241–250 of 308 posts
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FB, IG and WhatsApp are isolated silos (for now). FB tries to work for everyone whereas IG and WhatsApp target younger demographics, since Facebook is no longer cool to be on.
WhatsApp certainly does not target younger demographics. Its goal is to be a messenger app for everybody.
Why just facebook? Why not Amazon, Google, JPM, Disney, etc? "Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook, says the company is so big and powerful that it threatens our democracy." "threatens our democracy". I've heard this talking point so much that it has no meaning any longer. It's just another of the oft-repeated talking point created by PR firms as part of a propaganda campaign. If facebook is truly that powerful tha…
This is a piece about Facebook specifically. You shouldn't expect that he address every monopoly that should be broken up.
Chris Hughes noticeably pulled a few punches regarding his old friend Zuck’s character: 1. “I don’t blame Mark for his quest for domination. He has demonstrated nothing more nefarious than the virtuous hustle of a talented entrepreneur.” 2. “I don’t think these proposals [Zuck finally asking for regulation] were made in bad faith.” It’s pretty naïve at this point to say that Zuckerberg has done nothing more than a “v…
Regulation can often help incumbent businesses by raising the barrier to entry for competition, which allows higher monopoly rents.
Better than breaking up social networks would be to force them to interoperate on an open protocol. When I first signed up for Facebook I was disappointed that only other Facebook users could see my account. Then when Google+ came on the scene I thought they'd worked out a way to interoperate with Facebook, but instead Google just wanted their own silo. What we really need is for social networks to interoperate the w…
Another example: what if cell phone carriers only let you talk / text with people on the same carrier network? Suddenly everyone would need to buy T-Mobile, or Verizon, or Sprint, just to talk to one another. Or carry 4 different sim cards, similar to having multiple accounts. Sounds terrible? Good. That's what Facebook is doing now.
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This sounds to me like a backwards argument. The Cambridge Analytica scandal revolved around unsanctioned access to data. I don't think the premise of having an API was the problem, it was the lack of transparency and control offered to Facebook's users.
Does your data about your date of birth belong to you or to both you and your friends? Ostensibly, it's very personal information, hence only to you. Right now you can set the visibility of your birthday on facebook so you control exactly who sees it. If you set it to private, no one can see it. But supposing you set it to "Friends", would you be ok with your friends downloading this data and keeping a copy for thems…
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> Are they though? They're nearly completely separate products with different activities and goals. Yes. By Facebook's own admission, photos are the center of the Facebook core platform, along with the social networking properties - comments, likes, status signaling, feedback - of the service that surround photos. Instagram was a dramatic threat to the center of Facebook: personal, social networked photo sharing, wit…
I agree with your second point but not with your first. To the consumer, Instagram remains nearly completely decoupled from facebook except for friend recommendations and SSO. Instagram has a fundamentally different photo "culture" and most people don't spend time on instagram OR facebook, they simply use both for different things. On facebook I'll see 900 pictures of my cousin's new baby or graduation photos, on ins…
From my (naive) observation it seems that facebook "the page" popularity has dwindled and people migrated towards messaging (be it the Messenger or WhatsApp) and instagram.
Chris Hughes noticeably pulled a few punches regarding his old friend Zuck’s character: 1. “I don’t blame Mark for his quest for domination. He has demonstrated nothing more nefarious than the virtuous hustle of a talented entrepreneur.” 2. “I don’t think these proposals [Zuck finally asking for regulation] were made in bad faith.” It’s pretty naïve at this point to say that Zuckerberg has done nothing more than a “v…
>And Zuck asking for weak regulation is such an obvious ploy to stave off stronger action like a breakup that would threaten dominance. Regulation can often help incumbent businesses by raising the barrier to entry for competition, which allows higher monopoly rents.
Also I just LOLed after reading the NYT editorial board reaction to this piece - apparently we disagree on whether any punches were pulled. The first line:
“Chris Hughes, a co-founder of Facebook, pulls no punches in his essay for The Times Privacy Project...”
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/09/opinion/chris-hughes-face...
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> I don't think it's possible to outlaw what Facebook does without unforeseen consequences. You don't have to outlaw it, just tax revenue from the undesirable behaviors to dis-incentivize them. In Facebook's case (and also that of much of the web), most of what people object to is the practices that support personal profile-targeted ads. So tax those until page context-targeted ads become attractive.
"You don't have to outlaw it, just tax revenue from the undesirable behaviors to dis-incentivize them." I think a 1 cent per impression ad tax would have a very positive impact on a lot of the internet. It doesn't destroy the advertising industry entirely, because there are still plenty of ads profitable at that point. A lot of the bullshit the advertising industry is subjecting us to isn't about those ads, where the…
And the personal tracking side would still exist, it would just happen before showing the impression, to identify you and calculate whether the 1 cent is worth it for you.
Better than breaking up social networks would be to force them to interoperate on an open protocol. When I first signed up for Facebook I was disappointed that only other Facebook users could see my account. Then when Google+ came on the scene I thought they'd worked out a way to interoperate with Facebook, but instead Google just wanted their own silo. What we really need is for social networks to interoperate the w…
IMO that would do a lot to reduce the monopoly power of social networks and platforms like Youtube, and be fundamentally fair.