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

Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

politico.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 215 posts

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#101

Post by chillacy »

paxys wrote: post #8
pmart123 wrote: post #3

While she views Facebook as too powerful, it is ironic she is happy to provide as revenue to the company.

It's not ironic, this is the entire point she is trying to make. It is impossible to reach a meaningful chunk of the public today without going through Facebook, and they have the ability to filter content as they see fit.

Wow she must be getting great ROI because apparently she spent less than $100 according to the ad disclosures. More likely an effort to build a story than her genuinely using fb for political advertising (else wouldn’t she throw more money in? I run ads for my business and 100 bucks gets you a handful of likes)

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#102

Post by liability »

dgudkov wrote: post #92
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook has no monopoly on internet advertisement They do on local political ads. Google searches are no longer effective for targeting those not already political involved. The local papers have been run out of business. Direct mail is expensive and unreliable. Pretty much all roads in this arena lead to Facebook, which makes its willingness to censor opinions unfavourable to it disturbing. There are strong reaso…

I strongly disagree. Political advertisement successfully worked long before internet existed yet alone Facebook. Voters still live in houses, walk on streets, drive cars on roads, use public transit, watch TV/Netflix/YT/whatever. There are still many ways to reach them. Even if other channels are more expensive it doesn't make Facebook a monopolist.

People no longer receive daily, or even weekly, deliveries of newspapers. They no longer crowd around the living room radio, and increasingly avoid the television, which increasingly has neither a cable connection nor rabbit ears.

Like it or not, the world has changed.

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#103

Post by crowdpleaser »

potatofarmer45 wrote: post #87

This is smart politics. Rather than simply telling people FB is a monopoly, she runs a limited experiment that had it been left alone, would have limited effect since the budget was so small ($100). Now this puts FB in a bind. If they really are a middleman for content, then these ads don't violate any laws and shouldn't be blocked. However, FB as a company with a product should block it just like coffee shop wouldn'…

Does Facebook claim to be a content-agnostic middleman? I know we accuse them of it, but they pulled some GOP / Trump ads for being sensational, that hardly sounds like a dispassionate middleman.

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#104

Post by ryandrake »

justboxing wrote: post #19

Serious question(s), not trolling. Why shouldn't Facebook take down the ad that's calling for a break up of their Company? How is this any different from a person walking into a store and asking to place an ad inside the store calling for breakup or shutting down of said store? What store owner would ever allow such a thing? Why would (or should) any business allow any sort of propaganda that strikes at the heart of…

Should Comcast let me send/post advertisements for a competing ISP using my Comcast Internet service?

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#105

Post by Pharmakon »

gmueckl wrote: post #71
Pharmakon wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So is that really going to change if Facebook is broken up? Yes. When was the last time you had a call dropped because you were saying unflattering things about your carrier?

When was the last time a user post/private message was deleted by Facebook that wad saying unflattering things about that company? Let's compare apples to apples.

If my phone call talking trash about my phone carrier is to a reporter getting ready to publish an expose... now we’re apples to apples. Better?

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#106

Post by jaggednad »

justboxing wrote: post #19

Serious question(s), not trolling. Why shouldn't Facebook take down the ad that's calling for a break up of their Company? How is this any different from a person walking into a store and asking to place an ad inside the store calling for breakup or shutting down of said store? What store owner would ever allow such a thing? Why would (or should) any business allow any sort of propaganda that strikes at the heart of…

It’s different because Facebook has massive power to influence the National conversation by choosing which content to block or not block. Your local neighborhood store does not have such power, ergo, it’s reasonable to treat Facebook differently from the way we might treat a store.

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#107

Post by amanaplanacanal »

sanxiyn wrote: post #24
justboxing wrote: post #19

Serious question(s), not trolling. Why shouldn't Facebook take down the ad that's calling for a break up of their Company? How is this any different from a person walking into a store and asking to place an ad inside the store calling for breakup or shutting down of said store? What store owner would ever allow such a thing? Why would (or should) any business allow any sort of propaganda that strikes at the heart of…

I think Facebook has every right to take down the ad calling for breakup of Facebook.

Of course they do, but it looks bad politically.

There are a lot of things that it is perfectly legal to do, which you probably don't want to. Especially if you are a public company.

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#108

Post by cronix »

almost_usual wrote: post #59
sanxiyn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Facebook has every right to take down the ad calling for breakup of Facebook.

This would suggest Facebook supports censorship

Yeah, they probably censor child porn, and other things, too. Don't you support censorship?

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#109

Post by hyperpallium »

justboxing wrote: post #19

Serious question(s), not trolling. Why shouldn't Facebook take down the ad that's calling for a break up of their Company? How is this any different from a person walking into a store and asking to place an ad inside the store calling for breakup or shutting down of said store? What store owner would ever allow such a thing? Why would (or should) any business allow any sort of propaganda that strikes at the heart of…

If the "store" was a newspaper, and it refused to report parliamentary debate on its impartiality...

It's not illegal, but does prove its partiality.

Re: Facebook backtracks after removing Warren ads calling for Facebook breakup

#110

Post by mirimir »

wvenable wrote: post #77
mirimir wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What’s their monopoly on? Serious question. Too many people like using fb so we break them up? lolwut. Yes, basically. Or at least, they have a partial monopoly on social media. > Is fb actively stifling competition? They've been buying competitors. That's classic monopolistic behavior to stifle competition. > Is there a market failure? Pretty damn close. Even Google couldn't moose its way in.

I'm pretty sure "partial monopoly" is an oxymoron.

https://scholar.google.de/scholar?hl=de&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=parti...
Post reply on HN