311–320 of 734 posts
If you don’t like Facebook just don’t use Facebook, WhatsApp, or Instagram. Don’t know why so many people here think parents and adults are not capable of regulating themselves and their kids. It’s honestly condescending to think you know better than your fellow citizens if you’re arguing for government intervention.
What are the potential legal ramifications for the whistleblower?
Potentially severe for leaking company IP. There are explicit legal protections for whistleblowing to the SEC but I don't believe there is anything protecting one's right to go to journalists with privileged information. However, Facebook would be 100% insane to press legal charges because that just drags this on even longer and reinforce the perception that they're bullies
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> One, most of the mainstream news has at least basic editorial processes in place that do a rudimentary check on truthiness. Come on, man. There are just so many counter examples, from the "paper of record" NYT (1619 Project) to MSNBC (Russia nonsense) to Fox News (literally everything) to Rolling Stone (A Rape on Campus) I could sit here all day listing outright lies and untruths published in the pages of mainstrea…
Both are true. Both the news and social media optimize for clickbait, which bad actors use to slip in misinformation. What's funny is, people use the exact language about the news. They'll say that CNN is just being used by the far left to promote far-left views, or that Fox News is being used by the far-right to promote far-right views. Yet when the medium is Facebook instead of the media, suddenly it's a problem th…
How about we just remove that so they are all equal? Not special or "more laws," just equal.
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If a poem (or book) makes 10% of its readers more likely to become geniuses and contribute to solving world problems such as cancer, but 0.1% of its readers are more likely to commit suicide, should that book be banned by law? Today's online society is based on posts created by content creators around the world, where algorithms can barely scratch the surface at interpreting their content, humans don't scale in revie…
It's a misleading comparison. From what I read, trafficking / sex slavery was (is) happening via some places on FB, the company knew about it, did nothing. For example. Edit: the article from this HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28741532 , search for "traffickers" and "drug cartels". /Edit. Understaffed moderation teams, although FB had lots of money
Humans are using FB and where you have humans they commit crimes. Trying to eradicate all crime when you have humans in the loop is generally not great idea. Besides fighting trafficking/sex slavery with very few exceptions generally means harassing women with zero benefit to society or reduction in actual sex crimes.
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That is the problem of following the absolute minimum standards in life - we (the society as a whole) have accepted that as long as businesses follow the law, its all good. We've accepted that the sole purpose of businesses is to make money within the bounds of the law. While this makes sense logically, it isn't good for anyone in the long run, practically. Also remember that all kinds of unfair laws can be passed, i…
The problem is that without laws, what would those "standards" be? You have to do more than the law? But how does any business in the future know what that is? The great things about law are predictability and flexibility. If the law is not enough, we can change it. Then everyone is held to that new standard. But having a standard that is not laid out, is the same thing as having no standard at all. Going into an are…
I fully understand this sounds idealistic and maybe it is dumb to expect people to do better, when much of humanity is trying to do the minimum and get the maximum in return.
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If a poem (or book) makes 10% of its readers more likely to become geniuses and contribute to solving world problems such as cancer, but 0.1% of its readers are more likely to commit suicide, should that book be banned by law? Today's online society is based on posts created by content creators around the world, where algorithms can barely scratch the surface at interpreting their content, humans don't scale in revie…
It's a misleading comparison. From what I read, trafficking / sex slavery was (is) happening via some places on FB, the company knew about it, did nothing. For example. Edit: the article from this HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28741532 , search for "traffickers" and "drug cartels". /Edit. Understaffed moderation teams, although FB had lots of money
If you don’t like Facebook just don’t use Facebook, WhatsApp, or Instagram. Don’t know why so many people here think parents and adults are not capable of regulating themselves and their kids. It’s honestly condescending to think you know better than your fellow citizens if you’re arguing for government intervention.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Looks like you are willfully ignoring Facebook’s own findings. They know that polarizing content is more engaging yet harmful… and they choose to amplify it anyway. The same old argument that it’s hard therefore let’s not do anything is not applicable. Facebook is not a neutral platform that just shows all posts from your friends in a chronological order. They are actively manipulating the stream and are fully respon…
Walmart is "manipulating" the placement of products on the shelf so that it's more likely for you to engage in bulk buying when you visit their stores. Both Facebook and Walmart have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders to create value for them. The difference is that, with user generated content, the idea of black and white "bounds" of the law is no longer applicable and you have to devise a system of checks and b…
Facebook doesn’t have a duty to manipulate content. This is a very weak excuse that works mostly for people directly benefiting from the situation. Didn’t cigarette companies have a duty to maximize profits? Pharma companies pushing accessible opioids? Is that a more apt analogy?