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181–190 of 210 posts

Re: Meta

#181

Personally, I'm less bullish on FB/Meta now. Half of me believes if someone can turn it around it would be Zuck, and the other half believes that FB's culture has optimized the wrong the thing for the past 5 years. Consider this, and call me out if I'm wrong, for the past 5 years we were led to believe by FB/YouTube that algorithmically generated could only have negative consequences as it moved people to more and mo…

> Then TikTok came along and it's kind of disproven that? ... none of the algorithmically generated content is as polarizing as what I would find on the other apps. I don't think this is fully accurate. The big differentiator for Tik Tok's algorithmic feed from FB's or Youtube's (in my mind) is not its accuracy or lack of polarization, it's actually that it draws much firmer and harder to cross lines between the part…

ByteDance (字节跳动) the parent company that owns TikTok and mainland china Douyin 抖音 have been caught suppressing and hiding videos from disabled or LGBTQ users so that they are not shown to regular users. [0] [1]

One might wonder what other content is suppressed on the platform. [2]

[0] https://www.dailydot.com/irl/tiktok-fat-lgbtq-disabled-creat...

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50645345

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-...

Re: Meta

#182
Mark Zuckerberg does not care about money. That's what I gathered from reading Chaos Monkeys and An Ugly Truth. He never had that problem. A privileged sociopath who has never known life outside of Westchester, Harvard, and his Silicon Valley compound. He talks about "connecting people" but that's probably because he himself is deathly insecure about it.

He has never been one of our species and that gnaws at him. Do girls like him? Do we like him?

His favorite historical figure is Caesar, he looks like Caesar with his haircut, which is also called "the Caesar". This man drifts away in meetings when they talk about boring money stuff, but he DOES care a buttload about the number of users and those users not leaving. It's power, it's influence - it's what he craves.

But. The man who pivoted on his idea of rating chicks - by stealing a better idea - may have run out his lucky streak, which started by winning the birth lottery in Upstate New York. He may have been at the right place at the right time, of prime age, and of means enough to have access to computers and the Internet (a very common thread, see: Bill Gates), but now that The Facebook brand has literally become toxic (RIP), he has to come up with an actual world-changing idea, and that, as he will find out, is hard.

And it doesn't help that not only is it hard to hire people at Facebook now, I will bet you the farm that those working there are walking it in for the nice paycheck. Why do you think the TikTok algorithm makes Reels look like a high school project? Those people don't have their heart in it, and why would they? The company repeatedly, shamelessly lies to them.

Re: Meta

#183

As much as I am not a FB fan, I give Zucc credit for dedicating an entire keynote to his vision of the future. What are all the other tech companies' visions for the future? Who knows! They never talk about the future. Apple almost never talks about anything more than a month away. Their vision of the future? Looks like it's probably: a brand new phone, similar to and released precisely one year after the previous on…

Amazon and Apple referring to customers, customers don't care about the vision, they care about the products, on the other hand Facebook has a different relationship,There is a Founder that is leading a company that refers to users although sometimes dangerously they call them "our people". A company with a leader of 3 billions people, sorry users. I wouldn't give credit to that.

Re: Meta

#184
post #35

Has a huge company ever rebranded themselves like this to a dream that they're so far away from delivering on? The Metaverse isn't an unfamiliar or abstract thing, it's well represented in movies and TV, and it's a pretty dramatic territory to claim: full sensory immersion in an infinite, interactive world. No one has gotten even a fraction of those things "right" and a social media company is gonna bet the farm on i…

The one thing they might have done that is closer to a metaverse than just immersion though: creating a completely digital economy, where work inside the metaverse has value based on creating within the metaverse. Facebook has nailed the economic walled garden, so may have some good ideas for digitalizing people's work using VR/AR as a starting point.

This is exactly it, IMO. People are so focused on the VR/AR/"immersion" aspect of the whole metaverse concept – rightfully so, given the Meta keynote – but there's much more to an actual metaverse than some cool goggles/glasses.

If the point of a true metaverse is a persistent, always-on, digital universe that exists parallel to our own, it seems like the company that defined "social media" is well-positioned to define that universe as well.

Re: Meta

#185

Article doesn't mention but Zuck wanted to acquire Unity because he thought Unity will be future VR/AR engine/platform and Facebook wants to own it and not be at the mercy of Apple and Google. I don't know why he didn't pursue it if he is so sure in Metaverse VR/AR thing.

Mark my words, Meta is going to acquire Epic Games so they can own of the major content creation engines for the metaverse. Not to mention all that sweet, sweet game developer data and owning one of the most popular social multiplayer games out there today.

Epic's valuation is around $30bn and Facebook has the cash to do it but arrogant Epic founder and CEO Tim Sweeney would never sell to big bad Facebook. Maybe he gives in and sells to Facebook because they have common enemies(Apple and Google).

FTC is another problem but they would probably allow this acquisition no matter how big it is because Facebook is not in the business of making video games or game engines.

Besides owning Fortnite and major content creation engines for the metaverse like you said another good synergy is boosting Facebook's Twitch and YouTube Gaming competitor Facebook Gaming with Epic's expertise.

Re: Meta

#186

Honestly, I am dismayed by the negative reactions. Even if facebook fails at this, they will produce huge technical innovation. This is an expensive space, you need a big player willing to spend 10-20 billion on it. You need the technical resources and data. The end result will be a ton of open source and new know how in AR/VR. What a blessing!

There's always going to be a segment of people who are scared of strides towards the future. And for good reason, unknowns are scary for a reason.

Re: Meta

#187
Metastasis: The spread of cancer cells from the place where they first formed to another part of the body. In metastasis, cancer cells break away from the original (primary) tumor, travel through the blood or lymph system, and form a new tumor in other organs or tissues of the body.

Re: Meta

#188
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> betting against a company with such a huge war chest is like trying to catch a falling knife. Indeed. My biggest fear is that succeed. I happen to prefer PCs (and there is no reason to argue for or against that). Apple has been incredibly successful at capturing market share and their devices are now mandatory at my new job. I might not like it, but it's not the end of the world: Apple behaves ethically. Now imagin…

Apple behaves ethically with those file scanners on your devices? Iphone parts that show errors when replaced with the same parts from another phone? Lobbying against the right to repair? Blocking access to 3rd party app stores? lol. It's just marketing, nothing more.

Apple has knowingly used child labor for a few years in China, and are alleged to do the same thing in Congo. This is not just them, but the people who hate on FB for being unethical while lauding Apple for being ethical... the cognitive dissonance or willful ignorance is astounding.

https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-knowingly-used-child-l...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-mining-children-trfn/...

Re: Meta

#189
> I don’t know that if we weren’t investing so much in this, that would happen or that it would happen as quickly, or that it would happen in the same way

This, at least, I can completely agree with. I’m happy that someone is expending so much effort to make what I want a reality. It’s just a bit unfortunate that it is Facebook.

Re: Meta

#190

As much as I am not a FB fan, I give Zucc credit for dedicating an entire keynote to his vision of the future. What are all the other tech companies' visions for the future? Who knows! They never talk about the future. Apple almost never talks about anything more than a month away. Their vision of the future? Looks like it's probably: a brand new phone, similar to and released precisely one year after the previous on…

He’s too early on this. Whatever expansive ideas he and his people are imagining won’t come true soon, but maybe it pays to say “new me!” when everyone is hating on you.
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