Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

facebook.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 699 posts

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#221

Post by bogwog »

jefb wrote: post #135

Yesterday free speech was so important that platforms must syndicate all topics equally and fairly. Today these platforms are so extremely dangerous to society that they should be shut down entirely. I’m not a fb apologist by any means, but maybe we should stop blaming these websites for everything and invest in education instead.

> I’m not a fb apologist by any means, but maybe we should stop blaming these websites for everything and invest in education instead.

Even educated people are susceptible to content that is specifically designed to incite outrage and divide us. Facebook (and other sites) optimize for that type of content because it maximizes engagement. Teenage girls developing body image issues also apparently maximizes engagement.

If there's any framing here that absolves Facebook of culpability, it's that everyone else is doing it too, and that there are no laws/regulations in place to prevent it... But even then, it's still obviously immoral to anyone paying attention, and the employees responsible for it at Facebook have no excuse for not realizing that. They chose to act immorally.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#222

Post by tibyat »

jtdev wrote: post #100
mbesto wrote: post #47

> If we wanted to ignore research, why would we create an industry-leading research program to understand these important issues in the first place? > If we wanted to hide our results, why would we have established an industry-leading standard for transparency and reporting on what we're doing? This is HILARIOUSLY out of touch with reality. You don't call someone a whistleblower if the reports they leaked were TRANSP…

Nothing this “whistleblower” has said is revelatory… she’s stating things we already know. The question should be “why now?”.

This was the cynic's response to Snowden, too. Hard to argue he didn't make a large and positive impact in the end, so I'm willing to give this a chance too.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#223

Post by worrycue »

2pEXgD0fZ5cF wrote: post #157
jedberg wrote: post #68

I'm having a hard time reconciling all this right now. On the one hand, from the outside, I can see the actions that Facebook takes and they seem awfully guilty of what they are accused of. But on the other hand, I personally know and have previously worked with some of the people who work on trust and safety, specifically for kids. Good people who have kids of their own and who care about protecting people, especial…

> So maybe Zuck is telling the truth here, that they are trying to fix all this. Except they are just playing around with the outrage algorithms, the problem is created by Facebook, not some natural occurence. If they wanted to "fix" anything they would make their algorithmic timelines opt-in, or at least an option, for starters. It is of course very much in the interest of the people working at Facebook to make this…

I wonder how Facebook’s algorithm works.

I know YouTube’s just recommends based on what you just watched/search (you can disable this aspect by clearing or disabling your histories), channels you have subscribed to, (I believe) videos you have “Like” or commented on, and videos you have marked as “Not interested -> I do not like this video”.

Is Facebook’s as “viewer driven”? Or does it recommend based other criteria? e.g. like what’s generally popular.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#224

Post by [deleted] »

mbesto wrote: post #47

> If we wanted to ignore research, why would we create an industry-leading research program to understand these important issues in the first place? > If we wanted to hide our results, why would we have established an industry-leading standard for transparency and reporting on what we're doing? This is HILARIOUSLY out of touch with reality. You don't call someone a whistleblower if the reports they leaked were TRANSP…

[deleted]

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#225

Post by colinmhayes »

seneca wrote: post #38

Facebook is an awful environment, but this political witch hunt is many times more dangerous than anything social media can do. It's a charade, parading out the typical "threat to children" and "dangerous to society" rhetoric politicians always use when they want to grab power. The entire goal is to make a pretense to control speech online. Stop using Facebook, and stop falling for authoritarian claptrap.

> stop falling for authoritarian claptrap

If only it were so easy.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#226

Post by LordHumungous »

spywaregorilla wrote: post #140
ahahahahah wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For example: > In fact, in 11 of 12 areas on the slide referenced by the Journal -- including serious areas like loneliness, anxiety, sadness and eating issues -- more teenage girls who said they struggled with that issue also said Instagram made those difficult times better rather than worse. All the reporting has been about how the research found that Instagram was so terrible for teenage girls, but that seems to b…

> According to internal studies retrieved by Haugen, Facebook found that 13.5% of teen girls say Instagram makes thoughts of suicide worse, and 17% of teen girls say Instagram makes eating disorders worse. This is a snippet of the research mark's referring to. Oh good, only 13.5% of girls feeling more suicidal.

No that's of girls who have thoughts of suicide, 13.5% say it makes it worse. Ok, is that good or bad? The number is meaningless without a control.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#227

Post by davesque »

jedberg wrote: post #68

I'm having a hard time reconciling all this right now. On the one hand, from the outside, I can see the actions that Facebook takes and they seem awfully guilty of what they are accused of. But on the other hand, I personally know and have previously worked with some of the people who work on trust and safety, specifically for kids. Good people who have kids of their own and who care about protecting people, especial…

Shouldn't it then be possible to account for and correct for the emergent evil? That's the point of government regulation is it not? Maybe then an appropriate, self-critical response from Facebook would be, "Yeah, our system is broken. How can we help?" instead of immediately going on the defensive. If they claim to care about the bigger picture, they need to acknowledge it without excuses.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#229

Post by atonse »

ramraj07 wrote: post #128
jedberg wrote: post #68

I'm having a hard time reconciling all this right now. On the one hand, from the outside, I can see the actions that Facebook takes and they seem awfully guilty of what they are accused of. But on the other hand, I personally know and have previously worked with some of the people who work on trust and safety, specifically for kids. Good people who have kids of their own and who care about protecting people, especial…

It’s like saying that the people working in the slaughter houses are actually kind folk who do like animals and care deeply for their well being. That can be absolutely true, but they still work for a slaughter house. Your care and trust doesn’t matter a bit because the fundamental nature of the organization is that it profits from cruelty. I understand it pays well, and that maybe they are trying to be nice and all,…

I actually think this analogy is the very opposite of what you may be trying to explain.

A lot of people that work at slaughterhouses do so because they have no other choice. It is the best opportunity that's afforded to them. It is a job that causes trauma for many, often has long, grueling hours, and doesn't pay well.

Working at Facebook couldn't be further from that situation. Never mind the obvious perks (the tech, the white collar work, the gourmet food, I hear there's also a wood shop where you can go do woodworking on your break, the half a million dollar salary, etc etc etc). But the overwhelming majority of these people have the whole world of job opportunities to choose from, if they're willing to take a pay cut from an INSANELY HIGH salary to just a VERY HIGH salary.

So in that sense, they couldn't be further away from working at a slaughterhouse. The fact is, they could quite literally work anywhere else (any other company or any other city/country with remote work now), and they choose not to. It's not desperation but the textbook case of golden handcuffs.

It's very, very difficult to say no to 500k a year. I'm not even sure I could say no if I were in that position. I'd probably tell myself "Just coast for two more years and both my kids won't have to pay for college" or something like that, and keep going.

Re: Statement from Mark Zuckerberg

#230

Post by hoppyhoppy2 »

jimkleiber wrote: post #215
hoppyhoppy2 wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently the lack of remorse is part of Zuck's new "no more apologies" PR strategy, as reported in the New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/21/technology/zuckerberg-fac... (archive link: https://archive.is/newest/https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/21... )

I don't remember him communicating with much remorse ever since Facebook started. His communication style seems very similar to how I think it's been over the years. Does it seem different to you?

Yes, it does seem different to me. I remember him often publicly apologizing after big controversies caused by Facebook's actions.

If you search the web for "timeline of zuckerberg apologies" you'll find articles enumerating his public apologies over the years.

Post reply on HN