121–130 of 135 posts
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Facebook didn't break the law. So I'm not sure what people mean when they say "get away with anything."
The FTC disagrees with you. But maybe you know better?
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They do. Their value is unclear. Accountants supposedly are employed by shareholders, but in practice are employed by executives. This makes auditing problematic, but it does have some value. The bigger problem there is the big four's oligopoly: they are too big to fail.
How are the big four all "too big to fail" when not too long ago they were the big five?
Break-up of the big four has been proposed, I see in this mornings Financial Times: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/a4f58dba-1a89-11e1-ae4e-00144...
Many have posted to this thread with complaints that boil down to "this is a slap on the wrist because they are well connected". If you were the FTC, what would you do to Facebook in this case, how would it be supported in law and what long term change for the better would your action create? Privacy is a civil good but it is a fine line to walk indeed to punish an innovator during a recession. Where's the happy medi…
The problem here is the personal information is being voluntarily given to Facebook. And the FTC can do nothing about that. As far as I can tell, most people using FB are trying to communicate with their friends (as they previously did via letter, telephone and email), not broadcast every personal detail and thought to potentially any person or organization connected to the web. Alas they are not well informed that b…
The value Facebook gets from the data is _sharing_ it with others: advertisers, various organisations devoted to catching bad guys, app developers, etc. It is not "private" by any stretch of the imagination.
Even if they purport to restrict access to a profile to certain users, a determined hacker can get around that.
This is a company that is trying to get into your email inbox at every possible opportunity. The concepts of "Facebook" and "privacy" are irreconcilable in my view. Even regardless of their ethics, there is an underlying architectural problem.
The successor to Facebook, which will offer real privacy, not the imaginary kind FB is pitching, will not be another centralised public website.
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Whatever trouble Facebook has with the FTC, it will face roughly 300 million times that trouble in Europe, where the rules are much more strict, and the data protection authorities have much greater power to act on behalf of the general public and individual interests.
That whole using-personal-information-to-burn-people thing is still (barely) in living memory in Europe. There have been riots in Germany over the government trying to take a census - with good reason. Privacy is more important than a lot of shallow people imagine.
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An article a few years ago talked about what privacy means to rich kids who have everything. Go to a $40k per year boarding school that mummy and daddy pay for? What do you have to hide? Not much. Then the kids get older and decide "no secrets for anybody!" What's the harm in sharing your life? It's a net win. If you see James got a new turbo jet ski, won't you want to work harder to get one too? Sharing can save the…
On the contrary, don't rich people have a lot more to hide? Just knowing that your kid is enrolled at Le Rosey signals to a criminal that she is worth kidnapping... and the last status update shows her headed to Ibizia for spring break. In contrast, nobody cares if another poor kid "likes" Justin Bieber. Over-sharing seems a lot riskier for the rich (and famous.) It would be interesting to read the article you mentio…
The only significant kidnapping in the US is drug-related (in Phoenix) or husbands kidnapping their own children from estranged wives: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/latinamerica/l...
So the penalty for ongoing repeated lies and fraud is.... nothing. Zero. The FTC has investigated, and the settlement is zero money and zero penalties. Not one dollar. Whew! I'm glad they were punished! They won't do THAT again! The U.S. is really in late-stage empire breakdown. I don't think there is any significant enforcement of any laws whatsoever against companies and people that are reasonably well connected. T…
Mind you, I'm not arguing for a lack of regulation. Rather, that this is what much regulation seems to be reduced to, these days. Sadly.
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On the contrary, don't rich people have a lot more to hide? Just knowing that your kid is enrolled at Le Rosey signals to a criminal that she is worth kidnapping... and the last status update shows her headed to Ibizia for spring break. In contrast, nobody cares if another poor kid "likes" Justin Bieber. Over-sharing seems a lot riskier for the rich (and famous.) It would be interesting to read the article you mentio…
Kidnapping for ransom is rare in the United States. It's not good risk/reward. The family of the kid enrolled at Le Rosey is probably living beyond its means, and lacks sufficient credit to pay enough ransom to cover the costs of a kidnapping operation. The only significant kidnapping in the US is drug-related (in Phoenix) or husbands kidnapping their own children from estranged wives: http://www.latimes.com/news/nat…
I doubt that.
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Facebook users are not Facebook's customers.
Is anyone else really tired of reading this "you're not the customer, you're the product" platitude every day, especially in contexts like here where it's totally irrelevant? Yes, we get it, Facebook isn't directly making money off their users.
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On what legal basis would you expect a financial penalty for a free, voluntary-participation online service that did the things that the FTC found that Facebook did? What does the law on the subject give the FTC authority to do?
The FTC Act: "Unfair methods of competition in or affecting commerce, and unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce, are hereby declared unlawful." The FTC is empowered to enforce that with a variety of penalties, including extensive fines.
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> The only thing keeping the society from total breakdown is inertia. I know, society is breaking down, kids are getting more disrespectful, things are more expensive, the end of the world is upon us, etc :) You taking your lifetime to come to a realization about the state of the world does not make the realization less true before you had it. It's a memory glitch. Jump back 100 years, it's the same shit.
>Jump back 100 years, it's the same shit. Yep. Jump back 100 years, and you're in the breakdown of the British empire. And look what we became, a pointless, miserable lame-duck nation utterly yoked to the next empire that rose after us, the USA. Now you guys are gonna be yoked to the next empire, China. Have fun with that! I'll maybe catch you on a beach in Brazil, where hopefully things will be cool. Fingers crossed…
You're off by several decades and two world wars. The British Empire was in full bloom in 1911, and there was little unrest in any of its colonies, never mind at home.