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Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

nytimes.com

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Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#171

Post by tzs »

tomp wrote: post #103
tzs wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having the law as the sole arbiter of what is allowed or not would be terrible for free speech. The problem is that we have an overwhelming amount of information being produced, so that people have a hard time evaluating all they are exposed to. Furthermore, we have a lot of people who are just too trusting, or too naive, or too gullible, or perhaps just even stupid. Finally, on top of that we have many information p…

You're conflating a few issues. Facebook is being boycotted ostensibly for failing to combat hate speech, whereas your comment is mostly written as a argument to censor fake news. Classical mote-and-bailey fallacy. Twitter deleting bots claiming that Obama was born in Africa? Fine. Twitter tagging Trump's warning that any squatters in Washington DC will be treated according to law as "promoting violence against speci…

> You're conflating a few issues. Facebook is being boycotted ostensibly for failing to combat hate speech, whereas your comment is mostly written as a argument to censor fake news. Classical mote-and-bailey fallacy.

I didn't realize that when you said the law should be the arbiter of what speech is allowed, not Facebook, that you were just talking about hate speech. I thought you were making an argument about free speech in general.

> Sure, you probably wrote your comment because you oppose Trump on political views and you support Twitter acting against promoting those views, but at least be transparent about it; don't claim that tech giants are just trying to protect the "naive, gullible, stupid" is gas-lighting.

Actually, none of the examples I had in mind had anything whatsoever to do with Trump as far as I know. I was thinking of flat Earth people, Scientologists, the people who feed kids bleach to ward of autism, and similar.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#172

Post by tech-historian »

pesenti wrote: post #100
tech-historian wrote: post #64

Serious questions: Are the people that work at Facebook proud to work there? What is morale like inside that place? When someone asks you what you do, and you say "I work for Facebook," what is their typical reaction? Not trying to be snarky. I'm genuinely curious how these perceptions/feelings might have changed over the past few years.

I have answered part of your question before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19036507 Happy to answer more.

Thanks for your perspective here.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#173

Post by rossdavidh »

skewart wrote: post #123
salimmadjd wrote: post #108

Am I the only person who has a problem with this headline, "Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing" am I overreacting here or others feel the same? For me at the face of it's not incorrect, but it feels to me a certain deliberate wordsmithing is used to create a sense of growing momentum. What we don't know if these advertisers represent 1%, more or less than x% of Facebook's ad revenue. I do understand FB will not pro…

What’s more, the NY Times has a strong business interest in convincing advertisers not to advertise on Facebook. I’m a bit skeptical of anything they publish these days about Facebook, Google, and other companies that could potentially threaten their access to clicks, just given their financial incentives to weaken these companies as much as possible.

My thoughts exactly, they have a clear conflict of interest when covering this story. Although, to be honest, all of mainstream journalism seems way more biased and blatantly slanted than I recall from 20-30 years ago. Perhaps I am just better at noticing it now?

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#174

Post by rainyMammoth »

tech-historian wrote: post #64

Serious questions: Are the people that work at Facebook proud to work there? What is morale like inside that place? When someone asks you what you do, and you say "I work for Facebook," what is their typical reaction? Not trying to be snarky. I'm genuinely curious how these perceptions/feelings might have changed over the past few years.

I know a couple. The answer is simple: Money. Facebook pays way above what other tech companies pay (a 6 year of experience senior engineer in Menlo Park can easily make 600k/year). There is also a sense of pride coming from back in the days when Facebook was still seen as a very exclusive and wonderful place to work at.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#175

Post by derp_dee_derp »

s_y_n_t_a_x wrote: post #170
wayne_skylar wrote: post #109

I find it so funny that Facebook hides behind "freedom of speech" when in fact what they do is the exact opposite. When everything you saw was cronological, you could make that argument. I write a message on my wall and everyone who follows me can see it if they scroll down far enough. Most importantly, the only criteria used was the time it was submitted which I think everyone can agree is fair. By prioritizing cert…

So Twitter is a private company and can do whatever it wants but when it comes to FB making decisions about free speech we need to force them into submission? If you don't like it, move to another platform, isn't that what you guys always say? :)

the person you responded too didn't mention anything about twitter and you seem to be chasing straw men.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#176

Post by toss1 »

klyrs wrote: post #143
wayne_skylar wrote: post #109

I find it so funny that Facebook hides behind "freedom of speech" when in fact what they do is the exact opposite. When everything you saw was cronological, you could make that argument. I write a message on my wall and everyone who follows me can see it if they scroll down far enough. Most importantly, the only criteria used was the time it was submitted which I think everyone can agree is fair. By prioritizing cert…

Facebook has a right to free speech. They can moderate and curate content on their site. Their commitment to your free speech is "free as in beer" -- as in, you're giving them content and they don't pay you a dime for it.

Of course they have a right to free speech

What they do not have a right to is the claim that they should be treated as neutral carriers (like TelCos) when they in fact constantly exercise editorial control for the placement each item.

(If they merely posted a chronological list, they would have a valid claim for free speech and no exercised control)

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#178

Post by eanzenberg »

esperent wrote: post #148
erikw wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I too am curious about the internal motivations of people who work for Facebook. Something I've noticed about myself is that I would be okay with working for a US defense contractor, ie a company which makes machines that literally kill people, yet I could not picture myself working at Facebook. I struggle to square this morally, because I also believe that defense contractors have a greater net negative impact on so…

> I would be okay with working for a US defense contractor, ie a company which makes machines that literally kill people The thought of working for a company like this makes me feel physically ill. Soldiers can at least feel like they are working to defend a country they believe in. Weapons companies will sell killing machines to anyone with money. Few things in the world make me feel the visceral disgust that these…

What damage is Zuck causing again?

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#179

Post by Veen »

pjc50 wrote: post #141
Veen wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a majority posts a banner, and one doesn't, it will be understood as opposition. As we've been hearing a lot of late: "Silence is pro-racist" and "Silence is violence". Under those conditions, not posting a banner would be to risk being considered a racist organization. This is not quite coercion, but nor is it possible to decline to post a banner without substantial and probably unjustified cost.

That's just other people using their free speech to call you a racist. Does their speech have a cost to you? Do you want them .. censored? Or should we be allowed to put "Veen is a racist" in all our javascript headers? As the British version of the Miranda warning says, "You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court".

We often object to people's speech when it is harmful: lies, slander, slurs, incitement, and so on are considered harmful and within the realm of what can be reasonably morally condemned. When I object to a lie, I am not asking for the liar to be censored, I am asking them not to lie. When someone calls an organization racist for specious reasons, I am not asking for them to be censored, I'm asking them not to slander people. Why? Because I believe it is harmful: in the short-term, it's a useful rhetorical technique to achieve a goal. In the long-term, widespread acceptance of lies and slanders is corrosive, divisive, and harmful to our society.

Re: Ad Boycott of Facebook Keeps Growing

#180

Post by rainyMammoth »

pesenti wrote: post #169
WhompingWindows wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain why you think FB's products are good for the world? Do you think Donald Trump would be President without FB? Edit: Apparently someone downvoted this comment within 60 seconds...this seems contrary to HN's ethos. I asked a general question with a specific example; is someone triggered by the words "Donald Trump"? This is pushing a legitimate question about FB's effect on the world down into the gray...…

I am an immigrant in the US. My family uses FB products (FB App, WhatsApp, Portal) to stay in touch across the world. It really improves our lives. It doesn't mean I believe everything that's done on our products is good for the world, but I do believe the good outweighs the bad by a wide margin. A big part of my job is to make sure that this margin increases.

I really don't see how by a wide margin Facebook products can be a net positive to the world. They are a net NEGATIVE and probably by a huge margin (if you could quantify it, probably destroying more lives than a lot of defence contractors). Facebook:

- Disrupt democracy all over the world,creating divisive political lines between us.

- Destroys the mental health of millions of teenagers that spend hours on Instagram comparing their lives with the fake lives of other people. An epidemic of mental health is directly linked to Instagram/Facebook

- Make us lose Billions of hours scrolling through a feed of nonsense just to display some ads.

Facebook is a huge net negative to the world. The only justification that I can see working for them is selfish money. Call it what it is, don't come up with some nonsense Koolaid around the product being a positive to the world.

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