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Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

wsj.com

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Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#131

Post by bopbeepboop »

darkerside wrote: post #115
kcplate wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps I am of the minority opinion, but I damn sure was never worried about a bunch of selfie-taking unarmed rednecks destroying the United States of America. My faith in this country goes a little deeper than that.

Marie Antoinette was similarly not worried about the visceral expressions of very real problems across the nation of France. It's not a problem until it's a problem.

Right — but we’re collectively okay with violent rioting, including arson and murder… but draw the line at selfies.

This seems more Reichstag Fire than French Revolution.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#132

Post by nsenifty »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #88
canada_dry wrote: post #31

> She also sifted through the company’s internal social network, called Facebook Workplace,...for years the company has been tightening access to sensitive material. Of course FB's highest priority order of business: lock down Facebook Workplace and put much tighter controls in place for disseminating internal documents.

https://workplace.com/security Those claims about privacy and security are certainly believable. Facebook has only leaked a billion or so profiles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook#Breaches Yes, this seems like a prudent choice for companies to use Facebook, excuse me, "Workplace", to manage internal data. Heck, why does Facebook need to sell ads, they could just sell "Workplace". The service seems to be workin…

Workplace (the product) has nothing to do with this but it's the policy of Facebook (the company) to trust their employees to use any information responsibly to do their jobs (with the exception of user or HR data).

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#133

Post by scheme271 »

erklik wrote: post #100
snowwrestler wrote: post #87

Facebook is going to become a hollowed out shell of itself if they do not change. They’ll get hollowed out by litigation, legislation, investors, or all of the above. They need new leadership. The tactics that got them here will not carry them further. There are tons of examples of the positive impact of new leadership, on companies like Apple, Microsoft, Uber, Disney, Ford, etc. And there are certainly plenty of exa…

> Yes I know Zuckerberg cannot be ousted by typical corporate maneuvering Why is that? I am not aware of Facebook's corporate structure so I am curious. - Yes, this is a LMGTFY question, but I find that people can often provide a better answer, that's easier to understand especially when the question is more of a curiosity rather something I wish to find the answer of rapidly.

To expand on the sibling comment, Facebook has two classes of shares. Class A shares have one vote and are the shares that are traded on stock exchanges. Class B shares get 10 votes each and are held by Zuckerberg and friends. Zuckerberg has enough Class B shares that he really can't be outvoted by other investors.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#134

Post by gnicholas »

JaggerFoo wrote: post #112

I heard that she may be the first billionaire whistleblower, when given a percentage of the fine assigned to Facebook.

Under what whistleblower statute? There are various statutes that provide different percentages, but there are strict rules for qualification.

I haven't seen any indication that she is a qualifying whistleblower under any statute (though admittedly I am not deeply following these revelations).

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#135

Post by cottsak »

arthurcolle wrote: post #113
runarberg wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there no consumer protection laws which forbids a company from pushing a product to market that they know to be harmful to their customers? IANAL but it seems pretty illegal to my eyes.

I hate Facebook, but your statement begs the question: "who defines what is harmful"

I think we should agree that women and girls physically harming themselves is "harmful".

> Frances Haugen: And what's super tragic is Facebook's own research says, as these young women begin to consume this-- this eating disorder content, they get more and more depressed. And it actually makes them use the app more. And so, they end up in this feedback cycle where they hate their bodies more and more. Facebook's own research says it is not just the Instagram is dangerous for teenagers, that it harms teenagers, it's that it is distinctly worse than other forms of social media.

I just started listening to this https://www.audible.com.au/pd/More-Than-a-Body-Audiobook/035... which shows directly through research how this kind of depression leads to physical self harm.

Now I'm questioning why I even want to have an Instagram account.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#136

Post by worrycue »

55555 wrote: post #119

I'm glad she shared what she shared. Facebook is a cancer on society IMO. In many cases, although perhaps not this one, whistleblowers have had an extremely active and political Twitter account when hired, or are literally being hired _because_ of their wokeness. Do silicon valley companies not screen for intensity of political views during job interviews in order to prevent issues like this? They certainly don't see…

Is it me or have things shifted from “prevent what you say online from being traced back to you as much as possible as it could be used against you” to “what you say online is now part of your resume and ‘leaving it blank’ is a ‘bad look’”?

I’m … not young and follow the “blank slate” approach. Was just wondering if the world had changed while I wasn’t paying attention.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#137

Post by lovecg »

sayonaraman wrote: post #127

have they defined what "hate speech" and "misinformation" mean these days? More often than not these terms are used by one party to silence & suppress opposing views of another. Thankfully Zuckerberg doesn't give a damn, one would be hard-pressed to find a better CEO for social media company who can stand up to all this whining.

It’s simple really. “All X are Y” where X is an immutable characteristic and Y is something negative = hate speech. “Covid vaccines contain 5G microchips” is misinformation. Do you have any examples of what you’re alluding to?

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#138

Post by conspiracist »

I’m wary of an angle here where the individual was hired by FB to set them up for a much bigger gambit down the road.

This individual can bring to light relatively trivial things and demonstrate that FB has put so-and-so measurements in place when they really go all in - think dissident/political enemy crackdown type of moves. Remember: the senate hearings are a farce because the senate is in bed with FB/NSA/CIA. But it looks good for them to seem tough and in turn it looks good for FB to say “We established a committee to oversee this X months ago. We absolutely care about Y.”

The individual looks like a hero and they get a big payout. Not a bad gig.

Unfortunately the concept of corporate plays like these are buried in William Gibson novels so people think they’re a fantasy, unaware of how the game works.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#139

Post by cratermoon »

55555 wrote: post #119

I'm glad she shared what she shared. Facebook is a cancer on society IMO. In many cases, although perhaps not this one, whistleblowers have had an extremely active and political Twitter account when hired, or are literally being hired _because_ of their wokeness. Do silicon valley companies not screen for intensity of political views during job interviews in order to prevent issues like this? They certainly don't see…

> Do silicon valley companies not screen for intensity of political views during job interviews in order to prevent issues like this?

That's literally illegal.

Re: Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it

#140

Post by bjt »

mrxd wrote: post #104

I think misinformation and conspiracy theories on these platforms are a huge problem. A few years ago, some bad actors were successful in convincing Congress of a crazy conspiracy theory that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. The results were far-reaching. The US violated the UN charter and launched a disastrous war in Iraq where millions of Iraqis were killed, injured and displaced. They used a platfor…

> A few years ago, some bad actors were successful in convincing Congress of a crazy conspiracy theory that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction ... They used a platform called The New York Times to spread their lies.

Citation needed that this was a knowing conspiracy as opposed to bad intelligence.

Setting that aside, there's a big difference between an institution like the NY Times getting it wrong on occasion, despite all their research and fact checking, vs an institution like Facebook building a platform that systematically rewards disinformation at massive scale.

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