It was painful to watch. From Zuck's smug, condescension, to the Senators grappling with how to ask the softest question while still looking tough.
Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
101–110 of 263 posts
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Facebook welcomes regulation in order to suffocate would-be competitors with it Sounds like a libertarian conspiracy theory to me, especially when we still don't know what these hypothetical regulations would look like. For instance if they make it easier to access your data, download and delete it they might somewhat weaken the lock-in effect of Facebook and level the playing field somewhat. Beyond that and even if…
> Sounds like a libertarian conspiracy theory to me, especially when we still don't know what these hypothetical regulations would look like. For instance if they make it easier to access your data, download and delete it they might somewhat weaken the lock-in effect of Facebook and level the playing field somewhat. What is the ask here? A ZIP with all your information? A JSON file with your friendship graph? How wou…
> What is the ask here? A ZIP with all your information? A JSON file with your friendship graph? How would that be readable to most people? I doubt that Facebook's data structures are so portable that they could just be placed into another social network?
Making scraping of your personal data a statutory right, including the building and distributing of tools for it.
No need to force FB to publish anything, just prevent them from blocking anyone who uses a tool to scrape their own data through the regular UI. This should draw the boundaries of responsibility in the right place.
This would allow e.g. a “messaging” bridge which automatically interfaces with the messages part of the site, and bridges it to any tool (or API) you want. At least per user per account. This would force de facto federation without putting a burden on FB.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#103Earlier quoted context omitted.
In theory yes. It would be entertaining. The reality is, he'd be screwed. Nor can we discount FB isn't a favored front of sorts for various "data collection agencies." p.s. I find it (sadly) funny how so many are upset with ZM and FB, but are completely unaware about Snowden, Obama's expansion of the Patriot Act, etc. FB is the obvious scapegoat. It currently has to play the role, even if it hates doing so. But for h…
This is a good explanation of why this hearing was so poorly designed such that nothing could be discovered. I highly doubt it was accidental.
What type of discovery would you like to make? It seems to me that whatever fb has they control and do with as they please and have the money for lobbyists and lawyers to corporate-splain their actions away and pay the occasional fine (cost of doing business). I'm having a hard time understanding why any of what is known is at all a surprise to someone who understands tech.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#104FB is now too big to fail.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
They should have had subject matter experts asking the questions. Instead there were people had no idea what they were talking about, wasting time on shout-outs to their sons/nephews or whomever (I was only able to follow it for a minute). The CEO needed to be under oath so that lying would carry consequences, and they needed someone who could cut through the BS of how some of the answers were worded. We need more pr…
But it would be more important for those engineers would also need to have a solid understanding of the law, which is a highly detailed and nuanced field. I think this isn't an implementable solution. Maybe you get a more-technically-knowledgable version of Ron Wyden who then sits on several subcommittees, but you're not going to get 10% of the Senate to be software engineers. After all, one could just as easily say…
> The flaw in this is that now those advisors' opinions on unrelated matters are subject to scrutiny
Well, that and there's no reason to think that the candidate won't just reach into the lobbyist pool to pick their advisor.
Still, you're absolutely right that having lawmakers that are themselves technical experts is not super important, or likely. They always rely on staff, and that's fine. No one person can know everything about everything.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
> less freedom on the Internet The regulations should be non-technology specific. Simply it should provide rules about customer/user data. Even if I use pigeons. (But not RFC 1149.)
Some regulatory requirements are manageable by a large, established company but not a startup. For instance, requiring human review of user content is going to be tough in a high growth phase.
But that's exactly how it works in many other lines of businesses, e.g. in construction. Many small companies can't provide compliance with the required codes, so they're forced to work their way up the ladder slowly or create joint ventures. Sure, that way you probably can't become a billionaire in a few years, but also bridges fall down less often because of it, so in the end it's not necessarily a bad thing for the society.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that the world you're arguing for is one where I get all my friends to sign a contract before I give them my personal details. Nobody wants that, not even in exchange for whatever Facebook provides. It's a perverse expectation rooted in some kind of idea that all human exchange must be regulated by some contract. And thieves are indeed liable for returning money.
It doesn't have to be a contract, it can just be trust, of the same type that people use to tell friends their personal feelings or whatever. If you know someone's who's a gossip, they might be fun to talk to but you wouldn't tell them you cheated on your wife because you don't trust them in that way.
So in other words no different from my expectations today.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#108I believe writers from the Guardian would sooner hand over control of the United States to the EU rather than try to understand why the US does things differently; but I think this question bears repeating: ethically, what has Facebook done wrong? Understanding the full context of this hearing is vital to your opinion on the matter. I'm nobody with an outsider's perspective, but to me Facebook has made very few error…
Most of the people who use facebook are not technically proficient so they will not have your understanding of what they are giving up when they use FB. This was brought home to me when my sister called in a panic when the FB news broke.
Even for the technically proficient there were issues. For instance, FB changes the privacy policies without notifying anyone. When FB rolled out the friends of friends feature my son was in college. He continually rejected my friend requests saying "we have something better than friendship." Then one day I could see his entire feed. I debated if I should let him know - and finally I called him. He immediately disabled the friends of friends feature. In my opinion this was a data breach.
Two things were the final straw for me. The first was that friends behavior was releasing my data when my friends acted irresponsibly. The second was that FB was tracking data offline of FB.
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have NoScript set to blacklist any JS from any Facebook domain. Breaking half the internet by default is worth it to neuter this invasive tracking.
NoScript doesn't stop the tracking. See the noscript tags in the html example of the post you replied to.
Oh, that is dastardly, I didn't see that. I also have every FB domain set to null in my hosts file, but I think it's time to extend that to my internal DNS too!
Re: Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook hearing was a sham
#110I believe writers from the Guardian would sooner hand over control of the United States to the EU rather than try to understand why the US does things differently; but I think this question bears repeating: ethically, what has Facebook done wrong? Understanding the full context of this hearing is vital to your opinion on the matter. I'm nobody with an outsider's perspective, but to me Facebook has made very few error…
I consented to sharing my data with the 3rd party, which was essentially a license for that party to own that data. Imagine you're not a facebook user. When Facebook sucks up your name and phone number and e-mail address out of your buddy's phonebook, along with all the messages and calls between you, have you consented? What about when you get a 'shadow profile' based on tracking buttons and pixels on other websites…
I agree with your argument but you should stop using grandma as an example of a non technical user. I am a grandma.