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Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

nytimes.com

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Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#131

Post by snowwrestler »

throwawaymath wrote: post #126
mcphage wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm criticizing exactly what you called out as an assumption - the methodology of the sample; namely that they survey's distribution matches the population distribution. Yeah, I’m reading your previous comment, and I’m still not seeing it.

You're not seeing the issue with extrapolating a survey that lasted barely a week, from Pew Research, to an authoritative statement about the zeitgeist of the entire country? Okay. I specifically called out the date range issue in my original comment. But it seems like people can't move past the impulse to (in)correct me about pop statistics. I never said the issue was small sample size.

The reason you're getting downvoted is that your argument is basically "well what if they're wrong?"

Pew has established a reputation as an organization who conducts polls regularly and properly. You are a throwaway account on HN. To be Bayesian about it, the priors are way better for Pew than for you.

If you have specific, substantive criticisms of how Pew conducted that particular poll, by all means, share them and folks can discuss that.

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#132

Post by JumpCrisscross »

jseliger wrote: post #11

Is there an actual crisis, outside the media narrative? Has Facebook seen an actual fall in monthly, weekly, or daily active users? To me, this story reads a lot like a media narrative that has very little to do with users's actual lives. And I've been reading variations on "Why Facebook sucks" and "Why Facebook is doomed" for a very long time. It's like the "Why this is the year of Linux on the desktop," but for med…

> Is there an actual crisis, outside the media narrative?

There isn't much short-term stock prices are good for. Determining if investors will bet there is a problem is one of them.

Facebook's stock is down 20% YoY [1]. Unless you believe investors were blindsided by stalling rich-country MAU growth due to demographic saturation, the market is pricing something in. Facebook, too, appears to believe there something is awry--Q3 2018 operating income was down 8 points relative to the same period in 2017, due mostly to costs and expenses ballooning 53% over the same period [2].

If the New York Times' sources about Zuckerberg hiring PR firms to write hit pieces against those criticizing Facebook are accurate, it seems he, too, sees a crisis.

It requires multiple suspensions of disbelief to think this is a manufactured problem. Facebook has been a principal actor in major scandals and atrocities around the world, appears to have reacted petulantly, and relies almost existentially on not having Instagram and WhatsApp torn out of it by antitrust regulators. The final point makes political vulnerability salient to its future.

[1] 144.55 on 12 November 2018 / 177.95 on 15 November 2017

[2] https://investor.fb.com/investor-news/press-release-details/...

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#133

Post by snowwrestler »

izacus wrote: post #125
phillipamann wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just corporate posturing. Apple recently banned VPN's that have the potential to block ads including Freedom [1]. [1] https://freedom.to/blog/freedom-has-been-temporarily-removed...

Interesting how this post got downvoted even if it links to a source. Anyone wants to weigh in why?

Freedom is not an ad blocker; Apple has approved other apps that block ads; iOS ships with native support for ad blocking and VPNs.

It's a bummer for fans of Freedom that it got blocked, but it's not accurate to extrapolate that into some general Apple opposition to ad blocking.

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#134

Post by mcguire »

skeptic_69 wrote: post #45
thanatropism wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a small piece of a wider process, but Jaron Lanier is having such a global impact; probably much more than what Anglos imagine.

not just jaron lanier! there are multiple thinkers who are fellow travelrs. Cal newport, Tristan harris, Nicholas Carr...

"Fellow travelers?"

Been a while since I've heard that.

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#135

Post by squish78 »

dcow wrote: post #94
ForHackernews wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, you can bloody well hate some business and still patronize it. I'd wager most Americans hate their cable company. I agree there's little risk of users deserting Facebook en masse, but what we may see is lawmakers coming down on FB like a ton of bricks. It will be popular, too: Heavily regulating social media and slapping them with massive fines will be winning issues with constituents on both sides of the ais…

If 3 other people pledge with me, I’ll delete my Facebook account right now. I’ve already exported all my data.

Just do it, you don't need other people to affirm you

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#136

Post by mandevil »

vincvinc wrote: post #109
jseliger wrote: post #11

Is there an actual crisis, outside the media narrative? Has Facebook seen an actual fall in monthly, weekly, or daily active users? To me, this story reads a lot like a media narrative that has very little to do with users's actual lives. And I've been reading variations on "Why Facebook sucks" and "Why Facebook is doomed" for a very long time. It's like the "Why this is the year of Linux on the desktop," but for med…

Facebook’s downfall does not necessarily have to come from “lower user engagement”. Think about the context that FB operates in. Imagine more and more governments reading more and more stories about how this powerful platform is influencing elections, allowing hate speech, spreading lies and even causing genocides. You don’t have to have a too big imagination to see what they will do next. Not to mention the influenc…

Also, what effect does "we are evil" have on employee morale? What effect does a 20% decline in stock price (for a company where the RSU's and options were a significant hiring advantage) have on their ability to hire and retain talent? If they lose the talent war, does that affect their future growth potential?

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#137

Post by JumpCrisscross »

Flimm wrote: post #127

Here is Facebook's response to this article from NYTimes: https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/11/new-york-times-update/ Quoting: > Yesterday, The New York Times published an article about the past two years at Facebook. There are a number of inaccuracies in the story, including: > 1. Russia Investigation: The story asserts that we knew about Russian activity as early as the spring of 2016 but were slow to investigate i…

"Except for the dates when it knew of the Russian attacks, Facebook doesn't appear to be attacking the facts of the reports, but the interpretation. For instance, the NYT never said that what Facebook did was anti-Semitic, but rather that it was using Definers to depict attacks against it as anti-Semitic. 'It also tapped its business relationships, lobbying a Jewish civil rights group to cast some criticism of the company as anti-Semitic,' the report stated. Many of its other responses, including the Stamos investigation, fall along the same lines -- rebutting points that the NYT never made."

https://www.engadget.com/2018/11/15/facebook-response-nyt-ex...

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#138

Post by mcphage »

throwawaymath wrote: post #126
mcphage wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm criticizing exactly what you called out as an assumption - the methodology of the sample; namely that they survey's distribution matches the population distribution. Yeah, I’m reading your previous comment, and I’m still not seeing it.

You're not seeing the issue with extrapolating a survey that lasted barely a week, from Pew Research, to an authoritative statement about the zeitgeist of the entire country? Okay. I specifically called out the date range issue in my original comment. But it seems like people can't move past the impulse to (in)correct me about pop statistics. I never said the issue was small sample size.

> I never said the issue was small sample size.

> a quarter of the 4,594 people surveyed by Pew Research between May 29 and June 11 report deleting the Facebook app.

Emphasis yours.

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#139

Post by 908087 »

ilovecaching wrote: post #20

To me the negative press cycle involving Facebook and other advertising companies is more about the hidden war between the new age digital advertisers, and the former rulers of ads: the conventional news outlets. The news outlets will jump on any chance they can get to kill their competitors just like any other company. Without Facebook, they could become the sole source of news again, and reap the lost ad revenue th…

So what you're saying is that you don't trust the news due to bias and self interest, but you do trust those who actively drink from the Surveillance Valley kool-aid pitcher to give you an honest and unbiased point of view on this topic?

Re: Delay, Deny and Deflect: How Facebook’s Leaders Fought Through Crisis

#140

Post by sheana_ahlqvist »

The Innovation For All podcast released a super timely episode related to this yesterday. It was on whether tech companies like Facebook and Google are monopolies and if that's really a problem. https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/google-facebook-are-mono...

The guest went into this topic some more: "While Facebook had publicly declared itself ready for new federal regulations, Ms. Sandberg privately contended that the social network was already adopting the best reforms and policies available. Heavy-handed regulation, she warned, would only disadvantage smaller competitors."

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