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Meta lays off 11,000 people

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Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#471

The world runs on certain types of software. I doesn't run on social media, or video streaming, or "AI/ML", or search. So it doesn't actually run on FAANG companies. It is no surprise they are shedding workers when the free money runs out. But if you are willing to work on "boring software" that provides actual economic value - logistics, HR/Payroll, or really anything people actually pay to use because it boosts the…

Sure, FAANG may make a lot of frivolous stuff (Metaverse, anyone?) but also a lot of boring software that the world really does run on now days. Google especially.

Maybe not in the US, but WhatsApp is pretty important messaging infrastructure in big chunks of the world

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#472
post #444

> I got this wrong, and I take responsibility for that. As always with these things, I wonder what taking responsibility actually means in practice. Businesses usually try to find ways to correct for major failures in decision making. In the case of Zuck, given his ownership, does anything actually happen or change? I'm sure his net worth has been reduced by changes to Meta's share price, but he was a multi-billionai…

Taking responsibility would mean resigning as CEO, for example. Or altering the voting situation where he has absolute power, can't be voted out by the board of directors, and thus has no accountability for his actions and mistakes. But just saying that you're taking responsibility is not actually taking responsibility. It's empty words.

I don't agree with that take at all. No leader would be able to learn from mistakes or grow if they had to metaphorically commit Seppuku every time they made a mistake by resigning or abdicating their authority.

Taking responsibility would mean owning the situation as being caused by you, and critically evaluating your actions to see if there were different paths you could have taken given the same information, or if there was other information that you should have added to your decision-making.

There are some mistakes so grave and unjustifiable that resignation would be the appropriate way to take responsibility for them, but I don't think a round of layoffs pending an expected economic downturn after excessive growth qualifies.

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#473

The world runs on certain types of software. I doesn't run on social media, or video streaming, or "AI/ML", or search. So it doesn't actually run on FAANG companies. It is no surprise they are shedding workers when the free money runs out. But if you are willing to work on "boring software" that provides actual economic value - logistics, HR/Payroll, or really anything people actually pay to use because it boosts the…

[deleted]

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a Bayesian perspective is helpful here. 1) How likely is it that Zuck makes that statement if he feels like he is responsible? 2) How likely is it if he doesn't feel responsible? I think the answers to those questions are quite similar, in which case hearing the statement doesn't actually tell us much.

Just to elaborate on this since I had to think about it and I might save someone else the effort: Let M = Makes the statement Let R = Feels Responsible Notation: ~R = Not R Answering OP's questions 1 & 2: I think it's safe to assume P(M|R) = P(M|~R) = 1 So P(M) = 1 So Bayes' theorem simplifies as follows: P(R|M) = P(M|R)P(R)/PM) = P(R) Thus, OP's point is that the statement tells us essentially nothing about the prob…

But both of your assumptions imply the conclusion, so the math doesn’t actually seem helpful at all.

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#476

The world runs on certain types of software. I doesn't run on social media, or video streaming, or "AI/ML", or search. So it doesn't actually run on FAANG companies. It is no surprise they are shedding workers when the free money runs out. But if you are willing to work on "boring software" that provides actual economic value - logistics, HR/Payroll, or really anything people actually pay to use because it boosts the…

I don’t agree at all. These companies are all super important and provide valuable services. If they vanish suddenly tomorrow that hole will be felt by every single human one way or the other. You are going back to 1970s for your comparison but that is not where we are

I'll grant you that for the AAG part of FAANG, but I can't think of a single useful product from FB. If FB itself vanished overnight people would just go back to sharing their cat pictures with family over sms (as they are doing anyway), and all the dusty unused Occulus headsets in drawers would stop receiving updates. Otherwise....

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#477

The world runs on certain types of software. I doesn't run on social media, or video streaming, or "AI/ML", or search. So it doesn't actually run on FAANG companies. It is no surprise they are shedding workers when the free money runs out. But if you are willing to work on "boring software" that provides actual economic value - logistics, HR/Payroll, or really anything people actually pay to use because it boosts the…

> So it doesn't actually run on FAANG companies

Disagree, a lot of businesses do use GSuite and also a lot of people in the world do definitely use youtube/gmail/gmaps. Samething with apple, people will still use iPhones and a lot of people in the first world at least will still use macs. Only companies your comments apply to are Facebook and Netflix, and even then Whatsapp is basically an essential app to have if you're not form North America

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#479
post #455

"We’ve shifted more of our resources onto a smaller number of high priority growth areas [like] our long-term vision for the metaverse" Imagine laying off eleven thousand people so you can keep clinging to the disintegrating corpse of the metaverse.

I wonder if no-one from higher-ups in Meta tell Zuckerberg that it is not going to happen and explain to him what sunk cost fallacy is.

Re: Meta lays off 11,000 people

#480
post #444

> I got this wrong, and I take responsibility for that. As always with these things, I wonder what taking responsibility actually means in practice. Businesses usually try to find ways to correct for major failures in decision making. In the case of Zuck, given his ownership, does anything actually happen or change? I'm sure his net worth has been reduced by changes to Meta's share price, but he was a multi-billionai…

Taking responsibility would mean resigning as CEO, for example. Or altering the voting situation where he has absolute power, can't be voted out by the board of directors, and thus has no accountability for his actions and mistakes. But just saying that you're taking responsibility is not actually taking responsibility. It's empty words.

"Where's the vaporware? Under the pickle...." is best portrayed by the younger types.

https://youtu.be/Ug75diEyiA0

You know why the food sucks so bad when you know who they are catering to :p

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