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Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

reuters.com

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Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#191

Post by op03 »

pfraze wrote: post #49
paxys wrote: post #2

> The notification, seen by Reuters, said without detail that the group violated policies on “adult sexual exploitation.” That's some bullshit right there. Spin the wheel, come up with a random charge, and ban the entire community with zero recourse and no way to appeal.

Okay so I completely agree but I want to add something to what’s going on Half the fun of WSB is that it is enormously offensive. The foundation of the community is that a forum talking about stock investing strategies is, at its heart, really dumb. It’s harder than most people can manage to evaluate all the “DD” flying around and any advice other than playing it safe (r/investing) is stupid to take from a rando on a…

The 6 chimp brain has no clue what its doing when it comes to group dynamics at population scale.

The only moves are blunder, react, counter react, avoid, fight, flee.

The chimps at FB have dug themselves into deep holes. The only way they save themselves is to pull everyone else inside and cry for Grandma to show up.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#192

Post by fakedang »

bravura wrote: post #163
dalbasal wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. I don't mean that it's unequivocally part of a conspiracy. But like I said, It can't go unaddressed. This isn't a Hacker news story about a banned app. It's international news, and the news isn't about WSB's (admittedly) bad language.

Social networks were forced to moderate with the capitol riots. Now they have to moderate left wing mob organization on their platforms to avoid the perception they will only censor the right wing.

WSB is less left-wing, more Libertarian. I routinely see them shit on both the left and right.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#193

Post by all2 »

mhh__ wrote: post #130
forgingahead wrote: post #107

There used to be a guy on Twitter/Facebook/other social media who kept harping about how the system was rigged....

Who?

Some orange guy. Everyone said he was bad. He's gone now. Not really sure where he went.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#195

Post by kibwen »

dvt wrote: post #165
kibwen wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but, generally speaking, killing someone is pretty black-and-white wrong. Ironically, this has left me speechless. Surely you realize the inherent contradiction of arguing that something is emphatically all-or-nothing, and then turning around and moderating your position with a strategically-placed "generally speaking"? Which is it? Is it nuanced or isn't it?

By "generally speaking" I meant in like 99% of regular every-day cases. Heck, I even gave some counter-examples. It just seems you're being uncharitable because the spirit of what I was trying to say I feel was pretty straightforward.

Look, I don't want to bust your balls in particular. We both believe that freedom of speech is generally a good thing and I'm sure you're coming from a good place. But surely you must acknowledge that I should not be free to, for example, dox you right here and now (my freedom of speech is overruled by your expectation of privacy and right to pseudonymity); likewise I should not be free to go around telling all your friends and colleagues that in your free time you prostitute yourself to lonely grandmas in nursing homes. And even if, for whatever reason, you wanted to waive these rights, that does not give you the right to decide that I should waive my own claim to those rights.

The bottom line is that there are exceptions to freedom of speech, including morally-justifiable ones. We don't need to treat adherence to freedom of speech as some sort of religion that admits no heresy. It is a generally good idea to distrust anyone who tells you how (not) to exercise your speech, but that doesn't mean you can't independently derive from first principles a reasonable set of self-consistent morals around when it is proper to value other rights above it.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#196

Post by RcouF1uZ4gsC »

kortilla wrote: post #157
Const-me wrote: post #61

Facebook is a natural monopoly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_monopoly No matter how they treat users, people won't leave due to network effect. I don't believe the problem is solvable with more tech or free market. I think the only way forward is political, with laws and regulations. Long ago railroad networks, water pipes networks, and landline phone networks were private companies free to do whatever they…

People said the same thing about MySpace. Facebook is trivial to leave (I haven’t been on it in years now). It was not trivial to change to a different railroad, plumbing provider, etc.

> People said the same thing about MySpace.

That gets brought up a lot however:

* MySpace never had the revenue of Facebook

* Far more people are on Facebook than were ever on MySpace. There are not that many of my personal friends/family were ever on MySpace. Now however, almost every one of my personal friends and family members is on Facebook.

* MySpace did not spend billions acquiring potential social network competitors. The two biggest c(non Chinese) social networks that might have challenged Facebook were acquired for billions (Instagram and WhatsApp) and the other network (SnapChat) had an offer, and when it was turned down, a competing service was created by Facebook.

* As a market matures, it becomes harder to unseat incumbents. The social media market is far more mature than it was before.

* as an example, Google dethroned AltaVista and Lycos rather easily. However, I would bet money that 10 years from now, absent regulation, Google will still have the dominant search engine. In the same way, 10 years from now, I would bet that Facebook will still have the dominant social network.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#197

Post by WClayFerguson »

remoteLily wrote: post #188
WClayFerguson wrote: post #151

[flagged]

This is free speech in action. Sites should be able to moderate as they see fit. In return, their users are free to protest the removal of some speech, or protest the tolerance of some speech. And then companies respond to those protests. The government doesn't get involved. It's messy, but there's no way around the mess without forcing companies to host content they don't want to host. Freedom of association is as i…

[flagged]

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#198

Post by intended »

pfraze wrote: post #49
paxys wrote: post #2

> The notification, seen by Reuters, said without detail that the group violated policies on “adult sexual exploitation.” That's some bullshit right there. Spin the wheel, come up with a random charge, and ban the entire community with zero recourse and no way to appeal.

Okay so I completely agree but I want to add something to what’s going on Half the fun of WSB is that it is enormously offensive. The foundation of the community is that a forum talking about stock investing strategies is, at its heart, really dumb. It’s harder than most people can manage to evaluate all the “DD” flying around and any advice other than playing it safe (r/investing) is stupid to take from a rando on a…

Excellent response. This line in particular

> side-effect of going mainstream: it becomes political, and politics is perception.

This is absolutely true. Before, when this was between a few reporters and Wallstreet / WSB, it was possible to handle.

Now it has crossed the tipping point into mass politics, and the size of the audience involved is massive. Nuance is dead.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#199

Post by harry8 »

kortilla wrote: post #157
Const-me wrote: post #61

Facebook is a natural monopoly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_monopoly No matter how they treat users, people won't leave due to network effect. I don't believe the problem is solvable with more tech or free market. I think the only way forward is political, with laws and regulations. Long ago railroad networks, water pipes networks, and landline phone networks were private companies free to do whatever they…

People said the same thing about MySpace. Facebook is trivial to leave (I haven’t been on it in years now). It was not trivial to change to a different railroad, plumbing provider, etc.

>Facebook is trivial to leave

Your experience (and mine fwiw) does not generalise. It is significantly harder for many people to do so while keeping up with familial and social obligations. Not to mention some business obligations for many. Facebrick is trying ever harder to make being a citizen impossible without a Facebook account. Government departments have Facebook accounts and use it for communication. WhatsApp is used for payments on much of the world. Don't kid yourself it's as easy for everyone as it is for you and I.

That said. Delete your Facebook account. Plan it. Do it. It feels so, so very good pushing the button and your quality of life improves significantly. Facebrick is as vile as any serious addiction tends to be once it has hold of you.

Re: Facebook shuts popular stock trading group amid GameStop frenzy

#200

Post by ralston3 »

Zak wrote: post #174
pfraze wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s really encouraging to hear

Perhaps, but not as encouraging as a migration to self-hosted Matrix servers on traditional paid dedicated/virtual server hosting that's much less interested in policing its customers' content than platforms are.

The thing with me is, WSB is a group of what? A few million at least? I saw that they were up to 1.2 million maybe yesterday. And they're having a hard time on most if not all platforms. If not technically, then in terms of some form of censorship (as is the case here). There was the Discord issue, this Facebook issue. I've heard Reddit devs has been helpful with scaling r/wallstreetbets, but even still, the number of users and the (crazy yet benign) content is proving too much for a single subreddit to handle. This is a real-life use case for a possibly open-source, scalable message board. I feel like people are suddenly seeing the downsides of these backdoor-dealing, self-interested walled gardens.

The era of the walled garden will end. #RemindMe

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