Facebook whistleblower says she wants to fix company, not harm it • Hacker News Board

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

#491

Post by shadowgovt » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:26 PM UTC

yholio wrote: post #387

code_duck wrote: post #301

>Frances Haugen: So, you know, you have your phone. You might see only 100 pieces of content if you sit and scroll on for, you know, five minutes. But Facebook has thousands of options it could show you. >The algorithm picks from those options based on the kind of content you've engaged with the most in the past. This is the primary reason I stopped using Facebook. I did everything I could to signal I did not wish to…

People in your social bubble clearly don't care too much about major personal events, but do care about politics. It's what your friends have in common, and what Facebook will deem important. You are just a statistical anomaly.

That's the point of this discussion, and the significance of dumping these papers in the open: Facebook's concept of what your friends deem important is decided by Facebook, not by your friends. For example, if Facebook takes a global "Politics sells impressions" signal and applies it to your social network, the result would be over-sampling political content relative to the amount friends actually share it (with possible positive-feedback-loop consequences).

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

#492

Post by from » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:28 PM UTC

jayolden wrote: post #413

It's mad respect to the whistleblower for the intention of fixing the company instead of destroying it. Facebook should try and come up to fix its flaws.

The more likely scenario rather than this faux-altruism is that she just wants to get whistleblower status to collect 30% of the settlement Facebook will make with the government.

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

#493

Post by shadowgovt » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:29 PM UTC

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…

Is Facebook (the company and the social media platform) the masses or the Princeton graduates? You could say that it shares content generated by the masses, but arguably so does the New York Times every time it quotes someone to support a story. And these papers suggest what Facebook does to a person's wall looks a lot more like editorializing than laissez-faire regurgitation of community-generated content.

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

#494

Post by makomk » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:32 PM UTC

yholio wrote: post #398

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…

> It's an elitist double standard with content controls for the masses and first amendment rights for the graduates of Princeton and Columbia with jobs at prestigious publications. It's called power. Journalists are people, and desire power just as much as the next politician, CEO or movie star. Unlike those, journalists get that power by controlling broad narratives and having disproportionate control over the free…

The fact that peer pressure is the "accountability mechanism" means that pretty much the only thing journalists are ever held accountable for is stuff that goes against the beliefs of the class of people who graduate from Princeton and Columbia and get jobs at prestigious publications. Stuff like spreading misinformation, inciting political violence and falsely undermining trust in democratic elections is fine so long as it's done in the name of the correct elite-supported political causes.

Hell, I've just watched the media over here in the UK create a fuel supply crisis through irresponsible reporting - they posted breathless headlines about petrol stations running out of fuel and having to close which actually created the crisis by scaring everyone into going out and filling up their tanks at once. In reality, about five stations in the country were shut prior to the panic buying - so few even the people who'd tried to go to one probably wouldn't realize there was meant to be a crisis. But our fuel supply chains just don't have the capacity to cope with everyone buying several times as much as usual once the press started a panic. Is there any accountability for this? Of course not. They just kept on running endless sob stories about the people affected by the crisis and how terrible it is for them, making money off suffering they created.

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

#495

Post by fleddr » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:42 PM UTC

I see this issue as an issue far greater than Facebook.

With that I mean the mass production of content that is illegal, harmful, misinformation, divisive, stolen or down-right low quality.

The internet is a crowded place now, people have a lot of screen time yet a low attention span. Hence, content creators have perfected the art of short form content that achieves maximum engagement. This won't change, not even in a world without Facebook. Even journalists work this way now.

Even though it harms us, it's what we want. We pay attention to bad news, outrage, the unusual. We want black and white and good and bad narratives, not complicated and reasonable takes.

Imagine a world without Facebook. It only consists of blogs, and there's no timeline at all. One day one of the blogs publishes a controversial article. All other blogs will link to the outrage article. Everybody reads the controversial article, nobody reads the moderate ones. The unreasonable ones will always win.

The bad algorithm is within us.

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

#496

Post by mLuby » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

GekkePrutser wrote: post #431

taurath wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hit the nail on the head there. It’s impossible to actually get what was the damn promise of Facebook to begin with, and instead everyone gets practically drugged with crap because it makes Mark more money.

Facebook was actually pretty good when it just showed me my friends posts and nothing else. But when they moved to their 'timeline' and started fiddling with algorithms that try to decide what I want to see, they got it all wrong and it became a chore to wade through it all. I don't understand how they think an algorithm can decide better what I want to see than me myself (by adding friend and blocking the ones that…

> they think an algorithm can decide better what I want to see than me myself

I agree with your points, except I believe there is a limited role for algorithms that help users discover new things they might like but not know about. I prefer Spotify's approach, where there's a specific area of the app (a "Discover Weekly" playlist) that gets refreshed but not so often that it becomes a dopamine lever. Although that kind of recommendation algorithm can't seem to handle multifaceted "loves rap but also renaissance music" users' tastes very well yet—in that regard Pandora's separate stations were better.

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

#497

Post by mountainb » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

lukestevens wrote: post #42

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #25

We have seen this story before. Person joins Facebook thinking they can "help". Then quits. Facebook is a public company whose purpose is serve advertisers. Online ads is the only way they can generate revenue. It is not some woo-woo about connecting the world, giving people a voice, or whatever. That's what the internet enables, not a single website controlled by someone else. Facebook tries to take credit for what…

It’s a strange pattern [0]: [Sophie Zhang] joined Facebook in 2018 after the financial strain of living on part-time contract work in the Bay Area had worn her down. When she received Facebook’s offer, she was upfront with her recruiter: she didn’t think the company was making the world better, but she would join to help fix it. “They told me, ‘You’d be surprised how many people at Facebook say that,’” she remembers.…

It has to do with how the university educated are socialized. They believe it's gauche to admit to pecuniary interest when looking for a job. They have to make it like a quasi-religious mission for which they are incidentally paid. It's intensely stupid. Obviously Facebook invites it and has consciously adapted its recruiting message.

Back in the 2000s before the financial crisis it was popular to portray the young as nauseating money grubbers who just wanted to get a job in banking. That wasn't great either, but I would rather honest greedheads rather than greedheads who lie to themselves and others about what they're doing with their lives.

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

#498

Post by Broken_Hippo » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

AlbertCory wrote: post #219

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…

The simplest solution is the one FB will never accept, and yet the harm to the public would be virtually zero: Eliminate all news, politics, and other public policy groups and apps. Return to being just a way to connect with friends and family. No one needs to get their news from Facebook. There are plenty of other sites on the Web for that. Same for all these other "engagement" services. Of course, this would cut th…

Eliminate all news, politics, and other public policy groups and apps. Return to being just a way to connect with friends and family.

Maybe this is just me being a late adopter of facebook (2012 or 2013 here), but... when was this magical time without politics and news? Was this in the time of game requests? Was there really no one sharing news stories back then? No groups discussing religion and philosophy and current events? No one organizing protests? No one commenting about how they disapproved of a lifestyle or couldn't ever harm a little, innocent unborn baby? Really??

I'm gonna guess you simply didn't see it from friends and family back then or didn't consider some of it to be political. It could be that people themselves share it more often now, but if that's the case, that's simply because the world has changed into such a world. But don't get me wrong, this isn't something facebook has done, as some folks have always been political and some loud about it.

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

#499

Post by notpachet » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:44 PM UTC

atraac wrote: post #423

code_duck wrote: post #301

>Frances Haugen: So, you know, you have your phone. You might see only 100 pieces of content if you sit and scroll on for, you know, five minutes. But Facebook has thousands of options it could show you. >The algorithm picks from those options based on the kind of content you've engaged with the most in the past. This is the primary reason I stopped using Facebook. I did everything I could to signal I did not wish to…

I recently had an issue with Facebook feed similar to yours. I've suddenly had my feed full of... Beatles fanpages. All kinds of 'old music' fanpages, Beatles, Queen, Nirvana etc. I don't even listen to them, I have never liked any of them, hell, I didn't even google anything like that. For last 2 months I've specifically marked every such suggestion as Not relevant. And it still shows me that stuff. Every, single da…

C'mon... admit it... these bands are starting to grow on you... slip out that credit card, my friend... that's right... just leave it sitting there beside you on the desk so it's handy... now a little more Queen... Mamaaaaa... Bohemian Rhapsody, now on Netflix... Oooooo... 20% off this commemorative mug...

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

#500

Post by misiti3780 » Mon, Oct 04, 2021, 1:44 PM UTC

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…

* J. Miller and M. Gordon at the NYT[1]

https://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/08/world/threats-responses-i...