Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#341

Post by thr0wawayf00 » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 9:27 PM UTC

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #331

thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By healthy I would mean physically non addictive and without any negative long term effects. But how would something like work? It's the substance's ability to cause euphoria that makes it addictive. You cannot have one without the other. Addiction occurs when one loses the ability to regulate their dopamine-driven activity, causing something akin to an infinite loop. Adderall is basically legal meth, and it's easi…

It should somehow be able to reset or configure brain's chemical state. There's 2 addictions, physical and psychological. Psychological, could yes still happen of course even if you restored the balance of dopamine and other relevant chemicals, but in theory you could at least get rid of withdrawals if you were able to manipulate those chemicals. We don't have a way to do that, and may be we won't have, and maybe we'…

What you're describing sounds vaguely like some naturally occurring psychedelics, but again, those typically aren't addictive because the body often tries to reject them, even when you achieve an altered state of mind. They're not pleasurable to take.

I highly recommend reading the Molecule of More, which does an incredible job of explaining the brain chemistry behind addiction in an accessible way.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#342

Post by vxNsr » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 9:57 PM UTC

baud147258 wrote: post #189

vxNsr wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But don’t you see what you’re saying? If the phone companies (TMobile, Verizon, etc) offered competitive pricing these apps/internet services wouldn’t exist! We would all happily pay Verizon the reasonable fees, instead they try to milk us and end up losing our business entirely.

not necessarily, because WA offers options that normal calls and text don't, like group conversations/calls, easier documents and picture sharing and video calls. I mean I have rather affordable texts for my usual correspondents, but I'm mostly using WA to chat with them

What’s stopping the phone companies from offering that? The point is that they’ve chosen to not innovate.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#343

Post by rybosworld » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 10:46 PM UTC

chuckee wrote: post #337

rybosworld wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Privately owned does not imply privately run.

Are telecoms not privately run? Or are you defining anything that's regulated as "not privately run"?

Really depends who you are grouping into telecoms.

Comcast/AT&T etc are not utilities, nor are they classified as such.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#344

Post by Denvercoder9 » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 10:59 PM UTC

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #339

Denvercoder9 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This. If calls and international calls were acessible, whatsapp wouldnt exist Whatsapp offers a whole lot more: read receipts, group chats, images and video, voice notes, location sharing, a web client (albeit a quite limited one), and it has a generally pretty good UX/UI (much better than Androids stock messaging app). Regardless of the economics, on a technical level calling/texting isn't competitive with Whatsap…

"at the technical level calling/texting isn't competitive with Whatsapp." This does not seem to an a comment informed about how the network works VoLTE is better quality audio than what's app, it gracefully works in large crowds and countryside instead of degrading into individual sylabiles the way whats app does. Latency is 10x lower. There is no central server that cam fail like it did last week. Calling is an intr…

With "technical" here I mean the featureset that's delivered to the user.

Maybe your mom doesn't care about the "fluff", but your mom isn't the person in society that sets the standard for apps that intrinsically require a network effect, and the people that do set such a standard, do care about what you dismiss as fluff.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#345

Post by krapp » Tue, Oct 05, 2021, 11:02 PM UTC

elliekelly wrote: post #279

krapp wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Now there is 1 single megacorp that a sizable portion of humanity depends on for phone/text communication. Not out of necessity. It's not as if any one corporation controls the internet and has a monopoly on mobile communication the way JP Morgan used to control the railroads. Plenty of options to text and communicate other than through Facebook exist. People are dependent on one specific app because they choose to…

People always had the option to avoid JP Morgan’s network of rails by walking or using a horse. But of course that’s silly to say. JP Morgan had built the one and only network. It was the fastest and easiest way to move goods and people so that’s what people “chose” to use. They “chose” it over options that vastly inferior. That’s what a monopoly is . And I would encourage you to think about the long-term implication…

> JP Morgan had built the one and only network.

And Facebook isn't the one and only social network, or means of communication over the internet. They don't own the infrastructure, and throttle all other sites into uselessness. They don't manufacture all of the mobile phones so that they only use Facebook.

>It was the fastest and easiest way to move goods and people so that’s what people “chose” to use.

Facebook is not significantly faster or easier in this regard than other solutions. A few years ago someone made an app that just texted "yo" and it got a million dollar valuation. An app that sends texts over the internet isn't rocket science.

>That’s what a monopoly is.

And clearly what Facebook isn't. Thank you for making my case so strongly.

> The negative externalities go far beyond “a slight annoyance”.

Not when it comes to the simple matter of being able to communicate with people on the internet. If losing Facebook means you in essence lose communication with the outside world, that isn't because Facebook controls all world communication, it's because you chose to center your entire life around a single application.

This was a non-event for most people. If Facebook had the stranglehold on global communication that many claim it does, the entire Western world, if not much of the entire world, would have come to a screeching halt.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#346

Post by ClumsyPilot » Wed, Oct 06, 2021, 1:03 AM UTC

Denvercoder9 wrote: post #344

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"at the technical level calling/texting isn't competitive with Whatsapp." This does not seem to an a comment informed about how the network works VoLTE is better quality audio than what's app, it gracefully works in large crowds and countryside instead of degrading into individual sylabiles the way whats app does. Latency is 10x lower. There is no central server that cam fail like it did last week. Calling is an intr…

With "technical" here I mean the featureset that's delivered to the user. Maybe your mom doesn't care about the "fluff", but your mom isn't the person in society that sets the standard for apps that intrinsically require a network effect, and the people that do set such a standard, do care about what you dismiss as fluff.

"people that do set such a standard, do care about what you dismiss as fluff"

Quick poll among my friends, 15% care about read reciepts but 100% care about money.

My mom is about the median age of a what's app user, who are these magical people that set the standard more than she does? Based on what evidence do you believe their preferences are different to her's?

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#347

Post by chakkepolja » Wed, Oct 06, 2021, 1:23 AM UTC

freetinker wrote: post #255

snek_case wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's easy to feel blasé about the internet, but it's also played a huge role in making information easily accessible. I learned about electronics from online tutorials. Taught myself programming. Also learned a lot about home repairs and renovations. Made a lot of contacts, landed jobs, etc. I met my partner through a dating app. I would say the internet has brought a lot of positive things in my life so far. The ope…

I’m going to count HN as a social network. It’s one of my favorite places on the internet. It surfaces great content, and the comments are a gold mine of top-notch information and advice (by and large). What general principles can we learn from HN that can be applied elsewhere? Does HN self-select its audience? No profit motive? Great moderation? (Thanks Dang!)

r/programming is pretty good in my personal opinion.

Also, niche tech subreddits tend to have great sources of information, even if some tend to become echo chambers over time.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

#348

Post by ajsnigrutin » Wed, Oct 06, 2021, 2:39 AM UTC

DantesKite wrote: post #48

ajsnigrutin wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem here is "other people". I'd like to use irc as a messaging platform, but almost noone uses it anymore. If all your friends and family use only whatsapp, you have no choice.

What are the benefits of using irc as a messaging platform?

Many different clients, bots, no registration, easy to join/leave channels, easy to automate stuff,...

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

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Post by OccamsMirror » Wed, Oct 06, 2021, 4:31 AM UTC

nxbp wrote: post #30

ajsnigrutin wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem here is "other people". I'd like to use irc as a messaging platform, but almost noone uses it anymore. If all your friends and family use only whatsapp, you have no choice.

and irc folks have splintered now to irc4ever hardcore, matrix preachers, mastodon tooters, other small social media jesuses and so on. oh, and discord lunatics. Can't wait for that walled garden to crash. Good thing is that there are choices. Bad thing about the good thing is that there are too many and we're stretching thin.

The general public do not give a shit about any of these. Wouldn't matter if there was only one.

Re: Facebook going down meant more than just a social network being unavailable

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Post by maratc » Wed, Oct 06, 2021, 12:31 PM UTC

sneak wrote: post #306

skohan wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is more likely imo

Someone who can't spend 2 minutes to install a free private messaging app to maintain a social or personal connection to me isn't someone who gives a shit about me (and whom I'm presumably better off without). Friends don't ask friends to submit to Facebook surveillance.

Would you be willing to install "a free private messaging app", Facebook Messenger, in order to "maintain a social or personal connection" to a person in your family?