He's telling me to calm down. That's so condescending.
2
Personally, I'm beginning to believe that Zuckerberg isn't quite as bright as everyone thinks he is. Either that, or he's a stellar actor.
1
He should have been prosecuted for fraud the day he flipped from "we'll protect your privacy" to "privacy is passé." https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/jan/11/facebook-privacy
3
Something just doesn't add up about the numbers involved with Mr Kogan's app data, which he asked for and was granted access to by facebook. In its press release, facebook claims that Mr Kogan was granted access to data derived from his app called "this is your digital life", which was available to facebook users for free. The users of the app, as part of the sign-up procedures, agreed to make certain data available to facebook, as well as the app developer. Facebook and Kogan put the number of signups at 270,000.
In order for 50M profiles to be mined from 270,00 sign ups, every person who signed up would have had to do the following-1)not bothered to use ANY of the privacy settings supplied with the app and 2) have close to 200 facebook friends that anyone, public or private could see because they never set their basic facebook privacy settings to protect their friends. I, personally, find it EXTREMELY hard to believe that every person who used Kogan's app was that careless, although the possibility of facebook users not paying attention to what they signed up for is , indeed, possible.
It seems that some may be playing this activity up for every second of notariety that it is worth, even though the numbers claimed seem to be way beyond the possibility of what actually transpired...
1
When an industry, or one company with practically unlimited resources to do anything to maximize profit and resist disclosure, responsibility, or liability harms us or is used to manipulate all of us in ways we never imagined, we resist demanding real solutions and assign folks not quite as clever as us, or perhaps just more trusting than we are, blame, responsibility, and ignorance. We may stop trying to fix serious problems since they are complex or difficult: we "need more oil" or folks already own "too many guns" or we "gave up privacy" rights by using Facebook or Gmail. Governments make excuses for not protecting us: money=speech, companies=persons, guns=safety, women<>men, and that our private decisions have zero value until they are collected and analyzed by others that "own" our choices. And companies get to decide how they are properly regulated, whether legally by everyone or by an "arbitration" process they define.
Regulation exists to reduce the risk of death and destructiom by stopping harm before it's too late. When oil is spilled money cannot resurrect birds, restore seas and land, or revive lost family members. But any concept of "personal responsibility" can't prevent oil spills any more than it can stop guns from doing the only thing they are designed to do, kill. It's up to us to decide what we will allow others, whether persons, white thugs, companies, even PACs and Attorneys General do to harm any of us and all of us. We the people, for us, by us.
1
When I was a kid, you went the phone company and got an account. The first thing they did was print your name and phone number in a book and pass these out all over town. If you wanted your privacy protected, you had to pay them a fee to be unlisted.
All of my life, corporations claim that they will not sell our data. Right. Now, if I want to set up an account with Google, I get a fail message and they want a phone number so they can text me a special code. They could just as easily email me that code but then they would not have my phone number.
I recently got a new phone. I have given my number out to about 8 people but the phone rings all day with companies offering me things. I know I did not give them the number:)
My silent way of revolting is to now give false information when ever possible online. If a company wants me to participate in a survey, I lie about my age, race, income, etc., just to mess with the data:) I encourage others to do the same to the point that online data collection becomes as reliable as an E-Meter attached to Leah Remini.
3
No sign of leadership here. Its too bad people like Zuckerberg, professional athletes, dishonest developers (Kuschner, Trump, et al) are all enrichened in our society and real leaders go mostly unnoticed.
2
The FBI needs to investigate what Zuckerberg knew and when. And whether there was deliberate attempt to mislead.
If you remember Zuckerberg was touring America last year with speculation rife of a run in 2020.
Question is: why in 2017? Why not earlier or later?
I’m not saying he colluded with Russia to get Trump elected.
I AM saying that he knew what and how Facebook had been used to win the election for Trump.
He and Facebook just stayed mum hoping no one would ever find out.
That itself is obstruction of justice, if not lying (maybe not perjury. But lying).
4
Why not in 2017? He is not old enough to run for president, yet.
And your point is...?
He will Be old enough to run in 2020.
Unlike Cambridge Analytica acting for the Trump campaign, Obama's 2008 and 2012 campaign didn't obtain Facebook data under false pretenses. Attempts of equate the use of Facebook data by Cambridge Analytica and "Organizing for Action"are based on false comparisons.
2
“Calm down. Breathe. We hear you ... (as we take the money and run)."
2
Really pompous.
1
"Little" is afraid of his own shadow. You will find him hiding under the bed or behind the couch.
Facebook is evil. Facebook does everything it can to prompt users to post more and more intimate personal information to the site. Facebook is a privacy and security nightmare for everyone who uses it. Facebook is by far the largest database of personal information on the planet and there are a limitless number of organizations who want to get that information so they can exploit it both legally and illegally. Beware!
4
Angrymobvoter...funny thing is...no one at FB holds a gun to the publics head. Not giving info is much like changing the channel when you dont like the show. Its still a free choice. Sit there and dislike the show, or change the channel. Dont fill in the surveys, stop answering their requests. A prompt to act can be overruled. Dont be a robot.
Or delete the account. I promise your life will not end.
It was not big deal when Obama and the DNC did this in 08 and 12. In fact they were applauded for their ingenuity and use in defeating the GOP. The only issue here is FB let the opposition do the same. OMG how dare they!
1
Strat326, yesterday Rush Limbaugh was pushing this line of deception on the radio. And today you've done a fine job of parroting it.
6
Strat. Check the facts. You are comparing an old toggle switch, to a micro chip.
One main difference; off limits data was not used in 08. Ooops.
3
While I very rarely use FB, last night I killed my account. I suggest you do the same. Enough is enough!
2
The world was a better place without Facebook.
8
I wonder how many young minds are contorted, thinking and constantly comparing themselves to their piers on FB. I believe people are tricked into thinking that everyone's lives are better than their own. Not true. FB is fine. The users need to use it keeping in mind that not all one sees is the whole truth.
Do you believe everything you see on TV? Treat FB with the same caution.
Polls and research show that younger people are leaving Facebook in increasing numbers, shifting to platforms like Instagram. As a result, FB is skewing older to Generation X and Baby Boomers (look at all of the Class of Whatever pages for high school and college and are used to set up reunions).
http://www.businessofapps.com/millions-of-young-people-will-leave-facebo...
Hey guys I just invited everyone over, I didn't say the house was safe to be in.
5
It will be interesting to see if there are any penalties for Facebook. Microsoft, Google and Facebook have all run afoul of regulators in the U.S. or E.U. But FB helped Trump won, so he may not want to punish them. (Which would be just another failure of our government to do its job, thanks to spineless Republicans and of course our idiotic president.)
1
How does Zuckerberg get away with NEVER appearing before any Congressional committees. Is it the Fake News, Golden Boy image he has manufactured. All the other CEO's in the world's biggest companies have to testify before Congress and for far less troubling reasons.
In Zuckerberg's case he has total control of the company to an extent one person does not have in any other company anywhere near as a large as Facebook. Facebook is not some private enterprise it is a a huge publicly traded company. Time to testify Zuckerberg and likewise Sheryl Sandberg his #2. No more hiding.
7
Well, the same (well, even MORE) data mined by CA are in possess of Facebook...what about Mr. Zuckerberg himself running for office, people were even thinking he was a "nice" potential candidate...
For sure, Blame Mark Zuckerberg for stalling, but where in the world has Sheryl Sandburg been? Isn't she supposed to be the adult in the room, the operations guru, the genius and polish behind the goofy hoodie dude? I said it 10 years ago: The whole "Lean In" platform is a miasma: it's Sandburg's ticket out. She knew better than anyone that FB's secret sauce (i.e., main revenue stream) is individual's personal data and FB's core competency to collect, store, slice, dice and SELL that data. That's at the core of its business model - not all the FB members who post every sneeze, cough and teething of their families and friends while the Russians gleefully hacked away. Members are just collateral damage in servitude to the billions in MZ and Sandburg's pockets.
7
Might want to put that presidential bid on hold there, Mark.
3
:)
Oprah 20/20 Vision
Under every seat, a new car and a trip to Australia.
Thinking of the movie about him with Jesse Eisenberg where he was portrayed as such an innocent. Wouldn't be surprised if he did cheat those twins.
2
Z remains clueless. Maybe he's a good salesman, but he has a tin ear for what's upsetting people. Maybe it has something to do with Trump's tax breaks for billionaires. First things first, right?
2
Facebook is the new face of Evil. They turned over their data for Russia to use to subvert the American political system.
1
When you start up a business and make billions never taking into consideration the privacy, safety nor rights of your users SHAME on you! Especially after you were warned. And now is your time to come forward and pay the consequences. You should have a suspension of business for say a period of time after November. And a fine which means something. After all they made a lot of money, making it easy for the wrong people to gain access to information they should have never gotten. And never verified if in fact they deleted it. Very poor excuses given.
4
Dont feel sorry for Zuck and Sandberg. They have made inter-generational fortunes which will give them huge power for time immemorial. Feel sorry for this generation of foolish and naive billions who gave their data away, lost their privacy, during that brief moment in history at the advent of the information revolution, before the necessary regulation came in to project us all.
4
About eight years ago, following the example of some friends, I opened a Facebook account.
It only took me a couple of weeks to realize that Facebook was just a clever scheme to exploit people's craving for self-promotion. I promptly deleted my account.
Then information started to come out that the whole enterprise was about nothing more than collecting data for advertisers – a booby trap just about everybody was falling for.
I am not against technology per se but I do believe that technological development has reached a stage where it brings the worst out of people: just look at cellphone addiction on one end, and the recent revelations about Cambridge Analytica on the other, not to mention the prevalence of twitter in the political discourse...
This is pathetic and terrifying.
5
Just click 'accept' and everything will be fine.
1
Deleting or quitting Facebook isn’t sufficient. They maintain silent ghost profiles for pretty much everyone based on inference and all kinds of third party data that they have slurped up, such as credit reporting. So even if you choose not to participate, you’re an unwitting participant of Facebook.
4
Maybe Mr.Zuckerberg is trying to come up,with a clever answer that is convincing.He should save his breath and simply admit that their algorithms allowed for unauthorized data mining.Although his company is worth a whopping 485billion, it is still a public company with share holders who expect explanations.The American public wants to know if there is "collusion" between social media companies and foreign entities.He needs to show respect for the Senate and appear before them when they make that request.
4
Massive tax cuts for the wealthiest and Zuckerberg's monster shedding billions upon billions: the Winklevoss twins must be laughing their heads off for the first time in twenty years.
4
One day they will make another movie about Facebook. titled Take the Money and Run.
2
EST; 420pm. The Zuck has posted a statement, admits to mistakes made. Again. Plus the usual, "we're gonna fix things." promise...empty for sure.
In no way should the public, FB users or not, trust this guy, or his second Sandberg. If you use FB, wake-up! If you don't and are thinking about it, don't!
Want these companies to take your data privacy seriously? Delete your account. Hit The Zuck in the wallet.
You are not FB's customer, you are the product. Your likes, your activities, your opinions, and all your friends and kittens are their product. Their true customers are those who buy or otherwise use the data they collect.
You are The Product. Wake up!
7
From its onset, back to its shady beginnings at Harvard, to the repeated unilateral loosening of users privacy standards despite promises not to, to appealing directly to children despite warnings by people who know better, to the hiring of supposed adult-in-the-room Sheryl Sandberg which did nothing to change Facebook's core attitude of disdaining privacy, Facebook has always struck me as a company led by people who do not seem to have any moral center at all. It is lucre, filthy lucre, that is the center of their universe. And this is where it comes to. Facebook is instrumental in the dismantling of civil and democratic order not only in the US but the whole world.
Mr. Zuckerberg, if he wants to live up to the lofty humanitarian utterances that he occasionally spews out, should completely rework his company's business model. His company's total disdain for personal privacy, and its toxic ambition to collect and peddle every piece of private and intimate information that it can lay its hands on is bad for humanity.
6
Aptly put.
To all those complaining about FB just eliminate it from your life. Trust me you will not miss it.
2
The "timeline" of events he included with his press release conveniently skips the fact that Facebook actively assisted the Obama 2012 campaign in essentially the same exact data mining exercise that he now regrets took place with Cambridge Analytica. The New York Times wrote numerous articles lauding that fact.
It's almost as if he sees the active 2012 Democrat data mining and marketing as a legitimate use of users' data, but the 2016 CA case as somehow against the Facebook ethos.
You can't have it both ways, Mr, Zuckerberg. You can hide behind "sanctioned" and "unsanctioned" uses of your APIs if you want, but at the end of the day, you've sold access to users' data for the purposes of political spin for years. We're not buying your act of contrition.
1
There is a distinct and important difference between using data to degrade, harm, and create mistrust aimed at seizing power or weakening societies and using it to better connect with citizens, understand their most serious needs and concerns, and encourage them to actively participate by voting or volunteering time or money. The US unwillingness to protect personal privacy, especially by not allowing most data to be collected or stored is a serious problem we continue to ignore. But, without laws written to enforce strict compliance (as we have with medical records and documented child sexual abuse) we can accuse or shame but are powerless to stop. Self regulation only applies to individuals, any group of two people or corporation of thousands does not have a single moral will or internal mechanism of doing good, playing fair, or protecting others from harm. Women can stand up against abuse and harassment, but we have an obligation to better protect them. Lynch mobs are always wrong and evil, but the killers hide, claim innocence, or justify their behavior by saying "but what's about that stuff you did?" Isolating Russian output as suspect and subject to review would cause no famine or harm to it's citizens, just as removing a self-harming and dangerous despot from Twitter would not restrict his free speech in any real way, nor would it harm Fox News - they've knowing lied and spread false narratives very effectively no matter what technology supports their dissembling.
1
... or Sandberg and Zuckerman can look deep inside themselves and do the right thing ... and then tomorrow do the next right thing ... and then in the following days do it again. What's the worth of a business empire compared to the worth of democracy, justice, truth?
1
Facebook has never cared about its users' privacy. This comes right from the top. Since FB is a public company, Zuckerberg should be held to a no-confidence vote and forced out. It is long overdue.
3
As soon as Facebook went public, it was beholden to its shareholders and the bottom line. All social media users are just pawns, a means to an end. Make no mistake, these corporations are in the same class as oil, banks, and big pharma - not benevolent providers of cat videos.
2
So he shouldn’t have given information that the republicans could use, but giving Obama information for his campaign was ok?
1
I will deactivate my FB account, too, unless we see more than words from Zuck.
The irony? If they charged users only $1/mo for the use of the platform with complete privacy... they'd make $2 billion per month. And they would be transparent.
The power of FB is not in the love of the company (or, God knows, their business model). The power is in the love of the CONCEPT -- the mutual affection and interest between real human beings, which FB has silently stood in the middle of, selling our every whisper and thought to the highest bidder.
FB the disruptor is extremely vulnerable to being disrupted itself by a for-pay social network that truly fulfilled that original promise to its members.
If they themselves don't become that new platform, another will swoop in and steal its users.
5
their business model is not to make money directly from you but from monetizing your data. By making it free they attract a lot of people i.e. data
3
Why is anyone surprised that Zuckerberg lacks ethics, empathy, or the ability to connect with the public in person?
Think Jesse Eisenberg in “The Social Network”. His portrayal was spot on and all the success seems to have amplified, not mitigated, Zuckerberg’s most disturbing qualities.
5
At minimum, Facebook has a problematic business model.
2
I deleted my Facebook account. The data mining really triggered this, but I as a photographer, I found out the Facebook has the rights to anything I post. Not that my work is that valuable, but I should be entitled to control over my own creative output. By the way, you can't delete your Facebook account without giving them a reason. My reason? None of your business. Just one final insult to the user.
12
No hope that Zuckerberg would have ever taken an ethical position. He's a tech geek and ill equipped to think about bothersome issues such as ethics.
The COO is hired to handle operational issues and think carefully about such matters. Its kind of in the job title, as in Operating and as in Chief. Sandberg? Too busy leaning out on this one.
Is anyone here actually surprised that a given woman (in this case Sandberg) is not every bit the equal to any given man in terms of failing to take an ethical stance when big bucks and career are at stake? I for one am not.
Women deserve equality in the workplace but don't ever think it will be a panacea to the problem of squishy ethical behavior when the stakes are high.
7
"He's a tech geek and ill equipped to think about bothersome issues such as ethics."
I don't think it's so much that, as that he's a tacit, and largely by default, adherent of the "human capital" worldview according to which as long as you operate profitably and "pretty much" within the letter of the law, the ethics take care of themselves.
What's so disgusting about facebook to me is that it's such a smugly grotesque caricature, an ultimate reducto-ad-absudem-except-it's-real, of the whole "human capital" paradigm (basically pure "homo economicus" and market-worshipping) pioneered by Gary Becker and UChicago econ department, and gradually became something of a "civil religion" in this country. Our schools ate it up and force-fed it to students to the point of near-universal acceptance.
"Meritocracy" (Social-Darwinian equation of virtue and success, even $ucce$$ based on cunning) and commodification/monetization of everything and everybody were/are "human capital"-'s ethical and doctrinal cornerstone: "money-making=good and ethical."
Again, Facebook is the ultimate distillation of the human capital worldview and ethical scheme. Everything and everybody into money.
3
Facebook was built from the start to gather information about users and group them into categories. It is incredibly good at this job, and Facebook monetized by using this to allow advertisement targeting with detail that had never been possible before. Individual users have never been Facebook's clients, they are Facebook's product to its advertiser clients. Users don't pay for Facebook's features with money, they pay by giving up their data for Facebook to make money on.
The difference now is that we're realizing that bad actors are exploiting this categorization and hyper-targeted advertising to influence political and social opinions rather than "just" influencing us to buy things. Mark Zuckerberg is quiet because this isn't a bug, influencing people is fundamentally the purpose of Facebook. There's no "fix" to this problem other than not using Facebook.
13
The public and our government institutions have greatly underestimated the damage Facebook has done to our societies and the complicit behavior of its executives as they have knowingly exploited vulnerabilities in the human psyche itself to gain a foothold into our minds. Make no mistake about it: until medicine masters physically wiring into our nervous systems, Facebook and its ilk have hacked our brains and effectively have established a form of mind reading and control.
It is the height of arrogance, disdain for those outside the tech bubble, and pure hubris that Zuckerberg et. al. can claim that it is only a "platform" and that the idea that people en masse would or could be controlled through its app as "crazy". If that idea is so crazy, Mr. Zuckerberg, what exactly are you hawking at shareholder meetings when bragging about the billions in ad revenue Facebook is generating each quarter because it is exactly designed to alter and control people's thoughts?
Facebook is not only a marvelously designed piece of software engineering, it is also a cynically contrived machine of human thought control that was designed and implemented by an army of computational psychologists, mathematicians, data analysts, and automation experts with the sole purpose of mining your mind, extracting its precious resources, and controlling your very thoughts. They know exactly what they are doing and the dangers their product poses to humanity.
11
This is not a mature CEO. This is no surprise.
He will watch his fortune dwindle and wonder how it all got away from him.
7
The BIG buck stops with Zuck and Sandberg. Their primary goal is not you, the individual...they are commercial, BIG business people, jaded by $BILLION$ in profit, that goes directly into their business, and themselves.
You are merely their captive product for sale hundreds of times over to thousands of other businesses. How many other businesses are there, where you can resell the same item without having to replenish your stock?
Unleash yourself, and retain a little more of your dignity, privacy and your self-respect without having to be part of a collective of billions of $, for sale to millions.
7
Listening to a television program about Facebook tonight, I was appalled by the depth of information kept on each user, and that even if one's Facebook account is deleted, there is no guarantee that the data that Facebook has will be deleted as well. I was wondering if a class-action suit could be brought to make FB delete personal information in their database? No doubt the terms of use agreement that we all signed probably says that FB can keep all of our data forever, but I doubt that anyone envisioned how much data would be kept or the use that would be made of it (especially by Cambridge Analytica).
8
Members of the so called Millennial generation are often unfairly criticized, but Mr. Zuckerberg's reticence concerning Cambridge Analytica reveals a major failing of said generation: they have never been taught failure. Previous generations learned about failure at an early age, and most importantly, ascertained that failure is actually easier to deal with than success. While this problem isn't necessarily the fault of Generation Y, it demonstrates that the much vaunted confidence of said generation is founded on a false basis. Unfortunately, this doesn't portend well for the future folks.
If Zuckerberg doesn't apologize for this, don't think that this is an expression of hubris. No, it's one of ignorance, and in consequence, is so much worse.
7
It's wrong to disparage said Millennials because of Zuckerberg. You mentioned- "Previous generations learned about failure at an early age, and most importantly, ascertained that failure is actually easier to deal with than success."
Trump has had many failures at an early, mid and late age and still continues to learn absolutely nothing or care about anyone. You'd think the said Baby Boomers would have done some great things. But The Iraq War, The Great Recession, and now Trump are far from being successes.
1
they have been hanging out concocting their fake answers.-MONEY is their life objective and using other people for personal gains is their true calling. Why people continue to use FAKEbook IS BEYOND ME.
2
Whether Trump, or Hillary Clinton for that matter, are typical of early Baby Boomers is subject to debate. While I'm of Generation X, I can only imagine what a contemporary of Trump would have dealt with as a youngster. The thought of youthful death in Vietnam crossed many minds of young men in the late 60's. Donald Trump never dealt with that of course, but how typical was he really?
The difference between Trump and Zuckerberg is that the former is indeed, and always has been, aware of his failures. The latter, on the other hand, still seems innocent of his failure in my opinion. Again, this isn't his fault, or that of fellow Millennials. Remember, they are the generation of social promotion. Retaining childhood friends throughout school to them wasn't something you earned through study, but was an entitlement regardless. This mindset differentiates Generation Y from its elders.
Pay attention to your address bar as you go from one site to another. Other addresses go by in a flash before stopping at the one you want, and many of these are Facebook components. Facebook is much deeper - and more pernicious, than the typical user realizes.
14
"Expected to"?
He ought to have had the integrity to do it days ago. Being dragged kicking and screaming into the light is not a good look.
Its far too late now, there seems little he can say that will make him or his company appear credible.
19
I'm beginning to seriously think that congress needs to draft a "Right to be Forgotten" law. Would love it to contain, among other things:
- A company must delete, on request by the user, all of the data it has on the user including all backups.
- A company must provide a copy of, on request by the user, all of the data they have collected from the user in a format that the user can easily transfer off of the company's servers (think download link, DVD, etc). Doesn't necessarily have to be a free service, but it needs to at least be possible.
- Credit bureaus must be forbidden from releasing any credit information to any third party without first getting direct consent from the subject of the credit report. This needs to be required for every credit request... when I'm sitting at a bank running my credit, i want a real-time phone call from the credit bureau asking for my consent before the request can be completed.
Obviously there needs to be steps to protect user data from fraudulent requests. But can i take orders from anyone else before i send this off to my congressman?
41
This is almost exactly what the EU is enacting at the end of May – General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). At its core is the 'right to be forgotten'.
19
Although the security risks and lack of safety in using a drug like Facebook has long been known to anyone who cared to take a moment to think about it, the events of the past few days should hammer the point home. Anyone using Facebook from this point onward has been duly warned, and any future debacles also must be blamed on the end user. It is beyond me why anyone would continue to use this product.
Disclosure: never have used Facebook, obviously never will, short the stock.
17
All powers try to influence the elective processes of other countries. Russia is no different from us in that regard. The attacks on Facebook however represent an attempt to hide the reality that Hillary Clinton was a fatally flawed candidate. In the 8 years of the Obama presidency she never understood why an unknown Senator from Illinois with less than two years of experience was able to embarrass her. I get it Democrats lost to the class clown and they need a conspiracy to explain the loss, otherwise the alternative could be that the party that was built to help working class Americans ran a candidate that was tone deaf to their needs and aspirations.
ALL I know is that Hillary lost this election in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin states that Barack Hussein Obama easily carried TWICE and against the whitest of white males (a war hero and a respected multi-millionaire businessman). Putin or Cambridge Analytica cannot explain that shortcoming. In the end she was a flawed candidate, who was politically tone deaf. Obama knew it and we all saw Trump use it against her. The sooner the Democrats embrace this truth the better they will be in 2020.
9
Pretty far from true. She was by far the most qualified candidate. That’s a given now.....
3
What a beautiful cogent comment Frederick and you hit every nail on the head. Yes the sooner the Dems realize what a colossal mistake they made the better off we'll all be. I voted for her but grudgingly she forgot about the states between NY, CA and FLA, that's on her. Not Putin nor FB but her.
1
Yes she was the most qualified, her problem was herself. Not FB, not the Russians. Do you believe everything you read on the net? Do you base your life decisions on how many "likes" some things get? Do you vote based on what you read on FB? If you do then stay home next election cycle. Clinton was her own worst enemy and we can thank the DNC for that.
1
"In a 2014 speech, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s C.E.O., said, “In every single thing we do, we always put people first.” By that, he said he meant that Facebook would give people “control over how they share their information.”
Facebook didn’t do that." --David Leonhardt, The New York Times, 3/21/2018
Time to pay the piper, MZ. Come testify. Explain. And please...either stop lying to your users (like me) or do what you say. Continue to fail and you will lose more than $50B in market value.
12
Zuckerberg, you have waited too long. This gigantic mistake will be in the headlines for weeks. Really makes you look like a goofball who can easily be manipulated. I'd sell the stock, if I owned any. Besides, the value of your company is NOT what's important; it's the damage you have done to our country, with your arrogant negligence.
18
“Calm down. Breathe. We hear you,” Zuckerberg must repeat. Chances are Facebook users somewhat tech savvy anyway. Trump got the bottom feeders with Fox News. Now going after mid feeders with Facebook on "Sky is Falling" Campaign. It's all about Fear and Trump Leading you out of it. Don't Drink.
"O brave new world that has such creatures in't"
2
The reason he is hiding is because he allowed Obama to do the same exact thing...they knew about it..but because he supported Obama he allowed it.
4
That makes no sense. Why would an Obama supporter help Trump in the same manner? It seems more like Zuckerberg will do business with anyone that has money.
The ugly underbelly of Facebook surfaces. They don't make money selling advertising, they make it selling our personal data. Sorry Zuck, you've be caught.
19
The world will be better when Facebook is gone
19
And Google too, don't forget.
1
OK if I go do my laundry, or it this imminent?
2
There will be some psuedo regrets and a promise to fix things. The fact remains that if you put your data on Facebook it can be, if not sold to a despot or hacked by a totalitarian country or even your local propagandist media outlet, simply "harvested" for the same purposes.
Facebook must be stopped. Regulated. Restricted. It is too powerful. The mainstream media must stop is affiliation. Why do we have to comment through facebook on almost all newspapers other than the Times? Why do we even have the option at the times?
11
Today i unplugged Facebook. I feel great.
10
Mark, "Calm down. Breathe. We hear the dip is becoming a plunge.”
2
Millennials...they ARE ruining this nation..its all about them and no one else..we are just their collateral damage..
5
Not true. A few Millennial’s have leveraged the tech boom, but they are still too young to pull the strings in this country. If you want to blame a demographic, the Baby Boomers made most of the policy we live with today, and occupy the positions of political and corporate power. Boomers raN the VC firms that Ade Facebook and Twitter possible. The Xers are coming up fast.
All of it was actually made possible by the Internet itself. The true root of all evil.
So what? My "data" was mined. They now know I like The Who and Dave Bowie.
So what?
3
OMG, they will also have my desktop wallpaper picture of Bertolt Brecht being grilled at a HUAC hearing back in the nineteen fifties.
For starters, they have the IP address of every device you have ever accessed FB on, as well as the time and date. Don't you find that a little creepy? They know every time you have been mentioned by either photo or text in someone else's feed. God help you if you need to hide from an estranged spouse.
1
I feel the same way. I really don't get it. Although I can't stand Zuckerberg and Cambridge Analytica, I despise Fox News more.
I'm guessing most of the face time we will see will come from Sandberg or another female employee. It seems every time a large corporation gets in hot water, they trot out the soft-spoken ladies to take the heat. I can still recall a young female executive from Phillip Morris that used to be trotted out in the media. This is one of the few times that the tech sector has a use for females it seems.
6
Facebook isn't sorry for what it has done, but it is sorry it got caught. Their business model assumes more revenue for more invasion of your privacy, and Facebook would rather protect its revenue stream than your privacy. Zuckerberg is a lightweight way in over his head and without the ethical or managerial skills a more experienced CEO would have. A good start would be to fire him.
13
I’ve never liked Zuckerberg and this latest controversy proves that he is a snake out for profits and self aggrandizement. Bad enough he stole the idea for this company originally, now he has let malicious third parties steal more of our privacy
13
I think Zuckerberg thinks that Facebook is too big to fail. He will probably learn that his network (I don’t call it social as it feels more anti social) isn’t even important enough to fall. Amazon and google might be to big to vanish - Facebook is replaceable. People will start turning away from it - teenagers already do - and will realize that they don’t miss it.
9
really??... cause FB has a larger market value than either
of them... also FB is much larger than what you see...
by now the FB pages can vanish and FB could still do
just fine... think like a weed that you pull... the roots
are what you are forgetting about... FB sells data from
not only members with posts... but everyone who is also
not a member...
It's important to remember that if you have a Facebook account you are not a customer of Facebook you are their inventory.
Given that why would Mr. Zuckerberg or Ms. Sandberg feel compelled to offer any of their account holders any explanation. Would Safeway explain itself to the canned goods?
It is both sad and ironic that this so called "social network" is one of the major reasons why we have all become so anti-social.
23
Unless he fesses up & says, "Our product is profit", then the rest is just too little too late.
9
Katie Losse misspoke. I think she meant to say, "how this all workS."
If he repeats his glib, cozy-up delivery I'm done. The days of the soft stroke are over.
6
Looks like Zuckerberg and Sandberg are "leaning out."
8
When will the government get out of the business of destoying businesses whose customers willing signed up-for and willing gave the company their information to use at will in exchange for the service of being in contact with their "friends". If the customers do not want the service, then don't use the service. If you do not like Exxon, stop buying gas and ride a bike. Facebook is not indispensable. There are dozens and dozens of companies that offer the same service. If you signed up for Facebook, your data and inputs are now theirs. Too bad. So sad. I have neither a Facebook nor Twitter nor Google account. Why, because I am not a sucker.
1
Seems like you have made a good case for regulation. People need to be protected. If people aren't smart enough to navigate the meaning of Facebook, then perhaps they aren't smart enough to vote.
6
Seriously, name one company (without using Internet search) that provides the same service as Facebook, with remotely similar (2 orders of magnitude are okay) adoption / membership levels. No?
Okay, how about one OAuth service provider, other than Google? No?
He has been silent because his lawyers are working on a mealy mouthed statement of apology.
12
This is what happens eventually to a guy who thinks he is always the smartest guy in the room and heeds no counsel but his own. (I'm talking about Zuckerberg right now, not our president. His time will come.) It is also why I deleted my Facebook account yesterday. I invite you to join me.
16
Done, and I deleted my twitter account too.
1
Zuckerberg has been playing footloose & fancy free with our data for so long. The chickens have come home to roost!
4
This really doesn’t surprise anyone except the press and those techies that have anointed Mark to be a “tech visionary”. These guys are all the same. Zuckerberg, Cuban, Gates, Andreesen, Bezos, etc. They got lucky and rich and now assume, because the press and their fans have told them so, that they now have profound abilities. Scratch the surface of any one of them and you will see they are all one-trick ponies. None of them has had an original thought apart from the one that got them their billions. Most, if not all, have never put in a hard day’s work in their lives so it’s only natural that Mark would shrink from view when the pressure is on. It’s extremely unlikely that he has a strong grasp of what is going on at the Company. The smart ones take their money and disappear at the first opportunity. The dumb ones think they are business superstars and then run their software companies into the ground or buy an NBA team and make it one of the league’s worst franchises. We have yet to see about Amazon which survives only because of outdated anti-trust laws (Yale Law Journal, vol 126).
10
I'll have to disagree on Gates and Bezos. They built real tools that people all around the world use for creating all sorts of products and services. Think AWS and Office, MS DOS and Basic back in the day. They changed the industry, had vision and good management skills. When companies grow they change, mainly because of all the moving pieces that one single person cannot control, investors, and personal agenda on the part that the top-level power structure. If anything, Gates' mistake was to "retire" from Microsoft and leave Steve Ballmer at the helm.
I am no fan of Facebook, I don't need it like I need my computing and communications systems. I won't miss them if they lose the little trust or dependency they have left.
2
This is a staggering lack of leadership on Facebook's part, especially as it relates to not just Zuckerberg but his COO, Sheryl Sandberg. There are people coming out of the woodwork now indicating that they have brought this issue forward to them previously to no avail. With the earning of billions of dollar, there should be some real accountability attached to it. And...where is Facebook's Board in all this??
4
Nearly every internet service provider is using whatever data that comes across their servers to generate income if they can think of a way to do so. Especially Russian and other East European based companies where anything goes and nothing is regulated. These companies as well as governments are using the internet access afforded to them via computers, screen and phone devices to conduct active data retrieval, they are listening to you and also watching you. Facebook has amassed a huge amount of private information from hundreds of millions of individuals and they know how to convert that information into cash.
4
I permanently logged off a couple of days ago, and will not be back.
My next step is determining what survives my exit, and having it removed, likely requiring legal advice.
I never used any other social media platforms, and began using Facebook to repost news from just a few sources, including the NY Times, the Intercept (Glen Greenwald), and the Guardian (they broke the Snowden NSA debacle, while Glen Greenwald was on board).
My reasoning was this - I wanted to get wide coverage of current events, in a venue like Facebook since Facebook members would be more likely to read a news report posted by another Facebook member, as opposed to subscribing to, or logging onto news media.
I learned that Facebook members, not all, but far too many, are on there mostly to satisfy some kind of narcissistic desire to publish who and what they are, and while some read my reports it just wasn't worth the time and effort it took.
4
Congratulations on leaving FB! I believe you are going to see improvements in your life.
2
But you didn't do that. Riiiiight.
1
A lack of a response is a response in itself. Zuckerberg doesn't care, so long as he's making money. He has always had an arrogant attitude and knows that most of his users will continue to use his product. Is it time for a boycott yet?
4
FB should be held accountable. Where would Zuckerberg, Sandberg and alike be hurt most? Probably their bank account? FB should be fiancially responsible for the invasion of people's privacy and legally responsible for the threating natioal security. Sadly this won't be the last time there is a bleach in privacy as long as people keep sharing their private information with social media or any form of coomunication run by greed.
3
"Calm down. Breathe. We hear you," he wrote.
Fakebook will forever put it's own interest before anything or anyone. It has been seen time and time again. Sort of like our current administration.
3
I am not a part of any social network... I call the friends I want to stay in touch with. I don't wear my politics or religion on a homepage for all to see... Social networking contributes to the polarizing of the nation by inviting the users to post their religious and political beliefs and opinions.... NONE OF WHICH MATTER to the world; Only to Mark Zuckerberg and Cambridge Analytica. I don't feel left out at all. In fact, I sit back and laugh at everyone stressing about their personal info being accessed... Have a nice day.
1
Lean in, avoid controversy. Great role model
1
It would be nice to see him act like a business leader by wearing a collared shirt and, God forbid, maybe even a tie instead of the usual grimy T-shirt and finally set an example to young people that business and billionaire executives also have class and dignity.
1
Email is very fast and effective. why do we need more?
6
Do you wonder why? Their business is finished. They were stealing the personal information of all the users to sell them to advertisers for a huge profit. If you cut that, what else is the business? Only cost? Better to close up.
3
He's "expected to make a statement?" Really? He should be hauled before Congress for open hearings. People are appalled.
4
I was an avid FB user in the mid-late aughts when it first became available to the general public. I recruited hundreds of friends to join and posted numerous things a day. In 2010 I realized that I had become a product for FB to sell. The existence of the platform was for one purpose only: so that FB could data mine me and all the friends I had brought on board. I deleted my account and have never regretted it.
Most people looked at me like I was crazy when I said Orwell couldn't have come up with a more insidious version of Big Brother - his version could only WATCH what you did all the time. FB watches & tracks what you do, how you feel, how you communicate, what your relationships are like, and infinitely more; it then uses all these various data points to sell your personality to basically anyone who steps forward and offers to pay. It's sickening. FB doesn't give a darn about building "community" or providing happiness through connections. If you honestly believe that your naivety is profound. This is a public corporation with no goal besides maximizing profit by co-opting your humanity. FB's Big Brother has cloaked itself in a bunch of marketing blather to hide its true intent - to turn each user into a monetized commodity. FB wants to STEAL all that makes us human and monetize that data for their own profit. I can't encourage you enough to #deletefacebook and do your part to halt this insanely cynical co-optation of our humanity for pure profit.
8
It seems that the woman who was in charge of the Obama campaigns data information said yesterday that Facebook actually came to their campaign headquarters and told them that they could have total access "because we're on your side." The Obama campaign was praised for being so forward thinking for using Facebook data mining.
1
Both Cambridge Analytica and Facebook have worked close together. They are both data mercenaries, selling the data they gather from their users to the highest bidder. That is their business model and how they make their money.
10
I invite users to try to Delete their Facebook account. I worked
for half an hour at it and their machinations sent me back and
forth, denied my Password (which I had recently reset).
Huffington Post made a stink about this awhile back, finally
said it is easier to just stop using Facebook. Which I have done.
Maybe if enough people speak out, here and elsewhere,
we can do what other websites allow with a simple Unsubscribe. Luckily, I have not used Facebook much.
But I dearly want out.
3
How ironic that someone who benefits tremendously from capitalism and a free society is willfully blind to his firms efforts to undermine that.
1
These guys have lost control of their Frankenstein monster. They simply don't have the maturity or knowledge to manage it. If they violated the consent decree, they should be regulated at a very minimum.
7
Anyone who gives up personal data on any web-based application is fooling themselves that it will be protected. What is more disturbing to me are the millions so gullible as to swallow the push message ads hook, line and sinker.
1
Excuse me but when I joined Facebook I did not assume my information would be mined. I don’t know why so many are blaming the victims. I have enjoyed the reconnections and new connections made on Facebook. In the United States nearly everyone moves and Facebook provides a connection even if it’s inferior to real connections but the geographical connections have been torn and so Facebook fills the void. A number of my “friends” have already deleted their accounts and I’m assuming many more will follow. It’s a shame. I liked it.
4
When there s nothing good to say, it is better to be quiet.
They are guilty.
3
This article forgot to also mention Equifax. Well whatever with that privacy breach, we've moved on already to the next scandal. Business as usual.
4
He'll come up with something designed to appease, no doubt thoroughly vetted by attorneys to minimize culpability. The public shouldn't be fooled by any of it; at this point, Zuckerberg's apologies and promises are worthless. If he could have continued to cover up all the company's "mistakes", that is exactly what they would be doing.
What the public needs is for Facebook and Camridge Analytica execs to be invited to a Congressional hearing and answer questions until the truth comes out, and if it looks like they're continuing to hide wrongdoing, they should be talking to the FBI.
But the privacy and security problems in tech are systemic, and our representatives must pass a bill to protect the privacy of American citizens. It shouldn't take long; they can model it after the one in the UK.
7
“Kate Losse, an early Facebook employee and Mr. Zuckerberg’s former speechwriter, said that the Cambridge Analytica controversy was different from previous Facebook privacy scandals, in that it was about an issue at the core of the company’s business model that will not be easily remedied: the disclosure of Facebook data to outside sources through its third-party developer platform.”
It’s time to sharply regulate Facebook and other social media to protect our privacy. Or perhaps, it’s time to seize, nationalize and turn some of their massive profits to rectify some of the damage they have done.
11
Zuckerberg allowed private actors to mine his site for people's personal information. That's on him.
But at the end of the day, we were the ones who posted that information, naively believing that no one but our inner circle would ever see it. That's on us.
And when it all comes down to it, our enemies used that information to distribute propaganda that was demonstrably false to the people who were already the most inclined to believe it. Those people read and re-distribiuted that propaganda without ever vetting or questioning it, despite all the evidence that was readily available to them from more trustworthy sources.
That failure to exercise basic fact finding is entirely on them, as was the outcome of the election. Remember that.
6
In a vacuum, what you say would be correct. In fact, very few Facebook users had any idea that their information would be shared with Cambridge Analytica. Although I'm sure Facebook's right to do it is mentioned in the fine print...
2
This shouldn't be hard to understand. Private information, once shared, isn't private any more.
4
People say they use Facebook to stay in touch with family and friends. I use my telephone to stay in touch with family and friends.
27
Yes, but how many "likes" can you get for using the telephone? And that's just one of its many pitfalls.
2
"Likes?" The pitfalls of Facebook is that users need to be "liked." Seems they're awfully needy for approval.
1
I always thought Zuckerberg as a man-child who succeeded too early and and not adult enough to deal with complex societal issues, along with his COO. All that power and avoided responsibility.
19
It's a shame more of us don't realize that when a service is "free' to use like Facebook, it's because you are the product, not the customer.
Another good reminder to renew my NYT subscription and make that pledge to NPR. If the government won't fund good media, we must.
79
Facebook is a social media monopoly. The government needs to start breaking these giant tech companies up. Facebook has way too much power on people's personal data, owning FB, WhatsApp, and Instagram too. Unlike Uber, it's very difficult for a dissatisfied user to delete all their data that FB currently owns. No company should be entrusted with this much power.
31
It’s not uncommon in the history of a tech company that the company has outgrown the tech founder. Maybe that time has come for Facebook and Zuckerberg.
15
In reality, whenever chosing to 'share' personal data people must realize they are forfeiting privacy. There is much tracking and data aggregation in every day life. Just think about location tracking, pop up ads and every time you use a loyalty card for discounted purchases. Data in not unique to Facebook.
Organizations like Equifax have not yet been held accountable for their security failures that have compromised critical personal data. Many millions of people are now vulnerable to financial loss that they were unable to prevent. Laws have not be changed to protect US and the folks at Equifax continue to make massive $ regardless of the risks they create for personal and national security.
Also, many mid to large size companies routinely out source new employee vetting. This requires any potential hire to agree to SSN + to be shared with companies operating off of US shores. This creates a huge personal data security risk that cannot be avoided if a person wants to be hired.
Lawmakers have failed to make data sharing and disclosure laws: robust, current and enforced. Data collection will only increase and data = profit for businesses. We citizens bear great current and future risk. Contact your US Representative to prioritize action.
20
Too bad he never took courses in data flow, geography, communications, privacy and security -- might have figured it out a little better had he finished his education
6
A lot of people saying everybody should just unplug from Facebook. But as a middle age person, this is the main way I keep up in a casual way with what my family and friends are doing. I don’t use it for much else. I try not to give fb too much personal info, and don’t respond to ads there. I suspect there are a lot of others like me.
9
Exactly! And for your bit of convenience it has cost us the sanctity of our elections. Worth it?
3
Unplugging from Facebook in this day is completely unrealistic. In the US, people use it as a normal communication channel. In other countries, Facebook is the ONLY way users can connect to the Internet. What we have to do - and what we, as individuals can do - are to be alert to changes in their privacy notices, to changes to their security options, and be attentive to changes we see.
And, of course, we can ultimately be responsible for the links we click while in Facebook, understanding that their math geniuses have developed very reliable algorithms to help them collect and analyze the data - *our* data - they collect.
3
You can always give family and friends a phone call and have a conversation just like the old days. Every click on fb feeds an algorithm.
1
Zuckerberg better get it together. So far he has nearly destroyed the worlds oldest and most stable democracy, all the while stone walling and deflecting blame. He needs to reshape his platform. I like many Americans enjoy posting pictures of vacations and friends on Facebook, but I will leave it unless it is cleaned up. Let's face it, it is now becoming a national security threat, used by unscrupulous actors and foreign intelligence services as a propaganda machine. Zuckerberg's desire to maximize profits must not come at the cost of our way of life.
88
In response to boji 3, it’s not acceptable to negatively categorize females over the age of 50 by saying Facebook is “doomed to the fate of aging grandmothers AND THEIR ILK and would eventually starve itself of new young vibrant users”. Devaluing a group of people who are older than you shows a lack of understanding of human decency. What makes you more vibrant than me just because I’m older than you?
5
Money trumps all.
1
Just try to Delete your account! Huffington
Post recently made a stink on the subject of deleting Facebook.
We don't need a crafted public statement from Zuckerberg. We need him to appear before Congress to answer the tough questions and face some real accountability.
115
Exactly. Congress needs to take a course in the workings of the internet and Facebook so they can talk about something other than paper ballots too. The only person I trust to be doing the business of governing is Mueller.
1
That they have been silent is not a surprise. These two data-reliant individuals are out of their league. I don't think either one of them had or has a realistic idea of the expanse of their company or how much data they really own, even less about the companies they hire to 'help' them gather and process those data. And, being data-reliant for their decision making, I am pretty sure they do not care much about the "bumps in the road" their company has had.
Any user who thinks Facebook cares about their data security and the privacy of their information has lived in a web-enabled cave for a long time. These two and the company they run are all about money, plain and simple. Nothing else matters.
41
On a trip to another country eight or nine years ago (while reading this newspaper in an internet café) I glanced over to the five or six other people online at their computers. Everyone was over the age of 50, all were female, and all were on facebook. I realized then that this company was doomed to the fate of aging grandmothers and their ilk and would eventually starve itself of new young vibrant users. That is apparently what is coming to pass, all the other deception and duplicity notwithstanding. AOL and Steve Chase meet Mark Zuckerberg and facebook.
18
Not quite accurate assessment. Bigger group for US, little more searching shows large numbers in younger groups worldwide.
http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/11/11/social-media-update-2016/
1
My kids, tech experts, don't use Facebook.
3
This probably sounds like an oversimplification, but everyone should just 'unplug' from both Facebook and Twitter. I consider them a type of social experiment for the computer age that has gone awry, you don't 'modify' bad experiments, you stop them. That open social platform isn't wholly wrong, but what it has transmogrified into is. There is no such thing as "free", most of us where raised with that charming little expression and yet are suddenly shocked when we discover the price paid by society when 'free' platforms like Facebook and Twitter turn against us. The inevitability of something going terribly wrong was inherently coupled with the 'free'. We got what we paid for.
40
That's exactly what I did. And for that exact same reason.
How to unplug? They make deleting the account a horror.
1
Seems leaning in is less appealing when things aren't rosy.
45
Facebook has known since 2015 about this breach of 50 million users data. They have known their users data was being manipulated by sketchy groups for political purposes and had plenty of opportunity to alert the public. They never did. They could have but did not audit Cambridge Analytica after the breach was discovered years ago to make sure the data wasn't misused.
They know they were negligent and greed-driven. Of course, Zuckerberg isn't going to go out there and admit to this. Handing over personal information to this company is asking to be manipulated.
71
It’s strange how so many affable, outgoing and kind people have turned to and been diminished by Facebook - which is essentially a tool for people that have difficulty in communicating and forming relationships with other people. Social Media has turned everything on it’s head; friendships and experiences that galvanized and carried folks through life are now rendered into two-dimensional banality. It’s all been said or done or photographed before and it’s now fodder in some nerd’s cabinet of curiosities. I hope Zuck loses a lot of money - he deserves to.
56
I deactivated my FaceBook account the day Trump was elected. I knew something was rotten in Denmark.
Zuck cannot rebuild trust with users. It is time that government impose strict guidelines (similar to the EU's) for user data and to follow up with regular monitoring and auditing.
71
Zuckerberg should just sell off Fascistbook to a white nationalist hooligan operation funded by the Mercers and managed by Steve Bannon and then go repent for aiding and abetting America’s right-wing coup d’tat for the sake of psychopathic personal greed.
Zuckerberg has a long history of having zero ethics.
122
Wait, Socrates,....that's exactly what he did. And our habits and preferences in 5000 points of analysis was the currency.
2
I bet you didn't say the same thing when Obama's campaign in 2008 (called the facebook election, btw) harvested millions of voters with Zuckerberg and facebooks' implicit acceptance. This is not about one side using it and the other side having a hizzy over it. We need to raise generations of youth who think critically, and can analyze data irrespective of belief system. And most importantly, to teach US citizens that there is a difference between online nonsense and serious news such as the Times, the Post, the Plains Dealer, and what have you.
1
If memory serves, this is a company whose genesis traces back to Zuckerberg and his college dorm-mates rating women co-eds for publication/distribution. With that lofty beginning, it's evolution should come as no great surprise to anyone.
136
Yes, MZ always struck me as an ethically challenged individual, not just because of the coed-rating interface but also the way he treated his initial business partners and the way he hijacked the company out from under them. There were also some other questionable episodes. He is in no way a person to be looked up to and emulated.
2
Facebook is not a good thing, for individuals or America or the world. Yes, there are some benefits to being able to communicate and share information in times of crisis. But the world hummed along quite nicely before the advent of "social media." I deeply hope this is the opening to a long, careful, and considered hard look at what these technologies are doing to civilization, to society. One of the smartest things I've done is quit Facebook. My life is immeasurably better for it.
72
Scott: Re: " Yes, there are some benefits to being able to communicate and share information in times of crisis." Why would anyone ever think he needs Facebook to "communicate and share information"?
15
Ms. Losse is right: Facebook's business model is founded on "free" access in return for packaging and selling user data.
As a company with public shares, Facebook's primary fiduciary obligation is to its shareholders.
This internal conflict will not disappear.
Social networking has become so vital, perhaps it's time to consider other means of controlling it.
20
I wish that in the same way Firefox played a vital role at one time, so would something else that is open source.
Or failing that, Safari, Edge, Chrome, Firefox play a role in keeping the others "honest" which includes issues such as privacy. Facebook has no such check at this point. Go SnapChat!
5
No, not "vital", by any means, just invasive. There are myriad means of e.g. family communication, easily found with a web (not Facebook!) search; some are even easier for the archetypal Facebook Grandma to use than Facebook. Its power is fiat, like our currency—but even easier to drop like the bad habit it is.
I agree that it should be controlled. Its brazen disrespect for privacy (ours, not Zuckerberg's own, evidently) has earned it a one-way ticket on the government oversight and breakup train. Websites can also do their part by not demanding lichen followers as though it were breathing—something I've always found facepalmingly crass when done by otherwise professional businesses anyway—and making their money from *their business*, not backroom deals with lichen follower counters, dataminers, or other such vulture capitalists.
Re: "Social networking has become so vital, perhaps it's time to consider other means of controlling it." It needs to be kept in check, but it's hardly "vital". It's really a load on nonsense, and people who spend time with it are at best silly and deluded.
1
We have to create legislation that regulates Facebook as well as other social media!
The damage Facebook has wrought and the betrayel of their subscribers scream for regulation because clearly, they have absolutely NO intention of self-imposing
guidelines that will prevent future catastrophic damage from being wrought upon our democracy.
I have no doubt that if and when Zuckerberg responds, he will say they're a young company, did not fully comprehend how their data was being used and they have been putting new protocols in place that will prevent such abuse in the future.
The damage has been done and the potential remains.
Only strict and unambiguous governmental regulation will prevent further damage.
37
Please define strict and unambiguous governmental regulation. or let me ask the question this way. Fox News and CNN gave DJT a free platform for the entire Republican primary, Sean Hannity and the entire Fox network lie effortlessly about the Democrats and demonizes Progressive daily, should we also attach strict and unambiguous regulation to Fox News Opinions.
Before we blame Cambridge Analytica, Facebook, or Putin just switch on the radio and TV and listen to the unfiltered pollution that is now political coverage in the media. On my cable system alone I can count three entire channels dedicated to serving conservative dogma 24/7. Trump does not need the Russians he has Murdock, Hannity and Fox and Friends to do his bidding.
Not as long as Trump is in charge.
Lots of people are upset with Donald Trump. Trump was enabled by Zuckerberg. His company's actions and inactions represent possibly the gravest threat to democracy since WW II. And Zuckerberg's reaction has been "what me worry?"
I am frankly worried that the US will survive. The U.S. is paying the ultimate price for the unfettered profiteering of Silicon Valley.
100