton is floating around out there.

It cannot be complete bs if the Clintons are selling uranium to Russians.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#586

Post by wnevets »

gadders wrote: post #567
wnevets wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The dailymail, really?

Are you saying the tweets in the article are not genuine or the article is untrue? It would probably be better if you engaged with the content of the story rather than virtue signal.

If a dailymail story about facebook giving data they own to obama is the best you can do, you've only proven my point.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#587

Post by chasing »

yters wrote: post #585
chasing wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Both sides of the aisle are in the Russian pockets, but only Trumps' admin gets the focus. This is 100% bullshit. Trump's apparent relationship with Russia goes lightyears beyond whatever made-up conservative fever-dream about Obama or Clinton is floating around out there.

It cannot be complete bs if the Clintons are selling uranium to Russians.

They aren't.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#588

Post by pretty_dumm_guy »

I quite remember the day when my name appeared on the comments section of a website I visited (through facebook widget I believe). I freaked out. But when I discussed about this with my friends back then almost every one seemed to have a cavalier attitude towards this(meaning they were completely fine with it). I wouldn't be surprised if my friends still have the same attitude.

People are okay with sharing their information online if it provides them convenience. Facebook provides them with the convenience of staying in touch with people. This combined with "I have nothing to hide anyway" & "so what if?" thought processes and monetary benefits on corporate side seems to have led to this huge data bank that is Facebook today.

I am really glad people are talking more about this. Never too late. People need to completely understand their actions online have consequences.d

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#589

Post by aylmao »

dspillett wrote: post #565
aylmao wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It didn't do what _Cambridge Analytica_ is accused of doing, but it did do what a lot of people are freaked out Facebook can do; namely provide third parties with detailed user information. Using this information in 2012 was lauded as a great idea that helped drive Obama to success. _Cambridge Analytica_ did it in a more slezy way that violated Facebook's Terms of Use-- they lied to Facebook in terms of what the data…

> Yet Facebook is not painted as a victim here, They failed to disclose the issue (which they knew about for quite some time) and in fact continued to profit form the relationship with CA. I don't seen a reasonable expectation that they should be considered a victim.

I actually agree with you, this could be handled better by them. I'm personally a little confused by the details and timings though; where did you read about them profiting after they knew about the issue?

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#590

Post by will4274 »

specialist wrote: post #421
will4274 wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Money is not speech What does this even mean? It costs money to put advertisements in mass media. Either you believe everybody should be able to do that, or you believe that only some people should be able to address the public at large.

Why do you assume public political discourse should cost money? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine

The fairness doctrine enforces two sides of view, aligning nicely with two parties. But, most issues don't have two sides. Some have three, four, or five and some have just one side. The fairness doctrine is gone because it wasn't good, not because of some conspiracy around money and speech.
Post reply on HN