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Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

wsj.com

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Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#61

Post by tablespoon »

cm2012 wrote: post #21
GhettoComputers wrote: post #9

https://www.apa.org/monitor/2019/03/trends-suicide > The suicide rate increased 33 percent from 1999 through 2017, from 10.5 to 14 suicides per 100,000 people (NCHS Data Brief No. 330, November 2018). Rates have increased more sharply since 2006. Suicide ranks as the fourth leading cause of death for people ages 35 to 54, and the second for 10- to 34-year-olds. It remains the 10th leading cause of death overall. >But…

Facebook is global, the fact the suicide rate only grew in the US and not worldwide is a point in its favor. Not to mention the increase in suicide rate is higher for older generations who use social media less, according to the data.

> Facebook is global, the fact the suicide rate only grew in the US and not worldwide is a point in its favor.

Not necessarily. To oversimplify things to make a point, suicide may have two ingredients: Facebook and something else. The US has an increased rate because has both (Facebook and the other ingredient), while the other places don't because they only have one ingredient (Facebook) and are missing the other. It's not a point in Facebook's favor if it is one of many ingredients in a recipe for suicide, and Facebook may be the easiest ingredient to eliminate.

And that's totally plausable. The US has many unique cultural factors (e.g. highest rating of individualism of any country).

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#62

Post by tablespoon »

haswell wrote: post #6
johncena33 wrote: post #4

As much as I don't like social media and Zuck in general, I think social media get a lot of undeserved blame. The biggest culture shock I had coming to North America, how materialistic, exhibitionistic and keeping-up-with-the-joneses the whole culture is. Sure, social media has made it worse. Before you can broadcast your fancy car to your neighbors, but cannot broadcast your fancy dinner to the whole world. With soc…

> But the culture of materialism and obsession with status was there well before social media has come into the picture. This is a pretty gross generalization of an entire country filled with diverse people, a significant number of whom do not match this description at all, now or before social media. On what are you basing this? This sounds like the kind of conclusion you might draw by using social media as a measur…

> This is a pretty gross generalization of an entire country filled with diverse people, a significant number of whom do not match this description at all, now or before social media.

It's a generalization that probably has legs, though. IIRC, surveys show US culture is uniquely extreme in some areas (e.g. most individualistic in the world). Exceptions don't disprove a broad outline.

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#63

Post by _bfhp »

Karawebnetwork wrote: post #30
GhettoComputers wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you prove these statements with any data? There are of course benefits to online networking, but the US population of LGBT is 5.6% (of all ages) with most concentrated in urban areas so you are pointing out a small age bracket of a specific type of social engagement in a small population as a counter with the assumption it is beneficial, and the hobbies you describe are not social media engagement, they are onlin…

I moderate four LGBTQIA+ communities and support spaces on Facebook, totaling over 395k members. I cover both my local scene and international communities. Without the online spaces, most members wouldn't have friends. The bulk of the work is managing the news feeds and the main task is to approve posts individually. So we see them all. Many would otherwise be totally isolated. Teens in rural America are among the mo…

That "40 to 50%" trans statistic is incredibly worrying. Can you share where it's from so I can reference it in the future when these discussions come up?

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#64

Post by [deleted] »

_bfhp wrote: post #63
Karawebnetwork wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I moderate four LGBTQIA+ communities and support spaces on Facebook, totaling over 395k members. I cover both my local scene and international communities. Without the online spaces, most members wouldn't have friends. The bulk of the work is managing the news feeds and the main task is to approve posts individually. So we see them all. Many would otherwise be totally isolated. Teens in rural America are among the mo…

That "40 to 50%" trans statistic is incredibly worrying. Can you share where it's from so I can reference it in the future when these discussions come up?

[deleted]

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#65

Post by bpodgursky »

johncena33 wrote: post #4

As much as I don't like social media and Zuck in general, I think social media get a lot of undeserved blame. The biggest culture shock I had coming to North America, how materialistic, exhibitionistic and keeping-up-with-the-joneses the whole culture is. Sure, social media has made it worse. Before you can broadcast your fancy car to your neighbors, but cannot broadcast your fancy dinner to the whole world. With soc…

Did you consider that that what created the materialism, is the same as what created the reason for you to move to NA in the first place?

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#66

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

mch82 wrote: post #53
swebs wrote: post #47

Someone already posted the archive of the WSJ article. But also the actual leaked documents don't seem to be paywalled. https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/teen-girls-body... https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/teen-mental-hea... https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/appearance-base... https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents/social-comparis... https://s.wsj.net/public/resources/documents…

This collection of links to the actual decks is quite helpful. Thank you.

That's literally the entire purpose of the OP. Great that they're not paywalled though.

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#67

Post by RNCTX »

bawolff wrote: post #56
freewilly1040 wrote: post #40

I see a lot defending the researchers involved, talking about how great they are and how none of Facebook’s misdeeds are their fault. At some point though, when data is consistently not shared, and any findings not favorable to the company are buried, what these people do is not “research”. It’s propaganda. They serve to give Facebook the appearance of valuing neutral judgement on the impact of their platform, and to…

That describes how a lot of research gets done. Its not just fb, oil companies are notorious for that sort of thing as well.

An apt comparison, considering Steven Donziger is in court again this week, after having basically endured a corporate-funded prosecution that has drawn on for almost three years, for the crime of winning a civil pollution suit against Chevron.

The children of every fed-level elected and appointed official in his jurisdiction and/or related to the case (house of reps member, both senators, judge, prosecutor) work for the law firm representing Chevron. No one forced any of these judges, politicians, and prosecutors to be complicit in a malicious/fraudulent prosecution. They chose complicity.

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#68

Post by fungiblecog »

As a person looking in from the outside, I observe that there are many worse things going on in American society than Facebook that could cause rising despair and suicide. I’m not saying it’s blameless but the overall picture there is not of a healthy society.

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#69

Post by belorn »

freewilly1040 wrote: post #40

I see a lot defending the researchers involved, talking about how great they are and how none of Facebook’s misdeeds are their fault. At some point though, when data is consistently not shared, and any findings not favorable to the company are buried, what these people do is not “research”. It’s propaganda. They serve to give Facebook the appearance of valuing neutral judgement on the impact of their platform, and to…

Which comment are you referring to?

The only comment here on HN that seems to be directly dismissive is the one that claims about the study being made with a total size of 25 people, of which a final 7 people were selected for the in-depth interview.

Everything about this study seems to be terrible. How the study was made, the reaction by Facebook of the result, the researcher who conducted the study. It seems that rather than go with a establish company that do professional surveys they went with a small scale internal study that did not show favorable results and so they hide it and here we are.

Re: Facebook’s documents about Instagram and teens, published

#70

Post by mattgreenrocks »

swebs wrote: post #50
GhettoComputers wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the name “social media” doublespeak? Comparing the online or digital equivalent or approximation as a simulation of reality has either created a false hyperreality at best but usually that of a poor imitation.

It is still reality. You're talking to real people, not NPCs.

Sometimes they're real, and sometimes they're idealized projections put forth by said people. This will happen in any setting but social media seems to encourage it for whatever reason.

There are no easy solutions to this.

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