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Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

doctorow.medium.com

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Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#11

Post by Qi_ »

Barrin92 wrote: post #6
Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

>If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it what do you call this argument, best of all worlds-ism? So a priori any institution that persists is beneficial to its constituents merely because it continues to exist? Do concepts like power and dependence exist in the kind of worldview that produces these arguments?

My argument is based on free-market economics. The users/customers seem to not care enough to put their time and money elsewhere.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#12

Post by janmo »

Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

"If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it."

No. Because all your friends are on Facebook. And by buying out all the serious competition (Whats App, Instagram) they have guaranteed a monopolistic position. Even if you move to another place, if will grow too big, odds are it will end up being acquired by FB.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#13

Post by echelon »

Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

> If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it.

Just like sugary soda, loot crates, cigarettes, and opium then? Companies design products that are bad for people all the time.

> Zuck: they “trust me”

> Zuck: dumb fucks

This was said after his AOL hacking days [1], so he already had a certain predisposition towards "ordinary people".

Given that his history and his present behavior aren't much different, it seems he hasn't changed much. He designs products to extract from people.

[1] https://qf0.github.io/blog/2020/01/28/Mark-Zuckerberg-was-a-...

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#15

Post by dcow »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #2

> Regulating tech is a great idea (assuming the regulations are thoughtful and productive, of course), I’m not nearly as enthusiastic for these calls to bring heavy regulation on to the tech industry. Articles like this have a hypothetical ideal mental image of regulations that will punish only the bad guys while protecting themselves and the content they like. There’s also an implicit assumption that regulation will…

That box is already open. Respectfully your comment kinda reads like you assume tech is some new untouched frontier unexploited and ripe for the picking. We’re way past that and we must decide as a society how we want to navigate a world of global software services and immense data collection.

Doctorow has always been against government central control of information. I suspect he’s against any overly large centralized information control regime because it has the same practical impact to people’s everyday lives. It’s not weird to see him (or anyone) call for “regulation” when the regulation being asked for pertains to enforcing we as a society retain certain rights with respect to how we interact with our world. That’s the whole point… don’t get distracted on some “govt control vs no control” axis. Nobody is asking the govt to tell you how to run your business, they’re just asking that we make it illegal to abuse users in the way Facebook has by permabanning the developer of a genuinely socially good tool that is obviously not spam for the insane “it automates user interactions” blanket reason. My password manager automates user interactions… GTFO FB.

Also laws aren’t regulation. You can make something illegal without imposing back-pressure on every new venture in the space it pertains to.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#16

Post by ISL »

Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

By that measure, most of those who live under oppressive dictators think their leaders are okay. If not, "they would just rise up and replace them".

Doctorow's piece here reads to me as a call for viable alternatives. The prose attempts to advance a number of his favored alternatives, which makes it a little confusing.

To me, I believe we are headed toward a world where social media operates via an open API, like email. The road between here and there will be rocky.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#17

Post by joshsyn »

janmo wrote: post #12
Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

"If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it." No. Because all your friends are on Facebook. And by buying out all the serious competition (Whats App, Instagram) they have guaranteed a monopolistic position. Even if you move to another place, if will grow too big, odds are it will end up being acquired by FB.

So...???? These companies sold themselves to facebook. You don't own these companies. Build something yourself and get your friends to use it.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#18

Post by cute_boi »

joshgel wrote: post #9
Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

Like cigarettes? I have no sense of whether FB is physically addictive like smoking. But, if a company directly contributes to decline in civil discourse and harms democracy, and thereby harms the users, then isn't it a government role to step in? And isn't this the governments role even if users can't see the harm at the micro-level of their daily interactions with the company? I guess that is the argument at least.…

Facebook is addictive tbh. I heard they hired some prominent psychologist to make it more addictive.

My mother is surely addicted to facebook. She knows all data implications but she enjoys getting likes/shares etc. And fake news etc which is intentionally specious make the platform even more enjoyable.

I can't tell her to stop facebook and I am sure it is harming her right?

Yes this is government role but as with every government in democracy most of them are vested for short term profits and company like facebook lobbies a lot. We know facebook pushes millions of dollar in lobby so why would government solve it? Also facebook also provides sweet taxes to government.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#19

Post by dcow »

sokoloff wrote: post #8
jboy55 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just imagine the politician of your nightmares being in control of the regulations. I think the real issue is that people live in black holes of misinformation on the internet because that is where they want to be. When I look at the many Herman Cain Award threads on reddit, it seems the predominate original source of most posts is groups that the user signed up for. This isn't new, before Facebook, there were usenet…

> Just imagine the politician of your nightmares being in control of the regulations. Exactly this! Every time I see someone proposing some new expansion of government reach and power, it seems to be considered only from the angle of “just think of what the (people I think of as the) good guys could do with this increased authority!” “Yeah, but what could the bad guys do with this increased authority? Because as sure…

You can 1) make something illegal without 2) requiring any sort of regulation.

Re: Facebook shouldn’t be in charge of how you use Facebook

#20

Post by the-dude »

Barrin92 wrote: post #6
Qi_ wrote: post #4

The author seems to be filled with a sense of “knight-in-shining-armor-ism.” If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it. He calls Zuckerberg a "pope-emperor" of Facebook's users, but that's because the users choose to give him power. If the users stop choosing to give him power, he loses it.

>If Facebook’s actions really are a problem to most people, then most people would stop using it what do you call this argument, best of all worlds-ism? So a priori any institution that persists is beneficial to its constituents merely because it continues to exist? Do concepts like power and dependence exist in the kind of worldview that produces these arguments?

Sounds as a just-world to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

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