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Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#171

Post by ohbleek »

thanatropism wrote: post #125
bambax wrote: post #66

> Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook’s true customers, whom it works hard to please. And you just figured this out now? This is like saying "wow, who knew we would get so fat by feeding only on pizza, hamburgers and coke, aren't those companies evil". Well, yes, companies are evil. They don't work for you…

This is one of the better side-effects of Trump. We wouldn´t be having this conversation if Hillary or Bernie had used these powerful resources to tilt the odds and get elected. Because almost no one with a platform likes Trump, it gets exposed. If this happened under Obama (like, uh, Assange and Snowden and Manning and massive data centers in Utah happened), it would be completely swept under the rug in favor of a f…

I'm not sure I agree that it would be swept under the rug, seeing that you can mention those earlier issues without explaining them. Outrage and discussion occurred the same way they are now, and just like in those cases, not much is going to happen concerning facebook and its use of personal data. What I'm saying is that your assertion that it has anything to do with progressive/conservative narrative is false, because the result is going to be the same.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#172

Post by 52-6F-62 »

fortythirteen wrote: post #115
bambax wrote: post #66

> Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook’s true customers, whom it works hard to please. And you just figured this out now? This is like saying "wow, who knew we would get so fat by feeding only on pizza, hamburgers and coke, aren't those companies evil". Well, yes, companies are evil. They don't work for you…

> Should we all just leave Facebook? That may sound attractive but it is not a viable solution. Leaving not just Facebook, but Twitter, Instagram, and all other social media of its ilk is an extremely viable solution. It's like quitting smoking. For the first month or so you feel off-kilter, but, after a while, you can't imagine going back. Life is quantifiably better without it. Realizing that I don't need up to the…

Funny, I quit smoking and Facebook around the same time a few years ago. My life has been enormously better for it.

I miss neither.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#173

Post by kaybe »

ParanoidShroom wrote: post #47
kaybe wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, sentiance is super creepy.

I was recruited to work there, since they are from my local neighborhood I know them some time already. They have a history of analyzing data with financial support from Samsung. They are a smart bunch, don't have bad intentions towards people. That being said, their goal is indeed ... Well not something I value personally. But they are all good guys that are eager to make an amazingly powerful product. I agree that…

So you're saying this is not an elaborate hoax? There goes my last hope..

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#174

Post by watertom »

3chelon wrote: post #78
bambax wrote: post #66

> Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook’s true customers, whom it works hard to please. And you just figured this out now? This is like saying "wow, who knew we would get so fat by feeding only on pizza, hamburgers and coke, aren't those companies evil". Well, yes, companies are evil. They don't work for you…

You're absolutely right we should all leave FB. It's the only way to make them change. I've been seriously considering it for a while - I'd lose some exposure in my hobby groups, and my mother would miss the kids' photo updates, but I could just about live with that.

what you can't email your mom pictures? IF she can use Facebook she can read email

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#176

Post by paulie_a »

ahussain wrote: post #64
hellofunk wrote: post #31

I wish quite badly that the benefit of deactivating FB would outweigh the inconvenience, but FB has become such a mainstay that I'd lose touch with lots of people I really have no other way of contacting. I could say "good riddance," if there is no other way to contact them then perhaps they are not important enough to my life, but that's just not true. Or what about all the local forums (FB groups) in my city that h…

You can deactivate your FB account and still use Messenger (and hence keep your contacts). You would lose Groups and Events though

Why would anyone want to use messenger, it is such a low quality app to be beyond useless.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#177

Post by root_axis »

gfodor wrote: post #155
mliker wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VR hasn’t taken off as promised and the hype is dying down now. The headset is too clunky in its current incarnation. People view it as a novelty item rather than a useful tool, so I’m inclined to believe this won’t be the massive surveillance tool VR proponents think it’ll be.

Untethered standalone VR devices are likely a prerequisite to any mainstream adoption and are shipping this year. Your guess is as good as mine if they will reach mass appeal, but to assume VR is not viable before these devices are available at low prices is probably wrong. The one to keep your eye on is the Oculus Go which is a self contained device for $199. (Also a Facebook product, probably going to have all this…

> Untethered standalone VR devices are likely a prerequisite to any mainstream adoption and are shipping this year

Not good ones though. Any VR headset without positional tracking is essentially a google cardboard.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#178

Post by Pokepokalypse »

thanatropism wrote: post #125
bambax wrote: post #66

> Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook’s true customers, whom it works hard to please. And you just figured this out now? This is like saying "wow, who knew we would get so fat by feeding only on pizza, hamburgers and coke, aren't those companies evil". Well, yes, companies are evil. They don't work for you…

This is one of the better side-effects of Trump. We wouldn´t be having this conversation if Hillary or Bernie had used these powerful resources to tilt the odds and get elected. Because almost no one with a platform likes Trump, it gets exposed. If this happened under Obama (like, uh, Assange and Snowden and Manning and massive data centers in Utah happened), it would be completely swept under the rug in favor of a f…

"massive data centers in Utah" was absolutely a Bush Administration thing.

If Obama didn't stop it, it was due to the toxic political climate and congressional domination by TeaParty/GOP. The current Democratic Party lineup, and over the past 15 years, has also been shifted pretty far to the right, but that has been a result of the effort by the extreme right since the Clinton presidency; since Newt Gingrich, and FoxNews to slant the electorate to the right.

I doubt that most Republicans or any Democrats would have supported that kind of horrible breach of the 4th Amendment in the 1990's or 80's. And trying to hang that around Obama's neck is ridiculously dishonest.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#179

Post by soylentcola »

root_axis wrote: post #177
gfodor wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Untethered standalone VR devices are likely a prerequisite to any mainstream adoption and are shipping this year. Your guess is as good as mine if they will reach mass appeal, but to assume VR is not viable before these devices are available at low prices is probably wrong. The one to keep your eye on is the Oculus Go which is a self contained device for $199. (Also a Facebook product, probably going to have all this…

> Untethered standalone VR devices are likely a prerequisite to any mainstream adoption and are shipping this year Not good ones though. Any VR headset without positional tracking is essentially a google cardboard.

Sure, but when the iPhone came out I'd already been using Palm and PocketPC smartphones for a few years. At the time I thought "any smartphone without the ability to install third party software, send MMS messages, use a GPS radio to locate me accurately, copy and paste, or even change the ringtone is essentially just a feature phone".

Things start out simple, limited, clunky, and expensive. Occasionally they become capable, svelte, commonplace, and affordable after 5 or 10 years of development and refinement.

Re: Facebook’s Surveillance Machine

#180

Post by pksadiq »

fortythirteen wrote: post #115
bambax wrote: post #66

> Facebook makes money, in other words, by profiling us and then selling our attention to advertisers, political actors and others. These are Facebook’s true customers, whom it works hard to please. And you just figured this out now? This is like saying "wow, who knew we would get so fat by feeding only on pizza, hamburgers and coke, aren't those companies evil". Well, yes, companies are evil. They don't work for you…

> Should we all just leave Facebook? That may sound attractive but it is not a viable solution. Leaving not just Facebook, but Twitter, Instagram, and all other social media of its ilk is an extremely viable solution. It's like quitting smoking. For the first month or so you feel off-kilter, but, after a while, you can't imagine going back. Life is quantifiably better without it. Realizing that I don't need up to the…

Quitting Facebook isn't as easy as it might seem. The same way as it's not easy to escape from the effects of smoking. Not because you can't, but there is always a chance of passive smoking.

So, as long as we have some relation with some society of which some one is connected, we will have some passive effects due to that.

Say like, if some one need to stop your car, they don't need to stop yours, but someone ahead of you.

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