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Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

techcrunch.com

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Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#41

Post by Supermancho »

blunderkid wrote: post #16

There should be only one regulation for fb, display following warning on all pages/screens: Statutory Warning: This product is specifically designed to cause behavioral addiction so you are guided down a slippery slope of over consumption & that is how this company makes money. Overuse of this product is known to cause - anxiety, depression, low self esteem, constant craving for attention, short attention spans, inab…

There's a lot more product than just Facebook, making this look a lot like a witch hunt. There are games, foods, brand retailers, who all do this to the exact same extent. The difference is that facebook has utility that lends to participating as frequently as possible (same as MySpace and newsgroups before that). The regulation is needed because of the ubiquity, not the behavior.

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#42

Post by rjzzleep »

nullc wrote: post #38
RealityVoid wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I estimate about the same impact of this as cigarette pack warning.

Essentially no one I know now smokes. Something was effective.

Those warnings were so successful that companies threatened small nations proposing them.

https://youtu.be/6UsHHOCH4q8?t=655

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#43

Post by laser »

I'm not sure this sort of meta-comment is allowed. But, given the importance of this information, and it's potentiality to induce outrage that leads to participation and commentary, and given the imperfect hacker news ranking algorithm which can fail to differentiate between conversation and flaming when punishing posts in visibility—might I implore you to refrain from commenting unless substantial so that eyes that may have power to action against such malfeasance catch note of this here? (Really likely of note only if comment:points ratio gets close to 1 and above. I accept that this comment's very existence is ironic, but with hope of the wider aim achieved.)

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#44

Post by jonathankoren »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #25
blunderkid wrote: post #16

There should be only one regulation for fb, display following warning on all pages/screens: Statutory Warning: This product is specifically designed to cause behavioral addiction so you are guided down a slippery slope of over consumption & that is how this company makes money. Overuse of this product is known to cause - anxiety, depression, low self esteem, constant craving for attention, short attention spans, inab…

First amendment protections against compelled speech might interfere with this heavily editorialized "warning".

Commercial speech is heavily regulated.

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#46

Post by winrid »

blunderkid wrote: post #16

There should be only one regulation for fb, display following warning on all pages/screens: Statutory Warning: This product is specifically designed to cause behavioral addiction so you are guided down a slippery slope of over consumption & that is how this company makes money. Overuse of this product is known to cause - anxiety, depression, low self esteem, constant craving for attention, short attention spans, inab…

I would argue this site can make you feel the same way :)

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#47

Post by mgraczyk »

blunderkid wrote: post #16

There should be only one regulation for fb, display following warning on all pages/screens: Statutory Warning: This product is specifically designed to cause behavioral addiction so you are guided down a slippery slope of over consumption & that is how this company makes money. Overuse of this product is known to cause - anxiety, depression, low self esteem, constant craving for attention, short attention spans, inab…

I always disliked Facebook and still don't care much for it, but having worked on ranking there for a few months, comments like this just sound incredibly naive.

Facebook is not "specifically designed to cause addiction". It's designed by a complicated process with many people trying to maximize many competing metrics, some of which might go up when people are "addicted". In fact the complete opposite is one of the main goal metrics for most teams (measures of well being) and only a small fraction of people are even trying to increase time spent.

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#48

Post by gorgoiler »

blunderkid wrote: post #16

There should be only one regulation for fb, display following warning on all pages/screens: Statutory Warning: This product is specifically designed to cause behavioral addiction so you are guided down a slippery slope of over consumption & that is how this company makes money. Overuse of this product is known to cause - anxiety, depression, low self esteem, constant craving for attention, short attention spans, inab…

You make a good point. The counterpoint that springs to mind is similar to the California law that requires a warning for anything containing chemicals known to cause cancer.

I’m sure this case is commonly known but I’ll spell it out as I understand it briefly: the bar for “cause cancer” is apparently low and wide enough to mean a huge number of products have this warning, diluting the spirit of the warning. Cynics and critics suggest this over-labeling is a deliberate attempt to undermine the warning itself through over saturation.

In your Facebook example, this could end up meaning any site with user generated content and comments would have to carry the warning — including Hacker News.

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#49

Post by fastball »

quietbritishjim wrote: post #26
plutonicks wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While true it is harder for companies to manipulate those 2 measures. E.g. could Facebook run with 20 staff? Would Facebook and its shareholders be satisfied with 20m in annual revenue. This scenario requires trade offs. My opinion is that monopoly, political and market dominance is a sub-optimal outcome

It could certainly run with 20 staff – it would just spend a lot of money on license fees to a separate Facebook Services Inc that provides software and server administration services. This is similar to how companies avoid tax e.g. IKEA and Starbucks. It could similarly avoid large profits but avoiding large revenues works be trickier. But I'm not an expert in these things, so maybe it's possible if you really know…

Then you just base it off of the number of employees overall in the parent company, not the number of employees in the subsidiary.

Re: Facebook asks for a moat of regulations it already meets

#50

Post by gorgoiler »

laser wrote: post #43

I'm not sure this sort of meta-comment is allowed. But, given the importance of this information, and it's potentiality to induce outrage that leads to participation and commentary, and given the imperfect hacker news ranking algorithm which can fail to differentiate between conversation and flaming when punishing posts in visibility—might I implore you to refrain from commenting unless substantial so that eyes that…

Assuming the TechCrunch article’s headline is the same as the HN post headline, then I think you are already too late. I would describe it as inflammatory at best.

I can’t actually load the article because (I think) my web browser’s anti-tracking blockers interfere with TC’s adtech. I’m using Firefox Focus with iOS Safari.

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