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WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

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Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#601

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your beliefs are not as important as obligations which you got yourself into. If you want to act on your own accord and don't compromise, then maintain 100% ownership of your company. When you're managing a company that doesn't belong to you completely anymore, you're obliged to act in the best interest of your shareholders.

Yes, within the institutional role, eg as CEO of a company, a person is obliged to make certain decisions. Eg a CEO is obliged to maximize profits for his company, otherwise the shareholders will fire him. So if you’re going to criticize capitalism, you should criticize it as an institution.

> CEO is obliged to maximize profits for his company

This is not even close to true.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harold-meyerson-the-...

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#602

If we use Twitter to announce that people should #deletefacebook, what social network do we use in the event that it becomes necessary to #deletetwitter?

Why but just use Facebook to announce you're nuking your FB account and Twitter to announce the same

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#603

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Obama did was very, very different. The fact that you don't know this (or ignored it) tells a lot about how biased you are. And yes, there should be backlash against conservatives. They just elected a Nazi in Illinois.

> They just elected a Nazi in Illinois. I know nothing about American politics or what's going on in Illinois. But that you jump straight on calling someone you disagree with a "Nazi", while also saying how different what Obama did with no explanation and a lot of insults, does not give me much confidence in what you are saying here. Just letting you know in case you were trying to convince anyone of your viewpoint.

[deleted]

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#604

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not an urban legend, it happened, Andrew Pole was a statistician who worked at Target: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.h... About a year after Pole created his pregnancy-prediction model, a man walked into a Target outside Minneapolis and demanded to see the manager. He was clutching coupons that had been sent to his daughter, and he was angry, according to an employee who participated…

Acxiom (and I assume many others too) infers women's menstrual cycles from retail purchases so they know when it is best to send them certain ads. One week its kittens and flowers, the next it'll be an attractive man, etc. This kind of deep data mining has been going on for decades. You voluntarily give this information up when you make purchases with loyalty cards.

It's called a loyalty card, not a "we'll spy on you to get you to spend more, the discounts aren't for your loyalty but to get you to use the card" card.

This is what so many people on the thread don't seem to get. Most normal people take this stuff at face value. They assume it does what it says on the tin. They apply human decency and an expectation of a normal human, fallible, porous memory to a frightening, insatiable industry that has no decency and an infinitely perfect memory.

Facebook, they assume, lets you connect to your friends. Facebook never say "in return for a free photo sharing and messaging system we will spy on everything you and your friends do, track everything you do on the internet, figure out what makes you tick, your loves, hates, wants, 'secret' desires, tie it all up in a bow and sell it to anyone who'll pay us, with your name, email and phone number attached".

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#605
post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook exploits "bugs" in the human psyche, such as our need to avoid feeling lonely (by sharing intimate details of our life) is far more compelling than any abstract fear of "big brother". That is until big brother is Donald Trump, then suddenly the fear is no longer abstract.

> Facebook exploits "bugs" in the human psyche Small quip: the need for social interaction/emotional support is a human trait not a "bug". A bug would imply that this need is somehow undesirable/irrational, but that's just not correct.

Ah what I meant was that prioritizing loneliness over privacy is a kind of a bug; satisfying a more unconscious need over taking conscious decisions to be smart with your own privacy.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> educational foundation Well, that was the original hope with print, radio and TV. So we mostly get scandal sheets, soap operas and reality TV. "What we learn from history is that we don't learn from history", as some wag put it.

I'd like to hear a proposal for how print, radio or tv could have successfully served such an end. I.e. where enough people watched the content, where the proposal was realistically achievable, and would have been financially viable. Not saying such a thing is impossible but it sure isn't easy.

Hey, don't underestimate it. Protestant Europe got a big literacy boost from the Gutenberg Bible.

And if you dig around the writings around the time that radio and (later) TV got started, you'll see plenty of hopeful plans for universal education.

But after the transient is over, the steady state is kind of underwhelming. People are very resistant to instruction that doesn't suit them, and I really can't blame that.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to hear a proposal for how print, radio or tv could have successfully served such an end. I.e. where enough people watched the content, where the proposal was realistically achievable, and would have been financially viable. Not saying such a thing is impossible but it sure isn't easy.

Hey, don't underestimate it. Protestant Europe got a big literacy boost from the Gutenberg Bible. And if you dig around the writings around the time that radio and (later) TV got started, you'll see plenty of hopeful plans for universal education. But after the transient is over, the steady state is kind of underwhelming. People are very resistant to instruction that doesn't suit them, and I really can't blame that.

> Hey, don't underestimate it. Protestant Europe got a big literacy boost from the Gutenberg Bible.

I was responding to your comment saying "that was the original hope with print, radio and TV. So we mostly get scandal sheets, soap operas and reality TV"!

I'm fully aware there's major benefits that have come from those mediums.

> And if you dig around the writings around the time that radio and (later) TV got started, you'll see plenty of hopeful plans for universal education.

Again, you were the one who said it didn't pan out, and you implied the only reason they didn't was because "What we learn from history is that we don't learn from history", as some wag put it..

My comment was pointing out that the reason has to be more than just that -- thus the challenge to come up with a proposal that could actually work.

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#608
post #585

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

They aren't.

Highly questionable money transfers from the Russians to the Clinton Foundation, but I'm sure there's no foul play :)

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hillary-clinton-uranium-ru...

"The Hill also reported receiving documents and eyewitness testimony “indicating Russian nuclear officials had routed millions of dollars to the U.S. designed to benefit former President Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation during the time Secretary of State Hillary Clinton served on a government body that provided a favorable decision to Moscow,” although no specifics about who those Russian nuclear officials were or how the money was allegedly routed to the Clinton Foundation were given. In any case, none of these revelations prove that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton participated in a quid pro quo agreement to accept payment for approval of the Uranium One deal."

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at Wikileaks and Assange's tweets today. The screenshots are more concrete evidence ( fake or not ) than I've seen related to this CA thing.

If the most concrete evidence you've seen for either accusation is screenshots then you should check out the Channel 4 videos.

Exactly my point

Re: WhatsApp co-founder tells everyone to delete Facebook

#610

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The rest 95% either don't know, or could care less even if they know. I've told my non-techie fam and friends about data harvesting, privacy, and how facebook tracks everything, only to be ignored or outright ridiculed ("Oh you techies are so paranoid"). pretty much exactly my experience with Canadian and American family. People didn't give one iota of a fuck when the Snowden revelations came out because they just…

> People didn't give one iota of a fuck when the Snowden revelations came out because they just assumed that it was the case already. It's more complex than that. The tracking and surveillance are not visible to the average person. Point your camera at someone in a coffee shop or bar and take their picture. They'll be coming over to ask you why you took their photo. The fact that the coffee shop or bar is brimming wi…

Excellent point. I'd also like to add, people are afraid and feel powerless and tend to focus on more productive things such as raising their kids.
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