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Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#81

Post by tester34 »

mrweasel wrote: post #14

So is Google going to throw them out of the Play store? What's the argument for banning one social media and not another. Where do you draw the line that manages to keep Facebooks app available, while still being able to defend the removal of Parler. I know many will think I'm defending Parler, I'm not. I just don't see why Facebook is continuously given a free pass for all the horrible stuff on their platform. Is it…

because stuff like this in facebook's case is tinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy percent

meanwhile what % of parler's stuff all those "bad" things are?

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#82

Post by JumpCrisscross »

ashtonkem wrote: post #70
mrweasel wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes Facebook worse, in my mind, is that people don't seem to care that it's their real name associated with terrible radical, violent and angry comment. At least on something like 4Chan you'd be anonymous, but nope, people will write the most grotesque comments, while everyone can see their real name, where they live and who they work for. Some people don't seem to care, and that's pretty scary.

One key takeaway from 1/6 is that a sizable chunk of the mob had no idea that they were doing anything wrong, and are surprised to find themselves in handcuffs after the fact. At least most historical revolutionaries had the self awareness to understand that trying to overthrow the state is super illegal , and maybe a bit of clandestine-ness is in their own best interest.

> a sizable chunk of the mob had no idea that they were doing anything wrong

Has anyone dug into this? What were the actual stories that caused that suspension of critical thinking? (Serious answers, please.)

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#83

Post by beervirus »

x86_64Ubuntu wrote: post #43
mrweasel wrote: post #14

So is Google going to throw them out of the Play store? What's the argument for banning one social media and not another. Where do you draw the line that manages to keep Facebooks app available, while still being able to defend the removal of Parler. I know many will think I'm defending Parler, I'm not. I just don't see why Facebook is continuously given a free pass for all the horrible stuff on their platform. Is it…

Parler, unlike Facebook, only existed to foment the kinds of rhetoric and ideologies that lead to the 6th.

That's not really true. Parler existed to be twitter without censorship. That's a worthy goal, even if it (predictably) attracted some unsavory elements too.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#84

Post by AlexandrB »

jlehman wrote: post #19
hoka-one-one wrote: post #2

Terrible. The storming of the capitol was probably the most frightening single event in American history in recent times. I just got off the phone with my friend who lives in China. He was in tears. He didn't understand how someone could have such disregard for the value of human life and democracy to walk inside the capitol building in DC. It's completely against the law. For those in the dark, the event caused seri…

> He didn't understand how someone could have such disregard for the value of human life and democracy... Maybe he hasn't heard about Tiananmen Square[1], since in China it never happened[2]. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests...

I don't see how Tianemen Square is a refutation of the quoted statement. Tianemen Square is an event that demonstrates the value of democracy - people are willing to die to achieve it. Jan 6 shows disregard for democracy - those that broke into the Capitol were willing to destroy it.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#85

Post by arroz »

zests wrote: post #18
hoka-one-one wrote: post #2

Terrible. The storming of the capitol was probably the most frightening single event in American history in recent times. I just got off the phone with my friend who lives in China. He was in tears. He didn't understand how someone could have such disregard for the value of human life and democracy to walk inside the capitol building in DC. It's completely against the law. For those in the dark, the event caused seri…

Explain it to an engineer. A few people in a mostly peaceful protest got out of hand and this is the most frightening event ever? I'd say the congressmen shooting was 10x scarier yet received 100x less news coverage. Just to be clear, sarcasm and unduly extreme language do not work as well on an engineer :)

I find Jan 6th scarier just because of the number of people

We don’t know if it is going to happen again, if the mobs are going to be larger, etc

We don’t even know what kind of backlash Republicans that voted for impeachment will receive

People are afraid

The shooter was caught and that was it (though it could happen again, but with anyone really)

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#86

Post by dcolkitt »

mrweasel wrote: post #14

So is Google going to throw them out of the Play store? What's the argument for banning one social media and not another. Where do you draw the line that manages to keep Facebooks app available, while still being able to defend the removal of Parler. I know many will think I'm defending Parler, I'm not. I just don't see why Facebook is continuously given a free pass for all the horrible stuff on their platform. Is it…

There's a lot of rationales you can give, but the real answer is that banning Facebook would cause Google to miss their quarterly earnings.

Many people are willing to take a stand for their beliefs, many fewer are willing to nuke their RSUs.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#87

Post by bjt2n3904 »

megaman821 wrote: post #32

Emotional content elicits a larger response, says the article with the provocative headline. There is nothing new here. Why does the responsibility never lie with the people who say these things, only where they say it? It reminds of of the Columbine shootings, where many articles where written about the violent video games that must of inspired the shooters to do it. Those arguments sucked then and they still suck n…

This, right here.

In 2016, when Facebook was charged with hosting "fake news", their response should have been "It's your fault for believing everything you read on the internet."

When Facebook replied, "We accept responsibility, and we will do better", they spelled their own doom.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#88

Post by ramphastidae »

ttt0 wrote: post #80
greesil wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still do it. Get your own server in a colo that's owned by someone friendly to your political viewpoint. Keep some spares in a closet for when the feds inevitably come when someone uses your unmoderated platform to plan crimes.

> Get your own server in a colo that's owned by someone friendly to your political viewpoint. ...until someone up in the food chain will either shut that down too or force them to disassociate with you. https://www.theverge.com/2020/10/25/21532883/paypal-cuts-tie... > Keep some spares in a closet for when the feds inevitably come when someone uses your unmoderated platform to plan crimes. Section 230.

This is the free market at work. PayPal has a well known track record of canceling service to direct customers as well as business partners for arbitrary reasons. This is a major risk but companies too lazy or incompetent to build decent payments just slap on PayPal and everyone suffers. But businesses knowingly do it anyway. Well, this is the consequence.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#89

Post by jeffreyrogers »

IgorPartola wrote: post #78
nhumrich wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

real people like parlor.

Knives can be used to kill people. But a lot more knives are used in cooking. So we see knives as tools that are relatively rarely used to do bad things and mostly used for good things. Guns are mostly used to kill people. So we see them as tools only useful for that purpose. That’s why you can buy a set of knives on Amazon but not a 10 pack of Glocks. Facebook is seen closer to knives. Parler was mostly guns.

Arguably true of handguns, not really true of guns in general.

Re: Facebook Incubated the Insurrection

#90

Post by sydd »

nr2x wrote: post #5

Somebody from Facebook recently told me they developed the best system to flag radical/violent content in the world, I pointed out they first developed the best system to spread it.

Not trying to defend Facebook, but they did not do it on purpose. They developed a really addicting social network where you do as many interactions as possible.

When Facebook started it was a different world: Almost no data privacy laws, internet security in its infancy (e.g. in 2008 HTTPS was a rare new thing, not cross-origin security etc.) and people were spamming Farmville notifications to each other. It just turned out that this structure is an excellent ground for lots of bad things.

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