A leach is not your friend.
1
Nothing based on advertising can ever be positive.
1
Social media is designed to be a monopoly. It is a competition between monopolies. May the "best" monopoly win. Everyone with whom you communicate on a social media platform has to access that same social media platform.
Imagine a phone system where you had to use one phone to call people in France and another to call people in New Zealand. That is exactly what social media is like. LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, ... have to be accessed separately.
We need a cross-platform, cross-corporation social media platform. Like email. I access the internet through company A, send email through company B, to email company C to reach my friend who accesses the internet through company D.
Social media needs to be changed from a platform to a protocol. Like the internet itself.
It all started as a platform for people to know each other. Everyone appreciated this media, and in no time, the user numbers growing into a gigantic scale.
Facebook has failed in its duty. They have let down the people. Only because, it did not do the right thing. With all attention, time and efforts spent on growing and further marketing the organization, Facebook did little to set up the desired Rules and Regulations. The Corporate Governance, which would provide the guidelines to operate the Company, and identifying areas to safeguard the interests of the consumers.
Facebook is not a Company, manufacturing goods, or even a retailer selling items from the shelf. If it is one, it is the inventory the Company is entrusted with people's personal information and data. Facebook has failed miserably to provide the safeguards.
How does Facebook allow people to post malicious and inciteful information on its web sites? There are countries in Asia that has had to suspend the sites in this regard. As recent as a few days ago, the government of Sri Lanka had to suspend the site after finding false information posted. So, how does Facebook determine what is been posted, and the tools to automatically stop any unacceptable information?
With not much good seen in the past, I am not convinced that Facebook is serious in its responsibility to the consumers. I fully endorse and share the concerns of the Facebook co - founder,
Chris Hughes.
1
Facebook is a wonderful way for friends and family members to stay in touch. That’s its good side. The Corporate Monster moved in—including Facebook itself—with all the tacking , beacons, targeted ads, etc., and suddenly it wasn’t quite so friendly anymore. Then politicians joined, and warring nations, and spies, terrorists, etc.
Yes, regulation is absolutely mandated. Start by eliminating live video feeds, so mass murders can no longer be broadcast. Perhaps future heinous events will be discouraged if they cannot be publicized. Make sure of the identity of who is joining. Does the phone number and person actually match the person? Why is this person creating an account that already exists with a different phone number or email address from a foreign country? Gee. Ask some questions.
Keep the good and toss the bad. Open Civil Discourse is good. Emphasis on Open and Civil. No one gets to be anonymous—mind your manners. Not so bad now. Is it...?
Pipe dream? Maybe not. Let’s try it.
1
People talk about Facebook like it's a public utility. It has no purpose. None. Zero. Zip. It doesn't nothing that dozens of other outlets don't do. It is a waste of time and energy.
Just close your account and never sign back in.
This isn't rocket science.
2
When I was growing up, I was told not to discuss politics or religion with strangers. It was good advice.
2
Facebook cannot be fixed without abandoning its business model of selling user information and access to whoever has the bucks. And a change in model, like using subscriptions instead of clicks for funding, would mean a totally different operation.
1
We could begin to make everything work better in the US if ALL pages on the Internet had to post the company's phone number on its first or About page. Not being able to call companies, including facebook, with our complaints or questions, and have the phone answered by customer service is a MAJOR problem. To go even further, we should consider not allowing automated answering services.
1
Tried Facebook, quit Facebook, don’t miss it. Regardless of how Zuckerberg promotes his company, at its heart it’s a market not a community.
1
The Internet has become the universal operating system for the human race. Created as a tool for collaborating scientists, its design omitted the standard facilities of conventional OSes: storage, search, user accounts, etc.
For each of these omitted but crucial facilities, network effects led to a winner take all company supplying each of them.
Facebook is, in effect, the user account system for the net -- in many realms participation in modern life means that opting out of Facebook means opting out of society.
So the first thing to recognize is that Facebook has become an essential utility that cannot be permitted to be effectively owned by an individual. He may want his Precious, but with any real humility Zuckerberg would admit how much luck that Facebook won the user account role.
Second, Facebook's surveillance economics business model inevitably leads to corruption of society and social relations. Based on this model, Facebook is sociopathic, rather than social media. Let's look at that claim in detail:
Facebook is a later day Boswell, observing you all the time, it gets to know you perhaps better than yourself. It promises to do all kinds of great stuff for you, but, as a matter of fine print, it gets paid for helping others who frequently don't have your best interests in mind to persuade you to do things against those interests. The DSM V defines this as sociopathic.
2
@Eben
"....opting out of Facebook means opting out of society."
I opted out October 2017. I still have friends, family, my job.
Other than that, I get what you are saying.
@M Having worked in electronic privacy issues related to internet communications, I (and my colleagues) understood what would probably happen over time with surveillance economics. As a result, from the beginning, I "opted-out" of Facebook anticipating its inevitable transmogrification into a psychographic profiler. It's terrific that you still have friends, family and job, but at a higher scale than just you, Facebook isn't opt-outable. Here's just one example. Until the advent of third-party payment services like Stripe, new ecommerce businesses often had to go through lengthy background checks prior to acquiring merchant status. Stripe's innovation was to act a liability buffer between the new net-based businesses and the credit card processors. It could do this, it said, because it could assess a new businesses trustworthiness faster and better than the credit card companies.
You know how? By hiring a bunch of 20 somethings to review the applicant's Facebook and Twitter accounts (for duration of use, likes, comments, etc). Anyone without a significant Facebook history was/is automatically rejected.
Sorry, but as time goes on, the consequences of opting out will only get worse without significant legislation that forces Facebook and its like to offer open APIs, easy migration out, and interoperability with systems that are not based on surveillance economics.
Traditional media companies are held legally responsible for what they publish. When the internet was an infant, Congress passed an exception to this for internet companies, which were viewed as tiny little babies in need of protection. (The exemption is in the Telecommunications Decency Act.).
Fast forward to today: Facebook, Google, Instagram (Facebook), Twitter... not tiny little babies in need of protection. No, they are gargantuan behemoths in need of serious regulation. Solution: get rid of the exemption in the Telecommunications Decency Act; hold social media to the same standards of responsibility for what is published on their platforms as traditional media. The playing field has long since tilted to social media’s great advantage. Even it back out: repeal the exemption in the Telecommunications Decency Act. Talking to you, Congress!
9
I tried the beast on for size and found that its level of interest for me was ZERO. It's content is as interesting as the tabloids at the supermarket checkout stand. In many ways, these kinds of media are anti-social.
As for breaking it up, it is a private business, use it at your own jeopardy. There are many means of protecting privacy such as VPN but most people shrug their shoulders and carry on, oblivious to the dangers, only interested in convenience. Just as in politics, you get what you deserve.
1
My city's newspaper, The Asheville Citizen-Times, allows comments on articles only by registering on Facebook. The paper is owned by Gannett. I wrote an editor and asked why, and she answered that it was what the company had chosen as a way of validation. That's an interesting twist: you have to be on Facebook in order to truthfully exist, not a subscriber to the paper.
2
I suggest that people ask/demand that their HOA, their MOMS group, and their community/neighborhood groups use a message board alternative to Facebook.
4
When Facebook first emerged to eclipse My Space I joined. Then I looked at the privacy controls, took a look at a picture of Mark Zuckerberg and listened to a snippet of his objectives in his own voice--every voice speaks an indelible inner truth that reveals a person's true identity. My consciousness, that is my real non-Facebook self responded with a single word: Weasel! And so I eliminated my Facebook existence.
That was many years ago and my impression of Zuckerberg and everything that has emerged from his vapid iron fisted hold on his generation has proven that he was onto something and that something was how to anesthetize a generation through the continuous mutual application of unearned praise. Kind of makes you think of that image from the "Matrix" where all those folks are encapsulated in womblike enclosures with feeding tubes and extractors.
GOOD JOB!...MARK!
GOOD JOB!...SHERYL! Don't lean in so close, you're crowding me.
GOOD JOB MILLENIALS! Shhh! Don't wake the babies.
5
Chris Hughes's take on this is, at best, irksome. He made nearly a half of a billion dollars on this company he helped build. The intention was to be mammoth. And he was paid accordingly. Once again, a participant in an unsavory or unpopular but massive earning endeavor finds god and the greater good after the checks clear.
2
I for one never understood Facebook. I don't have a Facebook account and don't plan to ever have an account; however, at work my employer is showing favorability for employees to have a "Facebook-like" personal page to be perused by employees and customers - I don't like it. I don't think our lives should be open books that can be used against us. I don't need strangers, literally people I have never met, to know certain details...just so they know.
4
Quit FB in 2012. Never looked back.
3
No problems here. I’ve never been on any social media platform. And life so far as I can tell is just fine!
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@Sarah
Unfortunately my company requires me to be on LinkedIn.
I'd just as soon get rid of that as well. What a waste of time. I'd rather stand on my back porch and shout.
A big thumbs up for Kate from Oregon! Facebook is non-essential fluff, a completely unnecessary accouterment to life. Treat it as such, either an unimportant diversion or something to be completely ignored. Take back your own life. You don’t need the government to get into the social media regulation business. Time to grow up and take responsibility for what YOU do on the internet. Facebook is only as powerful and malignant as YOU make it. You don’t need the government to protect you from yourself. Just say no.
5
How about a day, 24 hours of Boycott Facebook. Do not log in. i mean, everyone who thinks Facebook needs to held accountable should participate in this boycott. Let us see the ad revenue during the 24 hours. May be Mr. Greedyburg will get the message. Facebook needs users. Without users, Facebook does not exist. Do not feed the beast.
4
Take the corporate abuse out of social media by law! Impose criminal charges for selling or transferring personal information of users without written agreement. Find digital means for detecting and blocking hate speech prior to posting with more heavy penalties for allowing it to surface. As has been suggested, break up giants like Facebook. And more...
5
Just don't join it. Truth be told I'm on Pinterest.
1
What I find fascinating is that throughout all the comments about how FB should or should not be regulated and how it functions into our daily lives now, there have been no mention as to what FB originally started out to be. Do people even know now in 2019?
I had started using it in 2006 while in university, as it was a tool for university/college students to connect within their academic community. You needed to have a legitimate school email to use facebook, and it was generally a safe place to be. Two moments my facebook experience had occurred that changed my views indefinitely of facebook... 1. I had unwisely posted my residence address in my 'about me' page (as it had an area for this information), and someone I barely knew went right to my door, spooking me how close & fast it was. 2. When facebook allowed non-students to sign up opening up that guarded community to literally the world.
No longer is it that place to build real networks within your community that it once was (it honestly really was!). It's really a shame now...
Personally FB just looks like a digital version of a giant garbage hole that people continuously throw their personal trash into. And like they say, you can learn a lot from one person's trash...
4
"...Now that I know what [Facebook] is, it sounds like such a huge waste of time!"
-Betty White, when she hosted "SNL" roughly nine years ago.
9
I'm beginning to feel about Facebook the way I feel about smoking. If you're stupid enough to use it, suffer the consequences!
15
If you read the user agreement and still signed up for it, I don't know what you're complaining about. It is what Zuckerberg said it was, it's free, and it made him rich.
I can live without Facebook, but I'd already be dead if not for modern medicine. Better to have government dismantle the for-profit health care system. You can fix your Facebook problem by not using it, but in America, fixing failed kidneys requires a ton of charge-what-the-traffic-will-bear money - and you can't not use them.
5
yes you can
Stay off
Find another social media route
Pick up the phone and call people.
Go out to dinner
Hug your loved ones.
read a book . yes read.
Socialize
remember all that old fashioned stuff?
Find a balance.
I have minimal FB presence form the time I mistakenly signed up years ago.
Haven't been on it in 10+ years and do not miss it.
11
And you can write your friends and relatives actual letters that go thru the mail!
1
I remember rooting for the fabulous Winklevoss twins to win out, but when Zuckerberg did. I lost interest.
3
I dumped FB almost a year ago, and I have absolutely no reason to go back to using it, regardless of what other individuals, groups, or organizations think. If they want to communicate with me, then they’ll have to find another way. There was life before FaceBook, and life goes on without FaceBook. Try it, you might like it.
9
I don't use Facebook. I will never use Facebook.
So what is everyone else's problem that they seem to think one cannot live a fulfilling and enriched life without it?
It seems to be that the underlying problem here is that people do not realize that they are dealing with ADDICTION.
15
The fundamental economics of Facebook seem wrong to me. They intrude into your browsing habits and figure out what things you're liable to buy, then facilitate marketing of those things, and supposedly their income model is sales commissions of all of those things that you bought in response to the manipulation that Facebook did. Or else they claim advertising revenue based on the ads I had been exposed to and the purchases I am likely to make for which they can claim responsibility.
Anyway my uncle told me he bought google advertising and it drove sales to his door, so he pays the bill & has markedly improved business because of that. I don't know. In my personal experience I literally do not buy anything that is advertised to me online. Or if I do, and especially if it is a costly purchase, I'll do my best to buy such items second-hand. Although I have heard it said: the more you think you are immune from advertising - the more manipulated you are by advertising. In my case I don't see how that could possibly be, but maybe I'm just really successful at deluding myself? I'm generally the opposite of "trendy". My SUV is a rusty 1987 Dodge with a cam shaft & header pipes, but was I somehow manipulated by marketing to make this purchase?
I genuinely cannot say!
2
As far as I can tell, Facebook is fine as is. I have a Facebook account, but rarely use it except to post an interesting article (usually science) every couple of months. If Facebook wants to use the information I post to generate a profile for advertisers (hey, he's a science geek) to send me targeted ads, that is fine by me. If you think that you are giving up some sort of privacy by posting on Facebook and this concerns you for whatever reason, then don't post. If you feel people are trying to bully you on Facebook, then don't read their posts. The last thing we need is for the government to be a big brother and try to "fix" Facebook and the internet. Facebook and the internet are not broken, and as the saying goes "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".
Never been on fakebook, never been addicted to heroin either.
It's easy if you try.
26
Lol. "These companies have a democratic function. They are the main instruments of the public sphere." Instruments, eh? More like bullhorns for the narcissistic and occasionally deranged.
14
Oh yeah? Never touch the stuff, never have, never will.
8
The best way to fix it is to not use it. It was built as an invasive app and money machine and won't be changing anytime soon. Just delete it, along with Twitter.
19
Here is the fundamental issue that people don’t seem to understand: Facebook cannot be “fixed” because at its core its business model relies on exploiting human psychological vulnerability. In order to maximize ad revenue it’s algorithms promote content that is more likely to attract views, which means content full of fear and controversy. It also relies on collecting voluminous user profile data to determine which of its users are most vulnerable to certain types of advertisements. It’s a manipulative platform at its core.
The only way to “fix” it is to outlaw ads on social media platforms. Then the incentive to promote harmful content to micro-targeted audiences is gone.
8
I deleted Facebook when I realized how unscrupulous it was, and also how it was damaging our relationships and spreading false information etc. I did it on principle, even though I wasn't particularly concerned about my personal information which is fairly banal. What I am surprised about, is how few other people have any principles or follow them.
14
I'm a retired programmer analyst.
I never signed up for facebook although I was tempted because I would like to be more in touch with family and it seemed like an easy way to do it. I'll stick with email and the telephone
I never trusted Facebook.
I value my privacy.
18
I am a retired computer professional.
Forty-two years in various software roles.
Have not ever had a facebook logon.
It looked like a bad bargain from the start.
17
@Zetelmo
I too am a computer professional and I just don't care. It has never interested me.
I never "got" Facebook or for that matter My Space.
It all looks like a monumental waste of time I could be using to read the Times for example.
We do not need to do a lot of thinking or research into the nature of the internet or what would happen if we broke up Facebook. Just tax it. Why does Mr. Z get billions for himself? Why does anyone? With sufficient tax money, the government could support NGOs that run public service announcements. This used to happen on network TV, though not enough. Debunking false rumors could be one useful NGO activity, and with government oversight, it could happen.
All of these problems are because of the abdication of government, because of "small government," which leaves power to be grabbed by corporations and rich people. Government abdicating power does not make us free.
8
The world survived very well before Facebook and social media. We went to the moon and ended the Vietnam war.
8
If you mean can Facebook be "fixed" as one might to do a pet, I would say yes, but that would be just a tad too drastic, don't you think? Or maybe not?
1
@Jay Orchard
I like that analogy. My vote is to put it down or fix it. But don't leave it.
1
I reject the idea that surveillance capitalism is something that the people allowed by way of informed trade off. There is long running quid pro quo of data for regulatory ineptitude between the USG and prominent tech firms. Those two parties cooperated to deny, deceive and sway the public to their favor under the cover of the GWOT.
Now, the only way the new de facto fascism can survive is if it is framed as a result of consumer preference and technological inevitability.
But that framing is loaded to suit the interests of a government that has transcended its constitutional obligations and a private sector that is resting comfortably into de facto ownership of everything that defines you.
Dare I say, this is why we own guns.
You can escape the world of facebook. My family has. We never gave facebook our data. We never blog through facebook. We never login with facebook. We use pseudonyms online. We dont post our face online on social media EXCEPT on linked in.
What is the difference? Linked in doesnt give your political opinion or your taste. It is just an immutable resume of work and education. Public information. Facebook is about private information.
The brighter among younger generation is waking up. It is just those foolish enough not to believed George Orwell whose lives will be destroyed by this nightmare.
6
We don't have to DO anything about Facebook. It serves no real purpose...just like minded people talking to each other, but folks with dissimilar views not talking at all. There is no real DEBATE going on in Facebook, just a lot of ranting. If you disagree with someone, you get unfriended. Of course, I'm really only referring to political discussions, not our everyday sharing of our lives, adventures and photos.
The point is, no one makes you be on Facebook and there are more efficient ways to exercise your political clout than talking to a bunch of people that already agree with you. Send your congressmen letters (NOT EMAILS! They get too many of those to read.) expressing your views, with ARGUMENTS supporting them. I notice on all social media sights, including NY Times comments, when one presents facts and figures to support one's position, people just tell you you're wrong, without making a real argument in response. Dean Baquet, executive editor of the Times, accused me of writing a "screed" when I sent him an email with facts about the tariffs being placed on American goods going to foreign countries like Germany. That was the extent of his response, name calling.
By the way, I've never written a letter to a President, starting with Clinton, where I didn't get some kind of response.
3
Facebook does not deserve you, delete your account. It is very simple; you will be okay.
10
Facebook is a time waster that allows outsiders to create turmoil for the aggrandizement of the majority owner’s wallet.
5
I can delete my Facebook account. But can I really escape it? No, not when business sites, including this Times page, embeds Facebook and other social media buttons on its page allowing Facebook to track and monitor my interest in such topics. Can New York Times really give up embedding social media buttons on its site? Facebook is a hydra-headed monster and it is not enough to regulate what happens on its site. We need to find ways to keep it from tracking our activities elsewhere.
15
What is wrong with Facebook and the other media giants is how they have entrenched themselves so deeply so that they're inescapable, even by people without an account. Facebook used cookies and other tracking media that takes advantage of the local storage offered by browsers.
These markers are used by just about every website (I see the NY Times as I type this is using googleadservices, contextual.media.net, js-sec.indexww.com, c.amazon-adsystem.com among others) and as you go about your day the advertisers can recognize you at each website. There are no protections about what they store on their servers from what they learn about you, or how they use it.
It's time for laws prohibiting websites from storing or sending any information about you without consent. Not that this is a panacea; who has ever read the users agreement they click thru?
7
I think this needs to be put into the bigger context of the appropriateness in a democratic society of Facebook, as well as Google and a number of other companies, collecting our personal data, analyzing the data with artificial intelligence to predict our behavior with regard to ads, and then auctioning the behavioral predictions to advertisers. Is that okay? I don't think so. What right do they have to all this data in the first place? Even if you do not have a Facebook account, and I don't, Facebook obtains your data on many websites as a third party (it appears Google is a third party tracker here but not Facebook). The government needs to step in big time and change the law so that the internet benefits users rather than leaving users at the mercy of big companies as is now the case where our data are taken and we have no idea what happens to it. What kind of democracy is that? Facebook is antidemocratic and this a big problem.
2
There needs to be a site where large numbers of people pledge to drop out of Facebook so that abandoning Facebook becomes as popular as joining Facebook used to be. We'll call it About-face book.
36
@Jay Orchard Brilliant
4
@Jay Orchard - I have already started and bought the domain last week: growyourownplatform.com. Let's just hope we can break som dopamine addictions...
1
Moi?
Facebook - don't use it; never used it. Hopefully, not on its radar.
Nextdoor - used it once or twice years ago; quit when neighbors started using it to promote political candidates.
Twitter - use it to stay abreast of news. Retweet sometimes; never initiated a tweet.
Robocalls - get a couple daily; don't answer, promptly block.
Problem under control! :-))
10
I understand why businesses use Facebook, but for individuals it's not that hard to say goodbye. I deleted my account 4 years ago and haven't missed it.
I have friends who would never eat at Chick-fil-A, shop at Walmart or buy gas at Exxon/Mobil because of their bad behavior, yet they give Facebook and Zuckerberg a pass. It's hypocritical.
20
I have never been a facebook User, so it would be easy for me to ignore it. However, I have seen too many family members and friends torn apart by facebook use.
We take action against harmful, addictive substances like heroin when it suits us. However, like prescription opioids, I don't foresee any meaningful action taken against facebook, because, like prescription opioids, too many rich white people make too much money off of facebook.
16
Great comments and most exhibit one thing "lack of trust in Social Media to do the right thing". I agree, so I choose not to use it since I already suffer the abuse of Google.
6
On blaming the rest of us for Facebook: there was no informed consent for "accepting" them into our lives. At all points, key information was withheld.
4
@Mike McGuire
It was common sense on the internet since at least the 1990s to be extremely careful in sharing personal information. Once something is on the internet it's very hard to erase it, because the internet is a network designed to spread information as far and as fast as possible, it's the antithesis of a private space. You always assume some amount of personal risk whenever you put your personal details on a website because you are willingly choosing to do that, nobody is forcing you to.
Nobody twisted your arm to make you create a Facebook profile or to use the site. I never used Facebook, because the very premise of the site flew in the face of what I had been taught about the internet with regard to personal information.
And note I'm talking about personal info, not private. Private info you have a reasonable expectation to be secret, it requires active permission to get access to it usually. Personal info does not. Personal info can be obtained just by observing a person in public and recording simple facts about them, by asking people who know you simple questions about your background.
Your name, age, race, sex, religion, nationality, marital status, relatives, political affiliation and so on, down to shopping habits and preferences for food and entertainment are not private info. Anybody at all can learn this without ever invading your privacy or requiring your permission. You've just made it easier to gather this info by putting it in one spot.
1