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Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#31

Post by therealmarv »

mantas wrote: post #26
nof wrote: post #12

Just boycott Facebook already. 'but everyone uses it', yes but you have a choice. If you don't like the Facebook, then gtfo and make the effort to build something to replace it. But I guess that is too much work. People whine about Facebook, yet they do nothing to change the situation. You change the situation by making a choice. If your choice is to have Facebook account, then you are part of the problem, not the so…

The solution is not to build FB killer. The solution is to decentralise the web. Let's embrace newsletters and RSS feeds once again. I recently came back to using RSS feeds and it feels great. The problem is that many websites don't maintain their feeds properly. Broken links, missing content and whatnot.. I guess nobody ever uses them aside from weirdos.

I've also done the same. Invested the last 2 weeks more time in my theoldreader account and using twitter bridges (even instagram bridges exist) for not supporting entities like http://twitrss.me/

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#32

Post by kadenshep »

kevinthew wrote: post #13
sremani wrote: post #5

Even though their formats are different NYT et al. and FB are competitors. Even though there is kernel of truth, the media witch-hunt of Facebook is out of proportion. Long story short, its not concern for democracy (if NYT was concerned about democracy it would not be a rabid partisan) its just jealousy and hate that Zuckerberg is eating their cake.

"Rabid partisan". I do love coming onto to HackerTheDonald to get my hot takes.

"I'm going to use my political motivations as a shield to avoid credible, consistently reasonable reporting of situations that don't align with my narrative. The facts, err I mean NY Times, are just biased!"

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#33

Post by nippples »

Ygg2 wrote: post #28
nof wrote: post #12

Just boycott Facebook already. 'but everyone uses it', yes but you have a choice. If you don't like the Facebook, then gtfo and make the effort to build something to replace it. But I guess that is too much work. People whine about Facebook, yet they do nothing to change the situation. You change the situation by making a choice. If your choice is to have Facebook account, then you are part of the problem, not the so…

> then you are part of the problem, not the solution Are you going US vs THEM on 2 billion people? Good luck with that.

> then you are a part of the problem, not the solution

^ regrettable quote

> Are you going US vs THEM on 2 billion people? Good luck with that.

^ another regrettable quote

Something's popularity says nothing about its value. See, for example, religion. The most popular ones still suck a lot. Some more than others.

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#34

Post by misiti3780 »

nippples wrote: post #33
Ygg2 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> then you are part of the problem, not the solution Are you going US vs THEM on 2 billion people? Good luck with that.

> then you are a part of the problem, not the solution ^ regrettable quote > Are you going US vs THEM on 2 billion people? Good luck with that. ^ another regrettable quote Something's popularity says nothing about its value. See, for example, religion. The most popular ones still suck a lot. Some more than others.

Correction: They all suck

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#35

Post by fredley »

dbrgn wrote: post #3

It's a sad state of affairs if Facebook is a requirement for becoming a working democracy.

That's not the point at all. Facebook just happens to be right now how most people discover and consume news, in many (most?) countries. This is a position of absolutely enormous power, giving Facebook the ability, deliberately or otherwise, to control and manipulate public discourse more than perhaps any entity in history.

Moderation of public discourse – in the sense of keeping public discourse in a roughly central place, and minimising the extent to which extremists can manipulate it – is absolutely a requirement for a working democracy.

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#36

Post by austinjp »

sremani wrote: post #5

Even though their formats are different NYT et al. and FB are competitors. Even though there is kernel of truth, the media witch-hunt of Facebook is out of proportion. Long story short, its not concern for democracy (if NYT was concerned about democracy it would not be a rabid partisan) its just jealousy and hate that Zuckerberg is eating their cake.

> if NYT was concerned about democracy it would not be a rabid partisan

How does that follow? How are democracy and partisanship exclusive, or "orthogonal"?

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#37

Post by PunchTornado »

Why is every complain about Facebook directed towards Zuckenberg. He is not alone in this company. We are thousands of engineers that work here and make fb what it is.

It feels like all our work (good or bad) is work being done by Zuckenberg, even if he did not have any input on some issues.

I don't see Larry Page receiving the same thanks or blame when deepmind or other google thing does good or bad.

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#38

Post by hectorlorenzo »

PunchTornado wrote: post #37

Why is every complain about Facebook directed towards Zuckenberg. He is not alone in this company. We are thousands of engineers that work here and make fb what it is. It feels like all our work (good or bad) is work being done by Zuckenberg, even if he did not have any input on some issues. I don't see Larry Page receiving the same thanks or blame when deepmind or other google thing does good or bad.

Don't tell Mark you work for him but still can't spell his name.

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#39

Post by aswanson »

mantas wrote: post #26
nof wrote: post #12

Just boycott Facebook already. 'but everyone uses it', yes but you have a choice. If you don't like the Facebook, then gtfo and make the effort to build something to replace it. But I guess that is too much work. People whine about Facebook, yet they do nothing to change the situation. You change the situation by making a choice. If your choice is to have Facebook account, then you are part of the problem, not the so…

The solution is not to build FB killer. The solution is to decentralise the web. Let's embrace newsletters and RSS feeds once again. I recently came back to using RSS feeds and it feels great. The problem is that many websites don't maintain their feeds properly. Broken links, missing content and whatnot.. I guess nobody ever uses them aside from weirdos.

That sentiment is why 99.9999 of programmers like us never made facebook. Normal humans don't want to maintain seperate feeds and RSS readers for every possible interest etc along with a seperate message client along with a place to post photos, etc. They want something simple and human, like fb.

Re: Facebook's experiments with user behavior in Serbia

#40

Post by notacoward »

cantrip wrote: post #18
loceng wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Treat or threat?..

One of the most annoying things to me about HN, or any forum site in general, is when people jump on obvious typos or grammar errors when they could easily ignore them and respond to the actual content of the comment instead. Use context. It's so incredibly obvious that this person didn't mean treat, and yet here it is, a little jab to say "I'm just a little bit better than you" because I noticed a missing h and just…

Maybe if s/he hadn't just accused other people of being uneducated (without repercussions despite the obvious lack of respect), the typo wouldn't have stood out as hypocritical. You too need to use context.
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