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Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

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Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#311

Post by strulovich »

Mizza wrote: post #45

I find it weird for a whistleblower to be so "lib", as the kids say. She said she 'loves' Facebook, and wants to fix it, not harm it. I don't want Facebook fixed and I do want Facebook harmed. I don't want the government to meddle with what types of things people can say online, I want them to ban the business model of stalking people online and selling intimate details of their lives. If the problem is Facebook choo…

Let’s say I opened a successful social media platform, where I make money from subscriptions to higher tiers, no ads involved.

Do you think the problems of Facebook won’t replicate there? As much as I can see, growth of the business and engagement is not just an ads related companies issue. For example, Netflix also worries about growth the same way FB does.

(Edit: FB employee, opinions are my own)

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#312

Post by zozin »

calrueb wrote: post #143

I like to imagine there are a bunch of Facebook Homefeed engineers out there who ran dozens experiments, tuning this-and-that, and found the ones that boosted revenue, and user engagement by X%. No one thought too deeply at _why_ some experiments were successful. Perhaps it was chalked up as "our new ML model is matching users to content they care about more efficiently". Then they shipped it, and everyone celebrated…

I don’t blame the engineers, they’re clearly very talented because their products are addictive. I don’t blame the executives either, because they’re clearly very good at managing a trillion dollar behemoth and making ungodly amounts of money for their shareholders. It’s not an employee or executive’s job to create products that are good for society.

I blame our inept and captured public officials for not regulating these products out of existence. It’s their jobs to protect the public from things that harm society. The tech industry clearly can’t regulate itself, no industry can, just like tobacco refused to use filters and car manufacturers refused to install catalytic converters. Preventing kids from getting addicted to apps and suffering from depression and low self-esteem is not in Facebook’s interest other than as a public relations problem.

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#313

Post by ziddoap »

Permit wrote: post #232
Mizza wrote: post #45

I find it weird for a whistleblower to be so "lib", as the kids say. She said she 'loves' Facebook, and wants to fix it, not harm it. I don't want Facebook fixed and I do want Facebook harmed. I don't want the government to meddle with what types of things people can say online, I want them to ban the business model of stalking people online and selling intimate details of their lives. If the problem is Facebook choo…

> I want them to ban the business model of stalking people online and selling intimate details of their lives. When you say "selling intimate details of their lives" you are misleading your reader. I don't know if this is intentional on your behalf but it makes it really hard to discuss real problems when you obfuscate them behind quarter truths like "Facebook sells your data".

Can you explain what you believe the other 3/4 of the truth is?

As far as I know, FB makes money by selling political and religious affiliation, location, age, gender, etc. to advertisers in the form of target markets. I consider most of those to be intimate details of my life.

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#315

Post by rossdavidh »

calrueb wrote: post #143

I like to imagine there are a bunch of Facebook Homefeed engineers out there who ran dozens experiments, tuning this-and-that, and found the ones that boosted revenue, and user engagement by X%. No one thought too deeply at _why_ some experiments were successful. Perhaps it was chalked up as "our new ML model is matching users to content they care about more efficiently". Then they shipped it, and everyone celebrated…

Almost precisely the problem with using money as a measure of everything. I'm not opposed to money, I'm even in favor of free markets, but this is a real problem. "What gets measured, gets improved". Hence, what is not measured, is what gets sacrificed.

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#316

Post by JumpCrisscross »

teawrecks wrote: post #292
infamouscow wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Congress can, and should, make it a crime.

It would be very difficult to make this a crime, because a lot of customers WANT companies to be able to track everything about them. What they don't want is for their information to then be sold and passed around willy-nilly.

> customers WANT companies to be able to track everything about them

Customers want free shit. American culture remains prickly to being tracked.

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#317

Post by lolsal »

InsomniacL wrote: post #210

Personally I believe this all boils down to 'Platform Lock-in'. I have to use Facebook because everybody I know uses Facebook. Just like when I was younger I preferred Playstation but had to buy an Xbox because all my friends had Xbox. Nowa days we have CrossPlay across platforms. If I could use a social media platform which has an approach to Privacy I prefer, while still being able to view my friends social integra…

> I have to use Facebook because everybody I know uses Facebook. Just like when I was younger I preferred Playstation but had to buy an Xbox because all my friends had Xbox.

This speaks more about lack of self-control than anything else.

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#318

Post by tobltobs »

mgraczyk wrote: post #239
calrueb wrote: post #143

I like to imagine there are a bunch of Facebook Homefeed engineers out there who ran dozens experiments, tuning this-and-that, and found the ones that boosted revenue, and user engagement by X%. No one thought too deeply at _why_ some experiments were successful. Perhaps it was chalked up as "our new ML model is matching users to content they care about more efficiently". Then they shipped it, and everyone celebrated…

I worked on the things you mentioned at Instagram, doing the tuning this-and-that for about a year on a few different surfaces including the home feed. You are right that for the most part, people look at metrics and make decisions about what to ship, and only the best engineers and data scientists spend time thinking about the actual product. However, you're wrong about what metrics are important. Since at least ear…

> The focus of many shipping conversations is how to address even unmeasured potential risks to these metrics. A huge number of experiments are run specifically targeted at improving these metrics.

How do you run tests on unmeasured metrics?

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#319

Post by dgb23 »

gibrown wrote: post #179
thepasswordis wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whistleblowers are anti-authoritarian, which is typically a right wing/conservative position in contemporary politics. To the people downvoting me here: can you list some figures who have been protesting authoritarianism who are left-coded in contemporary American society? I'm thinking of wikileaks, edward snowden, glenn greenwald. These people have all been "accused" of being right wingers. The people protesting loc…

> To the people downvoting me here: can you list some figures who have been protesting authoritarianism who are left-coded in contemporary American society? Martin Luther King.

And a few others with media attention from the top of my head:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abby_Martin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky

Re: Whistleblower to Congress: Facebook products harm kids and democracy

#320

Post by ddoolin »

godelski wrote: post #271
_ivvf wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except what you are saying is not really true. Most conservatives want to reduce government power, not extend it. The left, on the other hand, universally wants to extend government reach. I would recommend reading "The Authoritarian Moment" which goes into detail as to how the left are basically winning: https://www.amazon.com/Authoritarian-Moment-Weaponized-Ameri... To quote from the book's introduction: "There are…

In American politics, yes. The problem is that both parties when in power have extended the power of authority and none have reduced it. It's been going on for so long that I can't take any conservative that says they vote right to decrease government seriously. It's just a talking point now. No one is going to reduce the government's powers and it's gotten us in trouble already. It's always justified as "well I need…

This is just not true: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/21/us/politics/trump-democra...

I don't think you're wrong but by the same token, more gov't overreach is really the Democratic platform and that is not a secret.

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