Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#11

Post by whatshisface » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:06 PM UTC

fireball_blaze wrote: post #2

"If the best Facebook can come up with is this disgusting attempt at character assassination, Haugen is telling God’s own truth. We should listen to her." A pretty powerful closing statement IMHO.

>Facebook PR: “Today a Senate Commerce subcommittee held a hearing with a former product manager at Facebook who worked for the company for less than two years, had no direct reports, never attended a decision-point meeting with C-level executives — and testified more than six times to not working on the subject matter in question.”

This doesn't sound like character assassination, it's Facebook claiming that she wasn't informed enough. It would be like the NSA telling us not to listen to Snowden because he didn't actually work on the programs that he obtained documents about.

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#12

Post by jaywalk » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:11 PM UTC

It's tough to call Facebook's response a "smear" or "disgusting attempt at character assassination" since it didn't address her character at all. It certainly does attempt to discredit her, and it is cowardly and ultimately doesn't address the issues she brought up. But the author of this article is a bit hyperbolic.

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#13

Post by buitreVirtual » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:11 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

It's called a tipping point. Previous critics made similar denunciations, but most people and even the media just shrugged and pretended nothing bad was happening. It takes time for society to acknowledge inconvenient truths. Plus, here, Haugen provided a wealth of documentation.

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#14

Post by leahbarton » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:12 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

What's your source on her wealth? I'm only finding second hand sources stating up to 5 million...

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#15

Post by whatshisface » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:13 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

Here are some points I notice about this whole thing:

- Facebook has stated (in the press release the article is reporting on) that they support regulation. This is typical for large market incumbents, who have been said to always support fixed-overhead regulation, because it hurts smaller competitors more than it hurts them.

- Washington loves regulating things and can be safely assumed to be pro-policy in most cases. More to the point, incumbents today are far more concerned about the possibility of being blindsided in their campaigns by maneuvers on a platform their own team doesn't know how to work with, than they are about the difficult to quantify pros and cons of balancing antitrust and libertarian policy. You'd expect them to be pro-regulation on average, if it reduces the importance of the internet in running campaigns.

- The public is not presently pro-regulation and nobody really knows what form the regulations should take.

So in a nutshell, everyone who's powerful in this situation wants the same outcome, and all that is left is to convince the public to support a bill which will probably be titled something like "Cyberspeech Freedom Act of 2022." Lobbyists may have already drafted it, and we can expect that well-meaning activists will be swept along by the push and end up supporting something they wouldn't like if they fully understood what it was.

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#16

Post by orzig » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:13 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

Citation majorly needed on "1B estimated"

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#17

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:15 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#18

Post by Hokusai » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:21 PM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #15

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

Here are some points I notice about this whole thing: - Facebook has stated (in the press release the article is reporting on) that they support regulation. This is typical for large market incumbents, who have been said to always support fixed-overhead regulation, because it hurts smaller competitors more than it hurts them. - Washington loves regulating things and can be safely assumed to be pro-policy in most case…

> The public is not presently pro-regulation

I guess that this is true for the USA. But Facebook is a global company and other countries may be more regulation friendly.

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#19

Post by AlbertCory » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:21 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

There are very few billionaires. Who "estimated" this? Based on what?

Re: Facebook’s attempt to smear the whistleblower

#20

Post by BitwiseFool » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 8:21 PM UTC

cpr wrote: post #4

I'm sure what she's saying is only part of the evil that Facebook represents, but there's something fishy about the whole setup. Why is she getting full media coverage and support, when previous whistleblowers were roundly ignored? She's a very wealthy person (1B estimated), so perhaps she's fairly well insulated from any blowback? But again, why is now the time to pile on Facebook, and why this person? [edit] Hint:…

I'm paraphrasing a similar comment I made on a different thread, but this whole situation seems fishy to me...

Out of the blue some larger-than-life person (with impeccable credentials, no less) comes out of the woodwork and is lauded with attention while the big news outlets make this massive push against Facebook, all while congress is holding hearings about regulating social media. Then a massive outage happens at Facebook right after the New York Times published an article titled "Facebook Is Weaker Than We Knew." (This could honestly just be atrocious luck and an incredible coincidence.)

This woman is also remarkably calm, well-spoken, knowledgeable, and articulate for someone testifying before the Senate for the very first time - all while being broadcast around the globe, live on television. Perhaps she's simply a natural, but I sense she received some coaching and preparation beforehand. Combine that with how well she is being received by senators from both parties and you start to wonder just how much of this was orchestrated in advance.