Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're not wrong. Does it seem likely, though? I mean, at this point you're asking Facebook to do something which is directly inimical to its interests, in that people opting out of "local friend discovery" truncates its social graph, or at least reduces the weights it can put on some edges, and thus makes its information less valuable for targeted advertising. It would be nice to imagine that the people who make suc…
> people opting out ... makes its information less valuable for targeted advertising I have very little sympathy for a business model based on surveillance and manipulation. Figuring out how to generate revenue is Facebook's problem. Lots of unethical behavior would be valuable in various business models. Facebook can police themselves or they eventually invite (probably less desirable) legislation crafted by pissed…
I have none whatsoever. But Facebook, as it is today, is a thing that is. I don't see that imagining the current state of affairs to be other than it is helps anything. I'm also not hugely in favor of looking to government for a solution to this problem, because the United States government, for all its many and various qualities, has an extremely poor track record on legislation related to technology, and I do not see any reason to imagine their response to Facebook would buck the trend. At best, it'll be ineffective in its stated aim. At worst, it will be that and also inimical to a lot of other businesses which don't actually belong in its crosshairs to begin with.
> I have nothing against revealing the private information of the people who insist on doing the same as a business model
This implies an inaccurate conception of Facebook's business model, which has really nothing to do with revealing private information in the way you describe. I don't think Facebook lies when it says that such disclosures are accidental. I don't think that honesty is any excuse here, but you seem to be imputing evil where there's no reason to believe any exists; the problem is not that Facebook schemes at inflicting misery, but that its financial drive to monopolize an ever larger swath of human interaction increasingly creates misery as a side effect. We can acknowledge this, and work to put an end to it, without erroneously painting anyone as a monster.
You claim, too, not to advocate physical harm, and to be in general a pacifist. Those are nice claims to make. I hope you don't find yourself in the position of having to defend them after a release of Facebook employees' personal information results in someone being SWATted, or driven to suicide, or otherwise assaulted, battered, murdered, or likewise mistreated, as a direct result of an action with which you say you see nothing wrong. You might protest at that time that your rhetoric is unrelated, and your responsibility nonexistent. After all, I'm sure you yourself would never actually dox anyone, even if you do say it's fine to do so. Such protestations are not likely to find many sympathetic interlocutors.
> We accomplish this with liability. Data needs to be toxic.
This is an excellent point! It deserves to be found in better company than you have given it here.
> Blaming the victim is never the right answer.
I invite you, quite seriously, to review my HN comments on the subject of Facebook - they are quite plentiful, you'll have no trouble finding them - and identify any case in which I may accurately be said to have blamed the victim. My entire perspective on this matter is what it is because I am a victim! How do you suggest anyone go about making any kind of beneficial change more likely, if no one recognizes the need for it? How do you suggest such recognition come into existence, if not by finding ways to explain to people that there is a problem? Would you rather just sit back and wait until there's enough of a critical mass, of people who've been chewed up and spat out by the gears of Facebook's advertising data generation machine, for a groundswell of public opinion to arise organically? That seems a bit cruel to me.