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

Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 202 posts

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#81

Post by eeeeeeeeeeeee »

deaps wrote: post #23

You know - my wife and I were talking about Facebook the other day and the role it plays in 'the way society acts' these days. We came to the conclusion that the vast majority of feeds are filled with posts from sites that other like-minded people also have in their feeds. This causes the comments on those posts on your feed to mostly be filled with people whose feelings align with your own. I think that's dangerous,…

I think about this a lot; the inverse might be slightly true in terms of who we should be connecting to, or maybe it's about the frequency of new and diverse connections and how those introductions are done? Even before Facebook I think most people generally kept within their group of like-minded people. It has gotten worse now because we are very much divided physically by where we live, what jobs people hold, where kids go to school, etc.

I used to believe in the original Facebook mission -- connecting the world. I've worked remotely my entire life so I've had the opportunity to work with people all over the world from different cultures and backgrounds. It's given me a great perspective on humanity that I think a lot of people could benefit from, especially the ones that are in small towns (like I was) and don't venture out much beyond their borders in their life. But the internet allowed those connections to take place for me, not Facebook. We don't need Facebook to do any of these things, we just need to embrace the power of the internet.

Facebook brought together a lot of people from very different groups with very different opinions about the world and just slammed them together in an informal way, an awkward way. I have uncles that I find to be abhorrent and I had no interest in connecting to them before Facebook in any way, but Facebook thinks because we have genetic connection, that must mean we want to have a social connection, right? And they push those connections extremely hard.

I hate being "one of those people" but I deactivated my FB account early this month and it will be deleted in early February. I've definitely felt better without it, even though I know I'm missing some things. But if anything, it's encouraged me to be more proactive in reaching out to the people I actually want to keep up-to-date with, either via text message or real life meetings. It has also pushed me to blog more, and I appreciate that it's on a site I control and own, not for Facebook to manipulate and de-prioritize.

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#83

Post by indigochill »

excalibur wrote: post #57
Reedx wrote: post #8

I'd be curious to hear what people think are the top 3, because I feel like Twitter and Instagram are strong contenders. Or if indeed Twitter belongs in the top spot.

1. Government surveillance 2. Misguided government regulation 3. Corporate greed Honorable mention goes to malware.

I have to play a bit of devil's advocate for malware. I see the constant arms race between the red and blue teams as a sort of immunization process for our technical infrastructure. Where there are weaknesses, someone will exploit them. Then someone will shore them up. Over time, I would argue malware (technically, the response to it, but there needs to be some instigating agent) improves the health of our technical infrastructure. Like how forest fires are necessary to the forest ecosystem.

I expect the same will be the case for BGP hijacking. There'll be some high-profile hack (higher profile than the ones that have already happened) and finally people will get the hint and implement secure BGP like when everybody was in a panic over Heartbleed and Spectre.

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#84

Post by gerbilly »

Reedx wrote: post #8

I'd be curious to hear what people think are the top 3, because I feel like Twitter and Instagram are strong contenders. Or if indeed Twitter belongs in the top spot.

- Mandatory javascript.

- Spam and online ads (same thing really)

- Free platforms monetized by analytics.

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#85

Post by Dirlewanger »

skybrian wrote: post #52

DHH's comment is another example of what I call one-bit reasoning: everything is either wonderful or terrible. Facebook's features have had far-reaching effects and it's not that easy to classify them as positive or negative. Getting in touch with people is easier. Thoughtlessly sending things to all your "friends" is probably too easy, but there are also announcements you do want to read.

Twitter is the prime place for hot takes like DHH's. And his making this post is only part making us aware of this issue, and more his further building his own brand as a tech influencer. All about personal incentives. Basically, the whole system's fucked.

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#87

Post by iooi »

packetpirate wrote: post #67
vinceguidry wrote: post #20

Before Facebook, if I lost someone's contact information, and drifted outside of their social circle for a long enough time, chances were I would never ever see or speak to that person again. Before Facebook, if people wanted to organize conversation and cooperation on an information technology platform, the options were to pay $X00-$X000 for a proprietary system, get lucky enough to know about mailing lists, have so…

> Before Facebook, if people wanted to organize conversation and cooperation on an information technology platform, the options were to pay $X00-$X000 for a proprietary system, get lucky enough to know about mailing lists, have someone who knew sysadmin do it basically for free, or have everyone learn how to use something like IRC. Did you just drop off the planet between 1995 - 2005? Poor Myspace... everybody just f…

Your parents were on ICQ? And AIM? They set up a Myspace account?

Facebook is easy to use and accessible everywhere. This is coming from someone that hasn't had a Facebook account since 2009. GP makes great points and the title to this submission is pure clickbait.

Re: Facebook is the worst thing that's ever happened to the internet

#90

Post by rchaud »

fbn79 wrote: post #64
vinceguidry wrote: post #20

Before Facebook, if I lost someone's contact information, and drifted outside of their social circle for a long enough time, chances were I would never ever see or speak to that person again. Before Facebook, if people wanted to organize conversation and cooperation on an information technology platform, the options were to pay $X00-$X000 for a proprietary system, get lucky enough to know about mailing lists, have so…

Facebook innovation was not to connect with friends (many other sites / services was doing it). Facebook innovation was the news feed: all friends news in a single time ordered infinite scrollable page. The value of facebook is how good it is to keep the newsfeed interesting.

Honestly, outside of the tech innovation, FB's biggest "in" was its exclusivity. - First, you HAD to have a Harvard .edu address. For a lot of the general public, Harvard is top of mind when people think 'elite' institution

- Next, they expanded it, but only to other US schools with .edu domains. That's when I joined, around 2005.

- Finally, they opened it up to the general public everywhere, and by that time they were almost a household name globally.

Post reply on HN