Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#201

Post by Loughla » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:25 PM UTC

xyst wrote: post #166

Haven’t used FB as a social media platform in a long time. So I understand the decreasing usage by the younger audience. However, I think FB should pivot to strictly a marketplace. My experience of selling items on their marketplace has far exceeded my expectations. In comparison to CL, Reddit, or Nextdoor, FB Marketplace was a much better experience. Not sure if it is the elimination of “anonymity”, but dealt with 0…

I would second that. I do not have FB at all, but my spouse does. We maintain that account just for marketplace. I've sold many items online over the years. CL always ends in a haggle where the buyer wants to meet three hours away and pay half the list price, whereas Marketplace, I generally get what I asked for, under the terms that I've laid out.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#202

Post by KaiserPro » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:25 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #26

The biggest component missing from Silicon Valley's discussion of Facebook is its pathological lying. They lied to the FTC [1]. They lied to WhatsApp and the EU [2]. They created an Oversight Board and then lied to it [3]. (These just off the top of my head.) The culture is perceived to be dishonest from the top down. That is why they get bludgeoned more than Twitter, or even Tik Tok. That is what its surrogates miss…

Every large corporation "lies".

But there are a number of mechanisms. First, large corporation are large, which means its impossible to know whats happening everywhere. This means you are reliant on your underlings to report up to you. At each stage there will be entropy, noise and distortion.

Second there is PR, their job is to massage, deflect and sway.

Thirdly there is knowingly mislead in public.

The problem we have here is that there is a massive lens of facebook, so _every_ move they make is introspected and interpreted. For example the most recent outage. Outages happen it wasn't an inside job, and its really cute to imagine that facebook are both competent, coordinated, nimble and secretive enough to pull something like that and keep it a secret (especially as the incident review was out in the open via a leaked zoom and google doc.)

Don't interpret this as me advocating for facebook. I'm advocating for that same level of criticism being applied to the rest of FAANG.

Case in point, Apple tried to roll out a CSAM filter. lots of noise about privacy, but very little about how Apple was doing it because they are currently aware that they are enabling the industrial exploitation of children. We should be _very_ angry at this, as it threatens end-to-end encryption.

I get that its fashionable to shit on facebook, but it'd be great if we looked at what the others are doing especially when they are dabbling in AR.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#203

Post by Croftengea » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:26 PM UTC

Yes, most people just don't care. Facebook will be Facebook no matter what until there is something new that adds some new dimensions to social networking and attracts more investor money. People just wanted calls and used Nokias, wanted search and used Altavista, wanted messages and used ICQ.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#204

Post by triceratops » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:26 PM UTC

ghostoftiber wrote: post #180

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> most of them don’t give a shit about the reputation of FB This is close to a straw man argument. Nobody claims users will abandon Facebook. The article posits, instead, strengthening headwinds. Headwinds in hiring (there is already a double-digit premium Facebook must pay for talent). From recurring whistleblowing, and its impact on morale and productivity. Headwinds in projects and partnerships, like Libre/Diem be…

> People didn't stop using oil after the Standard Oil break-up. Nor Windows after its antitrust brush or cigarettes after the tobacco master settlement. The power of those companies was simply sharply reduced. I actually disagree with this. When the company is forcibly broken up there's a chance that it's "power" (what?) is reduced but if we look at Standard Oil, that quicky is shown to be not-what-happened. SO becam…

Standard Oil => SO => Esso. Mind blown! I had no idea.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#205

Post by hunterb123 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:26 PM UTC

mbg721 wrote: post #199

jwond wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference from what I see is that Republicans are attacking Facebook for censoring too much, while Democrats are attacking Facebook for censoring too little.

Only because of the nature of the censored content; Republicans aren't inherently as anti-censorship as the libertarian wing would like to hope they are. Social media are the fourth-and-a-half estate, and they're flexing their muscles for the other party.

I haven't seen any calls from any Republicans to censor any speech. Their base is very adamant about the Bill of Rights.

Do you have any examples to back up your statement?

Keep in mind we're talking about silencing political dissent, that's pretty fucking major, not a "oh both sides do it, that's life" thing.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#206

Post by sz4kerto » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:27 PM UTC

[2014] Microsoft is doomed as it has lost mobile and desktop is not relevant any more.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#207

Post by gorbachev » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:28 PM UTC

xemdetia wrote: post #191

cbtacy wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may be true for entry level jobs, but for senior level jobs the "stain on the resume" issue is very real. A friend was a recruiter for FB until a few months back and has repeatedly stated that over the last 18 months she had an increasingly large percentage of targeted senior candidates refuse to even take her calls.

I would also suggest as someone on the other end is that they have been very aggressive trying to get people during the pandemic. The recruiter name changes every few months but you get multiple calls and so on, moreso than others I've been engaged with.

Seeing exactly the same...recruiter after recruiter from FB go through the same dance. I don't know why they keep doing this given I never respond.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#208

Post by disgruntledphd2 » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:29 PM UTC

SamBam wrote: post #138

geodel wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah right. All moral quandaries get resolved while working for AANG.

Well, perhaps just the N, then. But Netflix has always been the odd-duck in FAANG. (And yes, you can point out reasons not to work at Netflix, but it seems like a whole nother level than the rest of FAANG.)

> But Netflix has always been the odd-duck in FAANG.

Yeah, mostly cos they make no money ;)

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#209

Post by goatlover » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:30 PM UTC

BallinBige wrote: post #106

The world would be a better place if that outage were permanent.

As long as Twitter and Reddit go down for good as well. But my guess is some other companies like Google would rush to fill the void and we'd end up with similar social media. All those people are just going to move to another platform.

Re: Facebook is nearing a reputational point of no return

#210

Post by jancsika » Thu, Oct 07, 2021, 3:32 PM UTC

breadzeppelin__ wrote: post #29

shoto_io wrote: post #3

No. That’s what people like us and all the main stream media hope for. But: most people I know don’t have the slightest clue that Insta and WhatsApp belong to the FB group. And even worse: most of them don’t give a shit about the reputation of FB. They just want to send messages and share pictures through those apps.

To go a bit further MSM's ad revenue is being hollowed out by Facebook et al. Why would anyone pay to advertise in Economist when they can advertise to "people interested in economics, earning over 150k, last thought about cigarettes three weeks ago" etc. Similarly, if you were an advertising exec at pfizer, would you choose to pay millions of dollars to advertise your meds to a continuously shrinking audience on som…

> Why would anyone pay to advertise in Economist when they can advertise to "people interested in economics, earning over 150k, last thought about cigarettes three weeks ago" etc.

Isn't the economist subscription-based?

Regardless, I'll bite: Isn't an important reason because someone wants to signal to the world that "everyone knows" their company is a sexy, category-defining beast?

E.g., there are Coca Cola machines that span both physical space (can be found in any region of the country) and time (everything from a machine built yesterday to half a century ago). When a human notices this their long-term memory probably goes, "Oh, Coca Cola has been and must still be one of the most important soft drinks," and-- just guessing here-- that increases the probability that their impulsive choice is for Coke in cases where thirst is involved.

If someone asked the question, "Why would Coca Cola want their soft drink ad in a rickety old gas station in an area of Northern Georgia that's still associated with the movie Deliverance?" they'd be confusing cause and effect.

Same logic applies here. I'd assume that advertising in [old media's digital presence] is an effect of an ad campaign that seeks to deliver an image of said ubuiquity.