Is a review of a scathing indictment of Mr. Zuckerberg really the place to doubt those who've warned about "lizard-men"?
1
I was raised by a conspiracy theorist, and I agree with McNamee's assessment of the ways Facebook (and social media in general) have made it much easier for conspiracy theorists to find one another, provide constant validation for their fringe beliefs, and drive them to unthinkable actions. I was an early adopter of Facebook and an avid user for a decade, but in the last few years I noticed a steady increase in misinformation and the spread of that misinformation by friends and family. The feedback loop is not only real, but it is enveloping people who used to have better things to do with their time. I deleted my account a year ago in part because it was too painful to me to watch people I love become the equivalent of internet trolls. I know that we need oversight and public protection to answer these problems on scale, but while we wait and advocate for that, I can't recommend deleting Facebook enough.
4
Haters gonna hate. FB provides a great free service paid for by ads. Targeted ads that are preferred by most people- because we would rather see ads of things we are more likely to be interested in. FB does not and never has sold anyone’s information. And it’s not in their financial best interest- as it would reduce their ability to charge for future targeted ads.
FB has allowed 3rd parties to get access to personal information IF consent was given. Third parties abused this privilege- which is not only bad for users, but also for FB as unhappy customers are soon not customers at all. FB has been closing these loop holes- as it’s in FB’s best interest.
FB was also the victim of fake news which ultimately destroys the value of their news feed. It is therefore in FB’s best interest to minimize the spread of misinformation. FB is spending billions to clean up their platform- and it’s in their best interest.
FB has not broken laws. FB does not want to limit free speech- beyond what’s necessary to keep their platform free from hate and misinformation. FB users do not want to be censored.
FB has been the victim along with their users to abuse by third parties. If FB doesn’t do a better job protecting its users- FB will lose business in the future.
The IRS and Equifax were hacked exposing very private data. FB’s hack exposed largely harmless user data that was intended for public consumption.
FB is not breaking laws. No one has to use FB. People choose to use FB.
FB has billions of users. Just by the numbers- some bad things are going to happen. And bad things happen everywhere all the time. Context matters.
Is there no personal responsibility? Must the state be a nanny to everyone at the cost of progress?
There’s a reason why so little technology comes out of Europe- stifling regulation.
This is just another well intentioned and misguided attempt at over zealous regulation- which in the long run hurts everyone.
It is in FB’s best interest to fix their platform- otherwise another new American company will sprout up to better serve their customers.
FB is a reflection of society- similar to publications, radio, and TV before it- only magnified. FB is not the problem- it’s our culture and society. Banishing FB does not make the warts go away.
And the marketplace is infinitely wiser at sorting this out- better than any bureaucracy or journalist or author.
I have said no to Facebook since inception and am very happy I did.
4
. . . I began reading this review and stopped when I read this: "and a raving madman in the White House." As a former Political Science teacher in California community college, if in lecturing I referred to a U.S. president with such a label, I would be considered prejudicial. Who cares whether Mr. McNamee likes or dislikes the president. I did not vote for President Trump, nor for Hillary Clinton (yes for Jill Stein), but some of my relatives did vote for Trump and they are not racists, or whatever we want to label non-progressives. When the NYTimes allows such snarky asides in a thoughtful article as this, it lowers its reputation. Carolyn Grassi, Pacifica, CA
1
My thoughts are on the book, not the company. I thought the coverage was a puff piece for the benefit of McNamee. Here is a man who knew who Zuck was--"the telltale hearts beating beneath the floorboards" and apparently who Sheryl was--but jumped right in because he could make a fortune based on what he knew they were willing to do. Now McNamee is so upset about what they were, and are, willing to do. Won't buy the book of yet another "now I've made my fortune" and "gosh, they've done bad things", author. Ideas for fixing it in the book he's now selling? I'd look at anything he has to say very skeptically. Wish the Times had done the same.
2
@Perry:
But according to the piece, the book *does* include ideas for fixing it:
"It’s [the book is] also a robust and helpful itemization of the ways Facebook could be brought to heel."
2
The problem isn't really Facebook...it is so many people's need to trash, diss, insult, slant and lie in order to feel better about themselves for awhile, by making others feel worse. Facebook is only a reflection of humanity's collective consciousness stuck in adolescence. Until we get our definition of POWER to a level of adulthood--i.e., power is not what you "take" from "somebody else," it's what you feel from within because you seek to be fully conversant with all of yourself and recognize when you project your own fears and hatreds on other people, rather than admit them deal with them yourself (AND ask for help because you have PROBLEMS you can't solve all by yourself). The fact that young Zuckerberg and his intellectually fascile-but socially stunted college friends invented Facebook initially to rate the looks of girls they were afraid to talk to says it all, and is reflected in many of its followers--who, in some way, don't feel they "belong" or "rate"--like f'rinstance the emerging stat that many White supremacists or mass killers can't seem to make it with women--sums up (to me) the ROOT problem--that of achieving INTIMACY. And to achieve intimacy with another human being requires a critical mass of intimacy with SELF. This is precisely the root challenge of adolescence, is it not?!? For adolescents--and for the majority of Homo sapiens currently--the World (other people, society, Authority, the "Other") is the ONLY problem.
7
A bit one-sided.
How about adding one further point? Facebook brings a lot of positives to people's lives. In times when we work too hard, it allows us to take short breaks to laugh and catch-up even in a short 5 minutes when there isn't much else to do. It allows us to get opinions off our chest and hear what others think. It allows us to share our bad puns and good photos.
Sometimes we just need to accept the reality that, however he got there and whatever his inspiration, Zuckerberg had one of the best ideas ever, and did a phenomenal job of making it work. Although allegedly and repeatedly considered a nerd, he understood something about humans that product-designers for centuries had not understood.
The irony here is that Mr. McNamee was one of the few people who seems to have understood this. So is he saying that he was wrong all along, or just that he doesn't like how it evolved? It seems that he's mixing the two ...
I fully agree with sharing all the downsides of facebook, but to suggest that they only reason people use it is that we're addicted to the dopamine-highs is just absurd.
If you write a book aimed at a more intelligent audience, you might want to present a balance picture of facebook, and then ask how we might keep the positives but eliminate the negatives. That would be a valuable contribution in which his unique perspective would be useful. Just joining the anti-facebook band-wagon doesn't add a lot of value ...
13
The most ironic facts are portrayed in the film which describes the true origination and idea developed by another acquaintance of zuck and how zuck managed to convince a court that it could be his.Such is the true gene of FB
1
Most of the people I know who are avid Facebook users are north of 40. Young people have moved on. Soon it will be the next Yahoo of social media. Zuckerberg had better come up with some new ideas or his "disruption" will be toast and not a tear will be shed.
And do ot forget that while the publicly traded stock may have declined in price, the company founder and company CEO, who zealously protect their fort from broadsides and evidence of less than virtuous behavior, also demonstrate their real faith in their mission selling millions of shares in regularly scheduled sales. I know i know, diversification of portfolios and all that...But how truly deep is the conviction of the Founder and CEO in their mission when they are continually cashing in their "vision"?
First, he misleads and misuses his college classmates.
Next, his company misleads its customers and misuses their personal information through their underhanded scheming and lack of transparency.
Now, insatiably, the company is misusing and abusing leading texch partners (Apple, Google, etc.) through baldfaced violation of accepted, legally binding industry norms.
Where to next?
3
sounds like the panic of buggy whip makers reacting to the automobile...
3
@Thomas
It may sound similar, but it is different beyond anyone's ability to fully comprehend. I believed--and argued--this same argument. It takes some time and observation to see how wholly new the social media universe is and how little say we have had in its impacts thus far. It might be compared better to the use of carbon-based fuels, which we now know may end life on Earth. Perhaps if the buggy whip maker was onto something...
6
@Thomas And now, as sea levels rise and the planet melts, we see the the whip makers were right all along. Huh...
4
I'm with Betty White, who famously said when learning about Facebook: 'What a waste of time."
Take kindly the counsel of your years.
3
Apparently Facebook is working on merging all its products so it will soon be very difficult to break the company up into its constituent parts. The regulators need to get going fast.
See Zuckerberg Plans to Integrate WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger NYT 29/1/19
2
Forgivingly considering the readership of the NYT, the tenor of this article is and McNamee are woefully out of touch with a generation of taste makers who no longer use Facebook at all. Some young adults under 30 have a login that they rarely use and I'd wager most youth under 20 have never even signed up for the service.
The irony of gullible, technologically ignorant pentagenarians, and older, being almost solely responsible for the spread of misinformation and misunderstanding on social media considering the hesitation with which they adopted and allowed information to be shared on the internet in its infancy would be hilarious if it hadn't gotten Trump elected president and caused damage of such "generational measure."
I deleted my Facebook account in 2012, and each passing year reminds me a what a sound decision that was.
4
Christopher Lasch warned us about "Narcissism" and Facebook is the outward visible sign of it. Think about the people you know who use Facebook. It's all about them! And the excuse is always: "Well it is a good way to keep in touch". It is a brag book and nothing more.
53
@Kathryn I used FB to log in! The medium may be used to give philosophical arguments, advocate for political positions, and to offer solace to those experiencing loss and grief. I try to do all these things, and hope I am no narcissist.
2
@Kathryn Really? I think you may be confusing "people who use facebook" and "people who post everyday on facebook". Of course, if you don't use facebook and you don't understand how to change the settings, this may be what you get.
My friends who use facebook mostly use it to replace the chats we'd have in a pub over a pint of Guinness if we were all living in the same city, if we didn't have children to mind, and so on. Sure, if you make a joke, you like people to find it funny, if you make a comment, you like people to find it clever or to reply to it, but that is about being human.
Just this minute, the most recent posts on my page are one friend in NYC talking about someone he saw outside in shorts and a t-shirt, a photo of a funny poster about the rugby game tomorrow (Ireland vs. England), a rant about the Italian politician Salvini (from an Italian friend) and a photo of a hand holding a cold beer indoors with a snowy garden behind. None of this is narcissistic, just friendly chatter.
1
Zuckerberg is either not aware of his responsibilities or does not care or chooses not to care. Facebook is where "lies are truth" as a recent television program pointed out. It's fake news, and according to data 65% of Americans get their news from Facebook, which is pretty terrifying.
Russian operators have been creating fake Facebook sites and fake news for years, and we may be paying the price now with the election of Donald Trump. Facebook is not a force for good, it is simply the spread of misinformation. It will have to be regulated or broken up after years of unchecked growth. Zuckerberg is in way over his head.
28
It is far too late to put this genie back in the bottle.
I actually enjoy the kid and cat pix and videos.
But, yes, if we do not do something to help users appropriately assess the relative accuracy and likely sourcing of the information to which they are exposed, we will have one helluva Brave New World with which to contend.
7
@MR
Too late to put the genie back in the bottle, but not too late to kick the genie out of your house and put some rules on who can use the genie for their own wishes to be granted.
4
I'm an adult and I use Facebook. I'm not enamored with it, but I do think it has become fashionable for some adults to gang up on Facebook and blame it for all that's wrong with the world. It seems clear from some of the negative comments about Facebook that some critics have only a faint idea of how it works. If I were to post that "I like Nazis" for instance, I would not suddenly find myself socializing with a bunch of Nazi-lovers (but I might suddenly have a lot fewer Facebook friends).
Yes, Facebook has been manipulated. Maybe it played a role in getting Trump elected. But all the platforms and the Internet itself has vulnerabilities that can be manipulated. Yes, we need better platforms. But more than that, we need smarter users.
This knee-jerk pull-the-plug attitude ignores the thousands of useful connections that Facebook has made possible: the baby pictures shared, the marriages spawned, the helpful groups enjoyed by knitters and other hobbyists, and so much more.
Given the environmental damage caused by Exxon, and the environmental awareness raised by Facebook, I think I would rather be the founder of Facebook, if I had a choice. Thanks to Facebook, I might be able to glean some personal insights into Albuquerque and make a more informed decision about whether or not I want to go there.
Yes, criticize Facebook. Improve it. Regulate it. But don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.
21
@Dan Frazier - That's a relativistic argument you pose. It almost raises the question of whether you might work for Facebook. If you were to assess the social value of Facebook, it does more harm than good. There are other ways to stay in touch with people which would not promote division and rancor.
11
@Dan Frazier The baby sitting in that bathwater is the president, and the environmental damage his administration is wreaking on our country and the world is something you might consider.
That bathwater is toxic.
13
@Another2cents
I also believe that there must be algorithms waiting to be hatched in the brains of techies that would enable families and friends and interest groups (knitters, Nazis) to share pictures and text without opening up their discussions to the outside world. Oh right, it already exists! It's called email.
7
I discovered the link to this review - like most of what I wind up reading - because it was in my Facebook feed. It can't be all bad, can it?
3
@Brad. Reminds me of a snake swallowing its tail because it was hungry. Where does it all start and end? It ends by spitting out the tail and looking for more nutritious food elsewhere.
2
While I deeply dislike Zuckerberg and stopped using FB roughly 10 years ago, he did what all innovative businessmen do - he intuited a need that people didn’t know they had and monetized it. Period. It’s up to the consumer/user to stay informed and make the decision of whether to continue using the service or buy the product. The only power he or his company had ends once you stop using FB ... so, stop using FB.
5
If the book is half as well written as this review, I won't be able to put it down. Well done, Tom Bissell.
4
1. The 2016 election was not lost because of FB's use by the Russians. While I voted for Hilary, she and the Dems ran a bad campaign, never visiting some midwestern states/ or rural areas. I discussed this concern w/ many friends before the election
2. thousands of businesses around the world use FB to help them w/ customers and information re: their products. Worldwide.
3. I live in Chico, CA - sister town of Paradise, CA, which burnt down the entire town of Paradise. Several FB pages to assist survivors in more ways than anyone can imagine, were the only modes which people could find lost loved ones, get needed food/ clothing/ shelter from homelessness, and fund raise. BTW: FB donated $ to many of the towns impacted by the CA fires / floods in the last year.
4. If anyone does not like FB, just don't use it.
5. Roger McNamee made his fortune from FB. Why now is he so concerned?
6. Granted, FB is not w/o it's faults. But what about other multinational companies destroying our planet (big oil for one), and especially the banking industries who got government bailouts in 2009 - and are now running similar mortgage schemes?
7. And Google? paying millions of $ for buyouts,to two of their top execs to leave, for sexual harassment ? Is Google still trying to sue their workers for organizing their discontent to these buyouts, using their Google email accounts? I am not up on this.
8. I agree that we have lost our privacy, but thru multiple venues.
4
1. The article is telling us to delete our facebook accounts immediately. That way, next election and going forward society can get back to only dealing with voter fraud. But according to my calendar, 2020 isn’t far off.
2. Timeline of the end of the world...
The only path WWIII and global financial collapse lead: the ultimate manifestation of mass genocide allowed by years of increasingly rampant racism and xenophobia, emboldened by the ever-growing election of Trumpites to various government positions, a ripple effect of the re-election of Donald Trump, the beneficiary of another Facebook election not long after this exact moment.
Don’t like that timeline? Luckily, you can still change it.
3. How to avoid the end of the world.
Delete your Facebook app. Now.
Cease use of the platform. Then, once heavily regulated and set up to be a powerful tool for good in the world, re-join.
... Or the government could just shut Facebook down and expedite the process.
5
Nobody could have predicted Facebook and its attendant ills? Try McLuhan's apercus: we're all spies, living at the speed of light in a global village. The genius of the 1970s saw it all coming. Reread him!
1
I enjoyed the review, and was convinced by it to buy the book. But I can't because the book hasn't been released yet.
Why does the NYT (and almost everyone else) review books before they're released? By the time it's out, I'll probably have forgotten about it.
It seems to me that the story of Facebook is testament to the very low quality of our education system.
1
I assume McNamee gets his share of book sales profits? I'll pass on the book. As an occasional user, my criticism can be summed up by the mantra, "If you're not paying for the product, you are the product." Regulators are catching on that in this illiterate age that FB can be not only a platform but a weapon. The fact that its impacts on manipulation are indirect makes it no less dangerous.
2
Of course Zuck was canonized early on in an immensely popular biopic, perhaps we should be looking at David Fincher's contribution to this global miasma. My account is currently deactivated, not deleted, and I have no desire to reactivate, but I saw Facebook early on not as a social network, but literally as a repository for my life, one that could be opened for review after my death. So I stocked it with photos and stories and videos, which I now see are as ephemeral as any other memorial. Well, all institutions, old and new, are looking pretty temporary these days.
The users of FB are very pleased with the product, and it's free. Let them determine the future value of the benefits of FB rather than allowing our criticisms of the company to weigh its real value to the community. Not every product/service is perfect. It takes time to get the kinks out, especially when you have foreign governments attacking your service. Hats off to Zuck for working so hard on this. He could have walked away so many times.
5
@Robert
"Not every product/service is perfect."
There is a large gap between "perfect" and being outright predatory and abusive in your business practices.
"Hats off to Zuck for working so hard on this."
Yes, he's been working hard for an alternative to the newly busted Atlas Project.
"Let them determine the future value of the benefits of FB"
Why not let a 12-years old kid determine for himself what kind of food is good for him? This only works if the individuals are informed on what they are consuming and understand the implications.
3
Hey Zuck, how much money do you make off of me now? I deleted my Facebook account!
6
@Big City Bob They still have your data.
They still have all of your content. But good one you for taking that step. I freed myself of FB years ago and never looked back.
1
Zuckerberg knows what he is doing. He thinks he can get away with it. I believe he is wrong. Time is up, Zuck.
7
I hate the title of this book.
14
People interested in the FB phenomena might want to watch the
Adam Curtis documentary the "Century of the Self" available on you tube which chronicles the work of Edward Bernays in developing modern propaganda and marketing techniques.
18
@Paul Millea - Agreed, it's an incredibly prescient documentary. It really lays out exactly how we got to this moment!
4
Yes @Paul Millea and @Yabadabadoo. And then check out his follow up - The Power of Nightmares. Thanks to YouTube we can get them to a wider audience. Curtis was stymied by U.S. networks who did not want these seen in a broad and public way here, so our next best approach is to get the word out.
2
The allure of Facebook is unknown to me. From the sounds of it, there may come a day when they come for me and others like me. Drag our screens away from us and forcefully reeducate us in the ways of Zuck.
Nope, I've never Facebooked. I have Amazoned. Pray for me.
5
I spend most of my time being New York Times-Ed. It’s totally worth it and I heartily recommend it as a general pastime!!!
1
The generations that spent 4 hours a day passively watching television content (inane sitcoms, quiz shows and commercials) controlled by Nielsen ratings are wringing their hands about Facebook.
6
@Larry We were not passively watching, we were actively watching and Facebook is the logical consequence of TV,i.e. total participation in creating ourselves as our own product. Cf. McLuhan.
It's not the greed exhibited by Zuckerberg and and Sandberg that bothers me so much. It's the deception. It's the pretense of 'do no evil and 'lean in' and any other red herring for exploitation in the guise of helping society. I hope one day they rue or are made to rue the Social Network deceit they created.
12
Zuckerberg's moral vacuousness, naivety, carelessness, indifference - I call it negligence - runs deeps and is embedded into Facebook's DNA. At first, Zuckerberg used the software to rate how "hot" college girls were. Then to build his user base and traffic, he contravened data privacy and anti-spam laws by gaining access to people's contacts, then he spammed people into joining. Now he's indifferent to Facebook being used to incite Burmese to kill Rohingya or extremists spreading their filth, to name just two examples. It was only political pressure that forced him to take action against Russian manipulation of the platform to swing the election. And let's not forget how instrumental Facebook was in supporting terrorist groups and being an enabler to recruitment and spreading their message throughout the middle east.
In short Zuckerberg, has no moral or ethical framework. He's not accountable to anyone as long as he keeps making money. But as the evidence shows, he's not fit to be in charge of a company that can influence people in such profound ways.
43
@James The fundamental problem is that there is *no* individual fit to be charge of a company that can influence people in such profound ways. It is too much power to invest in a single individual or small group of individuals. The solution is regulation, but the plutocrats who run our country and/or influence those who do are passionate advocates for deregulation.
2
I'll continue reading to the end, but I got to the point where I learned McNamee was a mentor of Zuckerberg and went, "hmmm". Then I got to the point where he advised hiring Sandberg and I went, "this guy sure gets his scruples conveniently late".
9
So given Mr. McNamee's multi-billion $ net worth and his newly found conscience, I take it we can assume that he will be donating the profits from his book to humanitarian causes?
14
Delete your Facebook account. I did and I don’t miss it.
10
Not mentioned is how some countries like Myanmar use Facebook as their internet and thus spread rampant false news which has lead to mob killings of people based on rumors. This is dangerous.
8
How unique. A venture capitalist who made billions of dollars investing in a legal entity realizes he was instrumental in creating a catastrophe, and now thinks the government should intercede and regulate a public corporation. Careful Mr. McNamee, you are beginning to sound like a socialist, which won't make your 1% pals very happy. Ah, no matter. I am sure you shorted Facebook a week before publishing your book.
7
Bovis preceded Wikipedia, which is similar to Farcebook in that it started with sex sex sex and requires considerable unpaid effort. I contributed $25 to Jimmy Wales fund drive this Christmas season. Zuck's scheme, if unmonitized, might also be made usefully harmless. That could be Roger MacNamee's pitch, but probably isn't.
I read a story that Zuckerberg raised his own goats and personally killed and ate them. He proudly claimed he would kill his own food. This shows you how cutthroat the innocent
looking and casual T shirt wearing Zuckerberg really is.
1
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus I don't like Zuckerberg, but killing your own food is not necessarily "cutthroat" (at least, not figuratively). If meat is to be eaten, someone has to kill an animal--why not the eater himself?
2
to buy Instagram Facebook lied to our government regulators. are our regulators so much asleep that they will do nothing ??
its a new york times article and there have been many stating facebook did indeed lie. why isnt zuck in jail ??
https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/16/disruptions-instagram-testimony-doesnt-add-up-2/
What a waste of time reading this book review. I could have been on FB posting cat videos.
8
This is appalling on so many levels. McNamee made a fortune of facebook and now decries it. Look up this loser on Wikipedia. He's a wannabe musician who supports stupid causes (music-related poster art? Really?).
Now his conscience wears on him as Facebook threatens to destroy our democracy and he has a little remorse. So he wrote a book. Who cares about this guy? These super wealthy silicon valley types (see Thiel, Peter) are all the same. Men (usually white) of privilege who live off the percentages of transactions and have the audacity to tell the rest of us how to live
4
@Festivus Thank you for posting. One sold book is one too many.
Perhaps we should organize a “Do not log onto Facebook day?”
8
A lot of responses to this are in the vein of "it's people's own fault for using Facebook". This plays down the millions of dollars Facebook and other tech companies have poured into researching users to become addictive and attention-grabbing at subconscious level. You don't have to be an idiot or a narcissist -- you've just got to be human.
1
I had long ago realized what FB is as it happily sells my information ie I have no privacy along with billion other people, and for long I hoodwinked Google, but of course the search engine caught up with me with it's smart AI. Apple too happily shares my data with other companies, when I use Safari, the cookies of other companies that I never visit are in my Cookie folder. I delete the cookies 3 times a day permanently, yet they pop up! The whole of Silicon Valley shares the data of the consumers with no compunction, and many other small companies happily buy consumer data with absolute NO guilt! FB by far is the worst, as it does nothing but lie lie lie. Mark Zuckerberg is as bad as that justice guy who got nominated. Sad that Sheryl S too is part of this big game. All for the billions that they want to make. At least Steve Jobs and Bill Gates gave something precious and made our lives better. But MZ and such kind are nothing but trash!!! To think that the US elections was hijacked by using the stupid media, is well beyond any one's comprehension, and this young idiot has no guilt whatsoever, I feel the days are numbered for FB and he will eventually fall down, after all it is a common knowledge he stole the idea from others at the University! The other threat Saudi pouring billions into the Silicon Valley and the valley lapping it up! No end to the greed in this part of the world!
1
Social media is a stupid waste of time. Even Twitter, which seemed like it had so much promise when it launched, has made the world a worse place. Just say no to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. You won't miss it. Though you may never learn what your cousin's kid did at the bus stop Monday. I guess that will be a tough loss.
12
Great writing. Look forward now to reading the book.
Down with Facebook!
2
Yet again I give myself credit for never having the slightest interest in being on Facebook, using it, joining it, or whatever it is that people do with it and on it. I’ve managed to have a successful and fulfilling life without it...talents, jobs, friends, family, etc. so, Zuck, or whatever you call yourself or are called by others, know that there are people who consider you and your platform a dangerous and immoral waste of time. May it fade away and you stick to gardening on your 44 secluded acres, if you actually know how to work with living things.
4
It's so easy to not Facebook. If you feel like you can't quit it, you have stepped away from living real in the physical world.
In essence, it's, in that case, a form of digital death.
Need to be reborn? Get out now.
3
I wonder if Zuke is proud of himself for working with hostile foreign countries and destroying American democracy.
5
I’m trying to delete all my kids’ photos from my Facebook account. I have recently read about pedophiles who have “stolen” innocent photos of children but then add vile captions. These photos are then “passed around” in child porn sites. “Sharenting” is now a thing which means parents who share online. Stop posting pictures of your children and revealing their birth date with birthday photos. Some criminals have dossiers of young children. You don’t know how the images can be misappropriated, no matter how “private” your account is.
If I didn’t rely on some private Facebook groups for communication, I would deactivate.
I have increasingly turned to Nextdoor for finding local recommendations for plumbers, painters etc.
I have read all of the comments. And there are a lot of people patting themselves on the back for never having used Facebook or for quitting Facebook. Those of us who remain on the platform are harshly judged. But consider this. I sold my data for the ability to join groups and have conversations on topics that engage me. I am able to communicate with people who are interested in what I have to say. I know the price I am paying for such connection. For me the transaction is no different than paying the New York Times a monthly subscription fee for access to their content and community. All websites, web services, and mobile apps are harvesting your data. Facebook did not invent this. It's all a matter of what is given back in return and Facebook at least (unlike a web cookie or a tracking pixel) provides convenience and a place to connect.
4
Psychohistory. Look it up if you don't know what it means.
This has to be the most over-heated, uninformative book review I have ever read. It reminds me of a jeremiad sermon delivered by an 18th-century Puritan minister: "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Zuck."
It takes a lot to make me sympathetic to a soulless corporate behemoth founded by a callow 20-something, and I'm still not there...yet. But I just moved a small distance closer after reading Mr. Bissell.
So, why do people use it? (I don't.)
P.S. I'd hazard a guess that it might be for the same reason that people like me write comments on NYTimes book reviews online.
3
Great review--makes me want to read the reviewer's work.
4
Really, the world ends because of Facebook and the evil Mark Zuckerberg?
The same was predicted when electricity was harnessed, the telephone was invented and the "horseless carriage" began showing up around the world. Some people just cannot deal with change and they should probably avoid computers and cell phones. The reality is that all of the technology companies and probably all companies, governments, and educational institutions gather information and may even abuse it. We have dealt with those issues before and are still dealing with the abuse of various companies, but the dystopian view expressed here might just be a little over the top!
The funny part is that Mr. McNamee is profiting once more on Facebook-now that is true capitalism.
2
@David If you accept the premise that Trump would not have been elected without Facebook then yes, the world might literally end because of Facebook.
1
If McNamee's book can provide plausible paths to prevent Fakebook from doing more damage in the future, it will be welcome. I've seen and heard McNamee a fair bit, and it's clear he understands how and why Fakebook works, which should give him an advantage in figuring out how to stop the company. But, it's hard to be optimistic, given the uncritical acceptance so many people give to Fakebook.
5
Would love to get off FB. What's a good alternative? It has been the only way to keep up with what goes on in my ancestral towns of Italy and to share photos and updates across thousands of miles with family both in the US and in Italy. I wish there was an alternative for what I need.
3
@Gary Campanella
alternatives: snail mail, email, telephone. All the things that existed before Facebook.
6
@Gary Campanella
Write letters.
3
@Gary Campanella
Email chain letters. Im off Facebook and the people I love know how to find me.
2
When a company grows so big it can single-handedly obliterate opposition, act as a law unto itself and influence a nation, the government is obliged to step in.
Breaking monopolies apart is nothing new - in 1948 the motion picture industry was essentially prohibited from owning cinema chains under anti-trust legislation. In 1984 AT&T was broken up into a long distance company and seven regional phone co's (Bell)
And even tho' the breakups don't always achieve their desired goals, it's time once again to drag out, update and reinforce anti-trust legislation as it applies in this new century of ours.
In the past 12 months alone M & A's with significant consequences (Time Warner/AT&T or Disney/Fox) should ring alarm bells.
The time has come when Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft must face renewed anti-trust legislative review. They are simply too big - too powerful - too wealthy to be considered positive influences on business, society and culture.
That foursome alone have greater daily access to the combined populations of China, India and the USA than do the governments of those nations. Not exactly a great state of affairs. Without positive action the time may come when It it's too late to stop a descent into Corporatocracy
7
The key is the last line, "Facebook's only currency is our continued attention, so it quite literally...is an empire that could be brought down by a feather. Now, blow."
I did! On Jan 1st, I gave up social media for a year. It's been only one month, but already it's had so many positive impacts.
I've had more face-to-face interaction. I also wrote a contract on a house yesterday! (Which I firmly believe I found because I wasn't glued to a screen.) I walked & drove the neighborhoods I liked and struck up a conversation with an older gardener. He connected me to a for sale by owner home that was unlisted. It's the "old" social network and the way luck often happens. We stare at our phones while waiting in line, sitting at restaurants, etc. and don't connect with the people around us. Thus we miss striking up a fortuitous conversation that could lead to something great.
I'm never going back to screen obsessed autotron.
27
I am part of a grassroots gun violence prevention organization that started six years ago with a single posting one woman's Facebook page expressing the horror of 20 children and 6 adults being shot in cold blood at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Today Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America has more than five million supporters and chapters in all 50 states and DC. On a personal level, I have no use for Facebook, but through the organization's national, statewide, and local Facebook groups, we have gained thousands of new activists throughout our state and local chapters here in NJ. There is no better way to publicize our events, share crucial research, give support to survivors we've never met, and reach out to potential new supporters. So while I agree with so many of these comments (in fact I rarely post anything personal or waste time scrolling through posts) it has proven to be a really effective tool for grassroots organizing.
15
One word - Infowars.
1
@TT I get that (and bless you for your cause). It's hard to beat the rallying power of FB. But being dependent on FB can't be good for anyone. Bob Lefsetz sends emails out to his millions of subscribers. It's a way more intimate medium, and intimacy is getting harder to find on the internet.
3
"But here’s the bizarre quirk of the Facebook dystopia, whose sheer perversity would have likely pleased Orwell:"
I sincerely doubt Facebook's perversity would have pleased Orwell. He would have recognized it for what it was - the blatant callous disregard inherent in nearly all giant capitalist networks no matter what the product. Facebook is concerned about one thing, profit.
As for McNamee, he made his millions and got out. Doubt he'll give any of it back.
3
In another age, McNamee might have been given the opportunity to divest himself of his worldly goods and retire to a monastery, there to pray and do penance in isolation for the rest of his days.
1
Personally I have never touched the stuff, not even texting. My life and loves are all on Earth where they always will be.
8
Though I'm skeptical and wary about Facebook, this review is overwrought, and it sounds like the book is too. Facebook makes it easy to have conversations with people around the world, in exchange for targeted advertising. Users should understand how the system works, and use caution and common sense. I myself use a pseudonym, never allow myself to be tagged in photos, don't post anything on my timeline, and have chosen all the most private options. But I enjoy using the site to chat with people in a group on a topic of common interest. Once in a while, I even click on one of the ads.
(Grammar note: "Facebook may well have wandered down the bleak path" should have been "might well have wandered." Past tense, contrary to fact.)
8
@A reader
Even if you don't tag yourself in photos, your friends may tag you. Then, FB knows your face and can find it anywhere.
I judge that Bissell doesn't like FB. I wonder if Bissell has ever used FB. Having run several successful blogs before FBs rise, I developed a thick skin from that experience. Now I blog on FB. Who ever wants my "data" can have it.
3
You have to love the guy that helps make the monster, reaps, what I'm going to assume are, the massive financial rewards of its success and then turns around and chastises Dr. Frankenstein for all of the things he supported and even counseled Dr. Frankenstein to do. And in turn charges you $28 to tell you all about how horrible Dr. Frankenstein and his band of merry pranksters are, to make even more money off of the monster he helped build.
There couldn't be a more self-righteous, Silicon Valley way of doing things. Except of course if Mr. McNamee was a Hollywood actor.
This is rich Mr. McNamee, very, very rich.
6
When will people realize that creation myths spun but the "winners" are rarely true? Is Zuckerberg really exceptional? Maybe only in ruthlessness.
Odd that FB recently extended the account deletion period from 14 to 30 days. I suspect people are deactivating and leaving FB in droves. Nothing interesting to see there. Scam advertising and trolls. It was never more than a glorified chatroom, and now of course it has become a tool for governments and corporations. Anyone using this platform probably has to stop.
1
Why would anyone want to take part in a business that makes its money from user's private information and activities?
1
The ONLY way you will have non-destructive social media sites is to entirely drop the advertising-based model for a subscription-based one. If it's a valuable service, then you should be willing to pay a monthly fee-that way the site will serve you and fellow subscribers and not advertisers. As long as it's "free" it will serve the advertisers and not the subscribers. He who pays the piper calls the tune...
16
If it's free, you're the product. Don't complain, you signed up to be bought and sold. Delete that FB account, it's isn't doing you any good.
7
I am not sure Facebook is any more invasive or dangerous than Google, Yahoo, Amazon or any of the other companies that collect data on us and sell it to one another and others. Imagine what google knows about us from our searches and emails.
5
The problem with exposés like this is that Facebook is already going the way of previous social-media iterations, like MySpace and AOL Chatrooms. (Remember when AOL was so big it could buy Time-Warner?) Even if it's hard to see now, there's already been a migration of people under 40, and now oldsters like myself who have FB accounts rarely look at them. What will tame FB — sooner rather than later — is not regulation from above, but attrition from below.
2
i am a contractor for facebook and i am forced to use my personal facebook account as a work log in. which means that i am bombarded with new and unpleasant ads based on what i was working on that day. further I cannot delete it when a particular aunt is being particularly condescending and nosy. i'm posting this to see if they find it to be honest with you. oh yeah and like you mentioned its a global reach, 4th richest company, i'm a contingent data "contractor" with no access to health care and 12 days of pto (not including holidays) and food which i'm told is a very generous benefit that they spend fifty dollars a day on. i would just like someone to pay most of the cost for my depakote thanks
7
This reviewers contention that Hillary Clinton's disastrous campaign failed thanks to Mark Zuckerberg and the Russians is proof positive that the fictions we choose to inhabit will outlive Facebook.
I'm surprised that the author failed to mention Facebook's co-opting destruction of newspapers in the USA. Which I find to be the greater damage to informed and involved citizens.
9
never had a Facebook account... I've always had an interest in being a bit mysterious
5
Yikes. Ok, well first: it's astonishing to me that people are now just realizing all of this. Zuckerberg has been a dope from the minute he appeared in the public arena. It seemed that any individual with any sense would turn down the chance to hand him all of one's private information. Second, having been a formerly well-placed new media worker myself, it was apparent from the beginning how Facebook was set up solely as a data-gathering enterprise, offering a sugar-coated presentation layer of services in order to attract and retain users and content. I warned everyone I knew of this and to not use the service. Everyone thought I was a crazy old man. At that time -- about 8 years ago -- the entire new media world shifted from new product development to integration with Facebook -- how you could integrate 'like' buttons and other Facebook APIs into your own environment was the number-one priority. I refused to do it and left the industry, having worked hard but making very little money. I put my (lack of) money where my mouth was. So, third, Roger McNamee seems to be one of these guys who reaped a fortune from investing in companies like Facebook and now wants to scrape a bit more in to his top 1% savings account by trashing the people and companies who made him a fortune. What a nice bunch of people. Real decent.
4
How many news organizations require you to have a Facebook account in order to log into the newspaper website? How many websites invite you to link to your Facebook account for the "convenience"? How many times did Zuckerberg visit the White House to discuss issues with Obama? The word 'platform' is a specific term used by the intelligence community to indicate an intelligence gathering entity. A spy satellite is a platform, a submarine spying on nations is a platform. They are referred to as intelligence platforms. The author is correct. Facebook is a goldmine for intelligence agencies and even our own American intelligence agencies. They don't have to break the law or get a warrant to spy on Americans. They can just hack into Facebook and they probably don't have to hack. Zuckerberg probably left the backdoor open for them, the details settled during one of those presidential consultations.
For example, the Chinese supposedly hacked into the OPM database of the investigation files of millions of federal employees. All the Chinese have to do is take a name and find their associated Facebook account and use all of the gathered information to build a profile of a target they are interested in.
Facebook is a threat to our national security. They openly collect and store information on private citizens that even our own government cannot legally collect, and they can't secure it from compromise.
2
Why or why do I have to read the overwrought Progressive leanings and biases of the reviewer throughout this piece? I want to know if the book is readable (no help there), credible (hard to tell, given the constant interference caused by the interviewer's biases) and relevant (OK, you got me there.). I will buy the book despite the review...Or look for a decent review in another publication first
9
Kingston Cole,
"I want to know if the book is readable(no help there) . . . .”
Help yourself to two sentences that you must have missed:
“Zucked” is thus a candid and highly entertaining explanation of how and why a man who spent decades picking tech winners and cheering his industry on has been carried to the shore of social activism.The most stirring parts of the book are those in which McNamee makes the angry but measured argument that “social media has enabled personal views that had previously been kept in check by social pressure.”
@Kingston Cole
You don't have to read it; you chose to read it probably because it is about Facebook. And it provoked your intense reaction and plan to purchase a book you might actually hate. You might want to think about that.
2
Although I have a couple of Facebook accounts (work made me get them), I don't use them. And to be very honest here, I think that people who do are asking for trouble. And the people who live for it, are in trouble. Deep, deep trouble.
24
@sjs
I had a Facebook account for business too as a real estate agent. The email addresses of my business contacts were hacked from Facebook and I received multiple phishing emails purportedly from those business contacts. They had nothing to do with them. The emails ceased when I deleted the Facebook account. I had another account that was hacked by a pretty Russian who let me know she had hacked the account. I don't believe this nonsense that the Russian government tried to influence our election through Facebook. Plain computer savvy Russian citizens did it the same way Zuckerberg hacked into Harvard university directories to get photos of hot students.
1
@Aristotle Gluteus Maximus
I've heard stories like yours before and together with your story they make a strong argument against FB. I'm also thinking of the people for whom much of their lives are lived only so they can make a great post on FB. They disrupt social events to take photos to post. They complain that they can't get anything done/have no time. A big reason for that is that all the time they spend on FB. And they post thing on FB that they really, really shouldn't post. A relative posted a photo of me on FB that upset me. She wouldn't take it
down even when I asked her. Don't get within camera range of her these days.
3
In 2008, a friend convinced me to join Facebook. After months of receiving alerts for trivial updates ("___ has gone to the mall"), I couldn't keep up with it *and* work at a demanding day job. I turned my account off but didn't delete it.
Last year I found someone had 'reactivated' my account via Facebook's mobile app. When I set the account up, I used a random Birthdate, and now can't remember what that was.
With someone trying to hijack my old account, I couldn't log in to delete it (the Birthdate is needed for that). There is *no* method by which you can contact a person or a team at Facebook for help in these circumstances.
I asked a friend in the "industry" what to do. "Um, maybe you can open a new Facebook account? A real one?"
Can't win.
12
I don't have a Facebook account.
I win!
65
Me too. I never trusted Facebook and never will.
One should always be suspicious of “free.”
4
@Metaphor
You and I are kindred spirits.
2
01/29/19
Hi Tom:
Dude: My compliments!
You gotta impressive vocabulary, brutha!
I had to Google search a whole bunch of the words you used!
I enjoyed reading your review (:
I don't do social media.
Speakin of "blow":
'ppears to me that FB is HIGHLY ADDICTIVE cocaine for NARCISSISTS!
KRAK-r-jack review, Bissell!
Kind regards,
David McNulty
5
This is an exquisitely written book review. Well done.
19
Foreign governments and domestic extremists find Facebook useful for precisely the same reason that legal, mainstream American companies find it useful. It sells people to those who want to manipulate them. We may consider some of those manipulations more benign or more dangerous than others, but turning our words and actions over to the purposes of others is the way it works. Russia, no less than Home Depot, is using it for what it's designed for. The concept of Facebook is itself evil.
14
I think our current situation is more Infinite Jest than 1984.
7
Elevation Partners lists Facebook as a "Portfolio Company" on its website.
Until that changes, why in God's name would anyone read or listen to a single syllable put forth by this disingenuous hypocrite?
10
@SD I'm failing to see the logic here. Why does that discredit the author's argument? I could see a conflict of interest if he were singing Facebook's praises, but that's obviously not the case here.
@SD Maybe he thinks a broken-up and/or regulated Facebook is worth even more than it is now.
Quit it, delete it, and never look back. And dump Twitter and Instagram while you're at it.
104
@vcb Please include WhatsApp another useless app that people gleefully use and now fb is going to tie all the apps on the mobile. Except Europe, no other country cares about what fb is up to. Sad,
2
I recommend a more judicious use of Twitter, invaluable in emergency situations (like wildfires).
1
So guilt wins and the author now has remorse.... and a couple of billion dollars. If he is so contrite, why is this book not free of charge?
69
@ReReDuce
Even Thomas Paine's genuinely revolutionary essay was not free. That doesn't mean it doesn't contain much truth, or that the person who wrote it was operating in bad faith. My brother/sister, we will be paying far more than $28 if we choose to fix the problems in our society.
2
I know Roger and he is one of the most generous people I’ve ever met. I’m quite certain he made quite a bit less than the billions you mention. Not that Roger McNamee needs defending by me, an unknown small business owner who met him because of one of his music bands, but how many other people in his position, having made an investment and seeing it pay off, only to realize that the investment in question became evil would do what he is doing? I think what he is doing is heroic. I’m pretty sure Zuck and Sandburg are quaking in their boots right about now as well they should be. Facebook is about to have a serious reckoning.
6
A narcissistic populace elects a narcissist.
Sadly, not surprising.
Selfie nation, empowered by the greatest advertising machine in history.
39
This is a book searching for controversy to sell books. In a few years Facebook will be dead; kids no longer use it, just babyboomers.
11
@Princess Leia Right, the kids use Instagram, which just happens to be owned by Facebook.
1
@Princess Leia Exactly. I joke that it's become a virtual old-age home. I'm 66, and I, too, rarely log on anymore. When I do, it seems more and more that people who do are lonely.
@Princess Leia
I sure hope you’re right!
No oppressive, authoritarian government enslaving us here. It's just us *choosing* to use Facebook.
64
Facebook to me reeks of insecurity and insincerity.
I used it for 6 months in college when it still required a ".edu" email address to sign up.
Not sure why people still use it - I supposed it's way easier to "like" a post protesting Trump than to actually go to a protest - and Facebook gets to let that person feel like they've actually done something meaningful with their click.
What a waste of good internets.
13
The big problem, and the reason why a despicable entity such as facebook will not go away and keep eroding the fabric of civilization, is that the people who should be reading this book do not have the time nor the interest to do so. They are too busy checking facebook.
34
I seriously question the intelligence of any adult human who has a Facebook account.
37
@Gunnar
I've always hated Fb, but to equate its appeal to just a matter of intelligence is to oversimplify it, and also to make a lot of cultural assumptions.
Or, to put it more simply, you come across as arrogant.
We *think* our conscious brain, including intelligence, is in control, but we are greatly triggered by emotions, and often subliminally.
There are reasons besides lack of intelligence that people succumb to something such as a bad habit, as I'd call Fb. It's got its reinforcement mechanisms just like drugs, gambling and whatnot that people - even smart people - can get hooked on.
1
My family initially jumped on FB when my nephew was serving in Iraq.....he only had so much computer time and so he would post something on FB to let us know he was alive. It was wonderful. Facebook became a nightmare during the run up to the 2016 election with the ridiculous postings and memes going around (almost all negative toward Hillary Clinton). We were horrified at the vitriol on the site. We left. Never to return. Mark Zuckerberg et. al. can NEVER be counted on to fix this nefarious platform. It is divisive and a megaphone for propaganda. Facebook is a horrid, awful, deceitful experiment.
72
the underlying issue to be recognized is our desire to have what Facebook does for free ... meaning, we do not want to pay a subscription upfront, so we leave it the Zuckster to mine our content for payment.
6
Mr. Bissel, I wish I could shake your hand. Thank you, sir, for telling it like it is and doing so with an honesty and clarity that does not eschew panache, a terrific sense of humor, and the kind of smarts I only wish our leaders, both elected and unelected, had.
Facebook is nothing without its followers (shouldn't at least some of them have seen what was coming in the very term "followers"?) and, as we know, those who follow cannot lead. For heaven's and the planet's sake, wake up, America.
39
I toy with the idea of signing off Facebook, but it is so easy to stay in touch with family members dispersed across the globe. It saves me from having to think about what to write in an email or letter and to keep track of when I last checked on an old friend. It feeds my addiction to gossip and my less than healthy nosiness about who is doing what when and where. I can, of course, also spy on past acquaintances without them knowing. Only Zuck knows all that I do and he’s making a fortune with it.
18
Facebook lost me just before the Cambridge Analytica issue surfaced last year. Previously, humans could not possibly make sense of the flood of 250 million users' clicks, logs, and "likes", since it was impossible for humans to make sense of this much data. But recently we passed a tipping point in AI technology. A few years ago, IBM's Watson used 4 TB of data to answer Jeopardy questions in fewer than a few hundred milliseconds--and it beat the humans by a 3:1 margin. It should be clear to everyone that today, analyzing tens of billions of Facebook user inputs every day is well within the realm of the possible.
So, continued use of Facebook provides data that appear meaningless to you and me but is highly valuable to third parties, once a computer has parsed it properly. It's just a matter of time before the analysis includes what you write rather than just what you click. My data isn't for sale, especially when I don't profit from its use.
This, my disillusionment with the staccato bursts of the micro information that comprises social media and the lack of depth of this communication necessary for understanding, empathy, and real sharing, and the quasi-anonymity social media provides makes Facebook makes this "platform" unusable from my perspective.
32
yes the harvesting is truly devious and exploitive, and we all pay it in ways that effect our sense of identity and al sorts of economic choices.. Quite a price as we watch Mr. Robert Mercer and family continue in the perfection of Psychographics. Steve Bannon and company has spawned a true dystopia. This book and world consciousness peril needs all the attention we can muster. It could lead to action for rejecting the platforms that collect our choices to be used by others to manipulate our future choices.
The choice is ours.
c.a.
1
@H:
As far as collecting data and demographics, of course it's not just Fb, with Google being an obvious peer, and many others, as calp alludes to.
At this point, a lot of us rely on search engines in multiple ways all the time. That's hard to completely boycott.
And how likely is 'the market' ('market forces') to flock to a kinder and gentler and less nosy Google? An actual alternative could be potentially huge, but so is resistance to change. Sigh...
1
Everyone I know uses Facebook, but I have for the most part avoided it. I have never really seen the benefit of social media for my personal life. If people need to reach out to me, they have my phone #. Also, I really am not interested in pictures of what people are eating for dinner, etc.
Having said that, I do hope that these platforms can be regulated somehow, but I have no faith at all in the ability of Congress to come up with something that actually could work properly, especially with Republicans still holding the Senate. I don't have much more faith in Democrats to do it either.
8
This is part of what I wrote in November to my friends as I left Facebook:
This is my last post on Facebook. Don’t be alarmed. I’m not leaving the planet. Not yet.
I've decided that my infinitesimal contribution to the wealth and hubris of Mark Zuckerberg, his company executives, and corporate backers will come to an end. Not because it will hurt them, but because I don't want to be part of a platform that monetizes the worst aspects of our nature.
I write this with mixed feelings as many friends and respected colleagues are part of my connections on this platform—people I respect and even admire.
The sad truth is that Facebook in particular encourages hurting others by giving the sender a perverse pleasure of striking in secret. It's not just the trolls who hide in the shadows and spew their venom at the unwary. It's the technology that some have used to create bots and other agents to militarize what should have been a purely social space of individual connections. The company profits from our flaws and magnifies them in an unethical and socially damaging business. Frankly, I’d rather not be a party to it.
So long. I hope you fare well.
133
@David Potenziani
This book is a reflection of an hysterical fear of democracy. Heavens...people might get some information that has not been filtered by the New York Times and CNN !!!
If we really cared about privacy, we would be focusing on the government's programs to collect and store everything we say and do forever. But that's not what we are upset about. We are upset about the possibility that people will get to read ideas that we don't agree with.
This book is a bit late. The anti-Facebook campaign has failed; the latest data shows that the number of Facebook users is increasing. And I continue to read important items of real, valuable news that do not appear in the mainstream media through links on Facebook and Twitter. I am better educated for it. Let's just hope that Facebook can withstand the political pressure to censor.
2
Remember how much fun Facebook was when it was all about your college friends posting about their kids and pets? This saga reminds us why an Eisenhower-style 89 percent top income tax rate is a good idea. With that in place, Zuckerberg would still be rich... but he wouldn't have had the incentive to turn Facebook into the beast it is today, because the government would have taken mst of the extra money.
16
I have a difficult time believing that searching for common ties through all the entries of Facebook poses any serious problem to society as a whole regardless of how sophisticated the searching algorithms may be.
Human beings are far, far too complicated for anyone to compile any sort of real, much less dangerous, value from what they post on such websites.
2
Being a self-proclaimed privacy nut, I've never followed anyone on Facebook, I've never posted anything, and I opened an account a long time ago because it was necessary to sign up for another program. Nevertheless Facebook has horded an awful amount of data about me, which I'm helpless to control. Borrowing Zuck's strained phrase to Congress, that's now Facebook's data, not my own.
What Facebook knows about me comes from everyone else's posts. While I've never granted anyone permission to try to friend me, to upload photos which identify me, or to relay details about my life, it happens, making my personal privacy settings irrelevant. The company has me in its clutches because it has craftily created a network around me.
Members of Congress, during their naive questioning of Mr. Zuckerberg, thought data meant what a user uploads. Of course a user "owns" that! But if a user takes it down, it's already too late. The real valuable data has been mined. And it ought to be regulated, because it doesn't all come by permission explicitly granted by users.
17
The tech world prized ‘disrupters’ but they disrupted society rather than just industry.
5
Can't wait to read this and see if it lives up to Tom's fabulous review. Those who seek to exploit our most human vulnerabilities for profit and market dominance need to be regulated; otherwise, how in the world do we protect our greater democracy? Always remember, capitalism does not abide by ANY notion of democratic principles unless forced to. By We the People...
4
I'm reminded of Neil Gaiman's American Gods novel. Every god needs Our belief, our worship and adulation to keep it nourished. Each of us has the power to withhold that...
20
A problem we face now: small businesses everywhere have become dependent on the reach of Facebook as a marketing tool. So many days I think about bailing...but I cannot figure out the alternative. Maybe the answer is that we must fist cut the umbilical cord and then find a better solution. Facebook is nothing without us.
30
@Julie Metz This is a really important point. The more businesses that launch themselves with Facebook as a strategy, the more those businesses become dependent on Facebook, with changes to marketing and business development coming far into the future, if at all. It's very hard to ask existing small businesses which operate on very tight margins or even negative cash flow in their infancy to change, but we can start to encourage small businesses to return to community-based, real world marketing to loyal, local customers. Building businesses without using viral social media platforms may result in slow growth or trimmed ambitions, but it also has the upside of not ceding your business to the whims of algorithms and EULAs.
1
Cultivating and protecting proactive democratic societies is not free... it requires hard work, critical thinking, openness, self-examination and personal commitment. As Rebecca MacKinnon has stated: "The potential for the abuse of power through digital networks - upon which we the people now depend for nearly everything, including our politics - is one of the most insidious threats to democracy in the Internet age."
Humans who support and are committed to the tenets of a thriving democratic society cannot assume that the Internet and Data Mining Companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter or non democratic foreign governments like Russia and China will evolve automatically in a direction that's compatible with and promotes democratic societies. WE THE PEOPLE must realize and critically assess HOW many digital technology firms are structured, governed, unethically used to make the billions of dollars they currently do reap. Many of the most financially successful digital mining firms work actively to shape the Internet to benefit their own financial gains with little accountability for their actions. WE THE PEOPLE must wake up, take responsibility, insist on accountability and fight for the protection of our own rights and interests on the Internet... as well as the rights of fellow World Citizens If we don't, we are soon to wake up and discover that our democratic rights and personal privacy have been programmed, legislated, and sold away to the highest bidder.
13
"Social media has enabled personal views that had previously been kept in check by social pressure." That Zuckerberg and Sandberg claim they didn't anticipate this is astonishing. Of course, they did. They simply didn't care. How else does a company used by one-third of the world's population have only 30,000 employees to monitor its use? It's simply criminal. The way to end FB abuse of power is to hold them accountable under the law, something Europe is willing to do but the United States is not. Easy to figure out why. We have an ancient governing body of mostly white men who don't understand how social media even works and a president and Republican party who were put in power due to FB's irresponsible business practices that allowed misinformation and hate groups to thrive. A good idea, overwhelming greed and a lack of conscience can get you far these days in the United States of America.
15
A very good review of a serious book. A good review of a serious book doesn't just compound the seriousness. I'm impressed. So I just purchased his book about the Twelve Apostles. That's another serious subject that I expect Bissell will give his light touch.
1
I quit Facebook in December 2018. I was done with the deception of Zuckerberg and the noise that is Facebook. The quietude out here beyond social media is a gift to my soul.
30
I have worked in high tech for a few decades, witnessed the transition from the many innovators (lots of companies in the 80s) to the few winners (FB, Goog, Apple, MSFT, Amazon, IBM; we don't even really bother to think about the chip guys unless their stock takes a hit; all the concrete stuff - the hardware - is made in Asia), from complete products to software apps (though Apple still markets products and Amazon dabbles). What starts as good always tilts towards and eventually becomes, if successful, a full blown corporate behemoth, making typical self preservation, profit, and growth oriented decisions. What did you expect? How do you expect them to act?
The biggest difference from oil, e.g., is how entwined tech is in our lives - yes, in the workplace, but, as described in this article, in the fabric of our lives, even now listening to our conversations (not just put clicks)! Marketers and salespeople have long practiced the art of gentle manipulation based on what they could learn about you. Now they know pretty much everything and sell it to whoever pays. Are we willing to do what Mr McNamee suggests? Maybe we can at least start by being as focused and firm as the EU...
8
Great review but I'm willing to bet that this book changes nothing. Facebook has become an addiction that users can't quit; for example, friends who complain bitterly about FB's invasive habit of following them across platforms on behalf of advertisers but still waste hours trolling through posts.
It's also a supreme time-waster that enables users to deceive themselves into believing they are contributing something worthwhile when they like a post or share a petition. Facebook has created millions of passive users who participate in meaningless and angry political debates with strangers that only leaves them more angry or depressed about the state of the world. Others use their FB feed as a substitute for having meaningful interactions with friends and family in the real world. I'll never go back.
9
Remember when good old-fashioned advertising was considered evil? The Hidden Persuaders, etc... How quaint. How long ago.
6
There are problems with FB, but this review paints with much too broad a brush. Much of what it says could and has been said about television, which played at least as big a role as FB in the disaster that is the current presidential administration. Is TV a good thing? I can live without it, but many apparently can't. I like using FB, and for purposes of my entertainment find it better than TV. I do some serious things with FB too. I'll quote Bill Clinton--"mend it, don't end it."
2
What serious things can be done with Facebook?
The best way to punish Facebook since it dominates in its business category, and has caused huge damage to the US democracy in the 2016 election, is to order its operations closed down on Sundays. Facebook users will survive, and if necessary to send a clear message about correct operations, close in on Wednesdays also. Society will survive and I bet you their behavior will change fast.Society will survive without Facebook on Wednesdays and Sundays. End of story.
4
I for one welcome our new Facebook Overlords.
1
I can't be bothered with Facebook. It reeks of insincerity. It's devilish in its need to addict the 'Facebooker'. It leaves the faceless mob in charge of your once independent thinking. If this is the future than we are all truly 'zucked'.
42
@james33
I am appalled at the envious, paranoid comments by NYT readers. The utilization of user data by Facebook to target ads harms no one. And then, contrary to rumor-mongering, this data is not shared or sold to anyone else - no harm, no foul.
I’ll trust users’ decision to use Facebook, not the vicious naysayers.
Wow, what a lousy job of reviewing what sounds like and interesting and valuable book. Do you really think that everything would be dandy if not for Zuck? The enemy isn't him, it's us.
38
@Andy
Did we read the same review? Mr. Bissel's main point, which he makes several times in his review, is just that - Facebook's business model is built on nothing but the cooperation of its followers, who are not paid for the work they do for the company, while the company, of relatively few workers, makes their money by selling the personal information of its unpaid labor force to advertisers. I think we all understand that now. The question is, what will we do about it? (Hint: Refer to Mr. Bissel's last sentence for the answer.)
52
@Andy to the contrary, the review has really piqued my interest in the book. It's a great discursive review.
18
@Andy If I could figure out how to post some sort of applause emoji in response to your comment, I would. I'm in my early 50's who had started using Facebook several years ago to reconnect with friends and acquaintances from long ago (high school and college). I deactivated my account (and a Twitter account as well) on New Year's Day and I've not missed either one. Not even for a moment.
I've been intrigued by the reactions of several long-time friends and acquaintances (fellow 50-somethings) who have sent me e-mails or text messages checking on my mental health and wellness, about which they apparently worried for no reason other than I deactivated my FB account. I've happily reported that much like Twain, reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
I agree wholeheartedly with your observation. We the people have embraced the habit of looking outward and not inward when assigning responsibility for our actions and our decisions. Just because it is easier to do so does not make it right to do so.
Thanks again.
23
Having looked at and listened to Mr. Zuckerburg when Facebook was gaining ground, I decided to pass by. I decided instead to take Bugs Bunny's advice to heart and turn left at Albuquerque. I'm not sure of what it was that I missed, but am glad that I did.
83
Boy wonder uses the world for fun and profit. Zuck and Trump have much in common,
82
@James Allen
I wounder how it feels to hate someone so much that you would take the time to add him into an absolutely arbitrary discussion...
2
@DAB
I'll bet you don't. Given that it appears you're defending Trump I would guess that you've shared a Hillary meme or two that were totally devoid of context.
4