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Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

nytimes.com

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Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#231

Post by s_y_n_t_a_x »

RNCTX wrote: post #229
s_y_n_t_a_x wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was pointing out the hypocrisy and the double standard. Twitter has been in the news cycle for censoring/manipulating tweets of Trump. On HN I see a lot of people defending this decision by noting they are a private company and you can switch social media services if you want. It seems you cannot switch services, the mob will always find you and push their "ethics" and "facts" onto you.

Listed corporations are not "private companies." They gave up privacy when they sold stock/bonds on public markets.

Twitter is a publicly listed corporation as well (since 2013) so that argument makes no sense:

https://thenextweb.com/twitter/2013/11/07/twitter-just-becam...

Either way, that's a strange moral line to take on all of this, whether a company is public or not.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#232

Post by bhupy »

danans wrote: post #184
tomp wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're conflating a few issues. Facebook is being boycotted ostensibly for failing to combat hate speech, whereas your comment is mostly written as a argument to censor fake news. Classical mote-and-bailey fallacy. Twitter deleting bots claiming that Obama was born in Africa? Fine. Twitter tagging Trump's warning that any squatters in Washington DC will be treated according to law as "promoting violence against speci…

> Trump's warning that any squatters in Washington DC will be treated according to law What is this law against peaceful protest that you cite? And under what statute is the use of violence against those protesters sanctioned by the law?

Squatting + Vandalism != peaceful protest

If a group of people peacefully protest on my lawn, they are not Constitutionally protected to do so, no matter how "peaceful" their assembly. If I call the cops to forcefully remove them from my property, I would be acting within the bounds of the law.

If a group of people spray-paints my business, and I call on the police to reprimand them, that is again within the confines of the law.

The President tweeting about doing the same is a simple extension of this. You may disagree with the law in question (as is your right), but it's a bit silly to suggest that tweeting about enforcement of the law (no matter how unjust you think it is), should be considered beyond the pale on a global platform.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#233

Post by bobthepanda »

gms wrote: post #211
btilly wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not just better at noticing it. It really is more slanted. Journalism 20-30 years ago was mostly funded on a subscription model. In this model they work hard to maintain their reputation, so that people will trust them as an accurate source of news. Journalism today is mostly funded per click. Which means that the most important thing is a headline that grabs people's attention and causes them to click. The i…

The NYT operates on an online subscription model, no?

How much of a percentage of revenue is that subscription model vs ads, and how does that hold up to the historical split?

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#234

Post by netcan »

skewart wrote: post #123
salimmadjd wrote: post #108

Am I the only person who has a problem with this headline, "Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing" am I overreacting here or others feel the same? For me at the face of it's not incorrect, but it feels to me a certain deliberate wordsmithing is used to create a sense of growing momentum. What we don't know if these advertisers represent 1%, more or less than x% of Facebook's ad revenue. I do understand FB will not pro…

What’s more, the NY Times has a strong business interest in convincing advertisers not to advertise on Facebook. I’m a bit skeptical of anything they publish these days about Facebook, Google, and other companies that could potentially threaten their access to clicks, just given their financial incentives to weaken these companies as much as possible.

That's kind of a skepticism conundrum. If media can't be trusted about media...

I mean, I agree with you. They're vested. Even if it wasn't financial, journalists must have an insider's set of opinions about good & evil in the media industry.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#235

Post by dingaling »

rainyMammoth wrote: post #174
tech-historian wrote: post #64

Serious questions: Are the people that work at Facebook proud to work there? What is morale like inside that place? When someone asks you what you do, and you say "I work for Facebook," what is their typical reaction? Not trying to be snarky. I'm genuinely curious how these perceptions/feelings might have changed over the past few years.

I know a couple. The answer is simple: Money. Facebook pays way above what other tech companies pay (a 6 year of experience senior engineer in Menlo Park can easily make 600k/year). There is also a sense of pride coming from back in the days when Facebook was still seen as a very exclusive and wonderful place to work at.

Not being facetious, but what to the devs do all day to earn that?

Their core functionality, Find a Friend, is pathetically limited and naive. Why can't I search for ( cohort of near my age who went to my school ) or ( everyone called Bob who is one or two hops from Alice and lives in Bigville )?

Or even search a friend list by some criteria instead of scrolling through 1200 names.

Frankly it sucks.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#236

Post by askafriend »

dingaling wrote: post #235
rainyMammoth wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know a couple. The answer is simple: Money. Facebook pays way above what other tech companies pay (a 6 year of experience senior engineer in Menlo Park can easily make 600k/year). There is also a sense of pride coming from back in the days when Facebook was still seen as a very exclusive and wonderful place to work at.

Not being facetious, but what to the devs do all day to earn that? Their core functionality, Find a Friend, is pathetically limited and naive. Why can't I search for ( cohort of near my age who went to my school ) or ( everyone called Bob who is one or two hops from Alice and lives in Bigville )? Or even search a friend list by some criteria instead of scrolling through 1200 names. Frankly it sucks.

> Why can't I search for ( cohort of near my age who went to my school ) or ( everyone called Bob who is one or two hops from Alice and lives in Bigville )?

They had this feature a couple years ago. It was called Graph Search and did exactly what you're suggesting (and even more impressive than that). They shut it down fairly quickly because it was a huge privacy and security issue as well as an incredibly abusive feature at their scale.

Building products in a system as complex as FB is not as straightforward as adding features just because you can or have the talent to do so.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#237

Post by danans »

bhupy wrote: post #232
danans wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trump's warning that any squatters in Washington DC will be treated according to law What is this law against peaceful protest that you cite? And under what statute is the use of violence against those protesters sanctioned by the law?

Squatting + Vandalism != peaceful protest If a group of people peacefully protest on my lawn, they are not Constitutionally protected to do so, no matter how "peaceful" their assembly. If I call the cops to forcefully remove them from my property, I would be acting within the bounds of the law. If a group of people spray-paints my business, and I call on the police to reprimand them, that is again within the confines…

> Squatting + Vandalism != peaceful protest

Agreed that vandalism is not peaceful protest.

> If a group of people peacefully protest on my lawn, they are not Constitutionally protected to do

But occupying a public space (not a private lawn) in protest - what you refer to as squatting - is absolutely peaceful protest. Lafayette Square is not POTUS' private lawn.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#238

Post by SuoDuanDao »

throwaway_jobs wrote: post #62

It seems the pandemic and unemployment is finally causing voodoo economics (trickle down economics) to reverse course and perhaps cause trickle up economics, where the multi-billion dollar corporations and rich alike will begin to feel the pinch of poverty on a massive scale trickle up. Unfortunately while taxpayers got their $1,200 Checks they were robbed blind of over $4T to the FED which went directly to stabilize…

I was listening to a great American poet recently, the lines "The buying power of the proletariat's gone down/ Money's getting shallow and weak" really stuck with me.

What can that much money in the markets really buy when there's no economy being served by it any more? Eventually the winners will find they've been playing the wrong game.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#239

Post by bhupy »

danans wrote: post #237
bhupy wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Squatting + Vandalism != peaceful protest If a group of people peacefully protest on my lawn, they are not Constitutionally protected to do so, no matter how "peaceful" their assembly. If I call the cops to forcefully remove them from my property, I would be acting within the bounds of the law. If a group of people spray-paints my business, and I call on the police to reprimand them, that is again within the confines…

> Squatting + Vandalism != peaceful protest Agreed that vandalism is not peaceful protest. > If a group of people peacefully protest on my lawn, they are not Constitutionally protected to do But occupying a public space (not a private lawn) in protest - what you refer to as squatting - is absolutely peaceful protest. Lafayette Square is not POTUS' private lawn.

> Lafayette Square is not POTUS' private lawn

But St Johns church is not a public space, and vandalizing it is not legal. Even in public commons, vandalizing/toppling public statues is currently not legal.

Trump's tweets/posts are strictly about reprimanding this behavior. Again, there is a growing orthodoxy that holds that this behavior should not be reprimanded, but tweeting about enforcing those existing laws is well within the realm of reasonable discourse, especially for a political leader.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#240

Post by bennesvig »

salimmadjd wrote: post #108

Am I the only person who has a problem with this headline, "Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing" am I overreacting here or others feel the same? For me at the face of it's not incorrect, but it feels to me a certain deliberate wordsmithing is used to create a sense of growing momentum. What we don't know if these advertisers represent 1%, more or less than x% of Facebook's ad revenue. I do understand FB will not pro…

Ben & Jerry's spent less than $5k on Facebook and Instagram ads last month. They'll get more publicity value from joining the boycott vs. paying to run ads for a month or two.
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