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Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

theguardian.com

21–30 of 204 posts

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#21
post #7

Morals at Meta is an oxymoron. No person with 'morals' would join this company in 2026, unless with the next RSU cliff, the morality hormone immediately gets triggered when the bank account reaches 7 figures.

I don’t think any company has “morals”. For sure individuals might but a big advantage of the corporate structure is this diffusion of decision making and blame. Anthropomorphizing corporations isn’t helping us get a clearer picture of how they work or why they do what they do.

I'm sure everyone here understands that. But, there's a difference between a company that puts morality and ethics first vs. one that abandons it altogether or even encourages its opposition. I've worked for all three types, and after unwittingly working for scum, I recommend to always check who one's bosses are. In my understanding, I believe Zuckerburg has always operated in opposition to morality.

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#22
Sounds like the lawyer's spinning what any successful business does with trying to acquire customers and serve their needs as though they were dealing drugs (granted, the line can be blurry between things that are simply enjoyable versus that which is more strongly addictive - some people get "addicted" to eating, but we can't really ban food, for example)

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#24
post #20
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing China does well. Put people that damage their society or economy behind bars.

Is that true or is it just people that challenge the power of the current Communist Party leadership that get punished?

There is this recent example https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/aug/20/evergrande-...

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#26
post #22

Sounds like the lawyer's spinning what any successful business does with trying to acquire customers and serve their needs as though they were dealing drugs (granted, the line can be blurry between things that are simply enjoyable versus that which is more strongly addictive - some people get "addicted" to eating, but we can't really ban food, for example)

Perhaps, then, it's a matter of degree like most things. And perhaps, again, "what most businesses do" is not really a good defense to hide behind?

I'm so tired of the whatabouts and the normalization and the pretending like this billion trillion whatever company has does anything but take advantage of its power to defend itself with slants and lies that any normal person or small group could never get away with.

You can be a big company and not be pointedly or maliciously harmful to society. Facebook is not that. And no, I will never refer to it as "meta" to allow yet another opportunity for these people to sane wash their behavior.

We know who they are. We know what they choose and chose to do. Let the tattered and broken laws of the world actually do something.

"What normal businesses do"... sheesh.

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#28
I hope people can see Meta is funding the other side in order to get Child Safety laws passed so they can have an out when children use their parent's device and Meta spies on them. Child Safety laws are just mass surveillance in disguise which has always been Meta's game plan since day one.

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#29

I hope people can see Meta is funding the other side in order to get Child Safety laws passed so they can have an out when children use their parent's device and Meta spies on them. Child Safety laws are just mass surveillance in disguise which has always been Meta's game plan since day one.

>Child Safety laws are just mass surveillance in disguise which has always been Meta's game plan since day one.

I thought they were pushing for on-device age verification, which from a "mass surveillance" perspective is pretty bad? If you wanted mass surveillance, you'd want mandatory ID verification by sites and/or government SSO, both of which allows you to capture a persistent identifier. Of course, meta isn't doing all this lobbying out of altruism. Doing on-device verification means they're off the hook for it, and google/apple has the shoulder the burden instead.

Re: Hook, hold, harvest and hide: Meta's alleged strategy laid out in first week

#30

I hope people can see Meta is funding the other side in order to get Child Safety laws passed so they can have an out when children use their parent's device and Meta spies on them. Child Safety laws are just mass surveillance in disguise which has always been Meta's game plan since day one.

I seriously doubt that the FaceMash guy was planning mass surveillance from day one. The people who propped him up might have, though.
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