It's fun pointing at corporate villains. I've done it. But it's more true and less satisfying to say that we enable the online world that has come to be.
I tried working for a start up and I hated it. But I love YC news for everything the web has ceased to be,
Interesting and intellectually engaging Quick to load Simple UI Strictly text
Which was the internet when I first encountered it I all its 28kbs glory (with songs gifs)
No matter how susceptible someone is to something, a decision they make is their own.
Trying to absolve the decision maker of responsibility for their decision is a sure way to disaster. If people at large start to feel that they are not to be blamed for their actions and it's considered acceptable to pin the blame on some corporate overlord, things will get out of hand real quick.
People in general are irresponsible. A complex world makes it harder to identify pandora's boxes lying all around. And that just amplifies irresponsibility at a speed and scale we haven't seen before.
At the risk of wandering into a lengthy philosophical discussion, this is really untrue in a non-dualistic materialistic universe, which our universe appears to be. In other words, free will is an illusion, and the decisions made by people are entirely a product of their genetics and experiences.
So if people's experiences can be strongly manipulated by corporations, then so can their behaviors. It's not about responsibility, it's about reality.