Comment by npunt | Hacker News Reader

Comment by npunt | Hacker News Reader

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FB is getting bad press because:

a) historically it's done a lot of shady stuff and gotten a pass on that,

b) it really screwed up around election time, with major / unprecedented geopolitical and economic consequence,

c) it doesn't seem to have fully understood let alone fixed the problems,

d) it's business model is interfering with fixing these problems, and

e) it's managed this situation from a PR perspective very poorly.

All of those are facts on the ground that would suggest FB is operationally not as solid as people previously assumed, and that it has many (possibly inherent) vulnerabilities that are not easily fixed that add risk to the business - risk of people abandoning it, risk of regulation, risk of being manipulated for political purposes.

Certainly FB was used by those looking to manipulate public perceptions during the election (and since), and that makes it in a certain light a 'victim'. But they were also the creators and popularizers of this new way of being manipulated, and thus an excuse of being ignorant of the implications is a bit weak, especially because of how they've handled things since.

Just practically, it's extremely unlikely that independent news & research orgs are all conspiring to manipulate FB's stock price. At some point people stop giving companies or individuals benefit of the doubt, which is what's now happened to FB.

This pattern of bad press you're seeing with FB is going to happen a lot in the future with our 24/7 news cycle and rumor mill. Something will come out about a company or individual about them doing something bad that will get a lot of visibility. In that process a lot of their past transgressions will come out, or be re-evaluated in a new light, and it will happen through a slow drip of new discoveries that will keep them in the press for a while. This will break into mainstream discourse, and it may permanently damage their reputation. This is a pattern inherent in the mix of people/companies royally screwing up, the existence of deep digital info trails, social media giving a voice to every person to share juicy info, and the instantaneous social media news cycle.

Let us not forget that Facebook has enabled in a way a form of direct democracy. Subversive globalist players without any moral compass (such as George Soros and Hillary Clinton, whose foundation connections are being interrogated as we type) are just angry that they lost in a long time.

George Soros frequently propagates propaganda via his Open Society Foundations about the dangers of Facebook. Because he lost.

No wonder it is being attacked.

And to be fair, the same can be said about the Koch brothers.

> George Soros frequently propagates propaganda via his Open Society Foundations

I am not agreeing or disagreeing with that, but so what if he does? He is a private person and you don't have to consume his politics just as I don't consume his political opinions or consume any trash on Facebook. It is the nature of liberty that people are allowed to express opinions you find offensive.

It becomes problematic if it is used to lobby for political change with private funding as a magnifier. Once you start to pump so much money into political movements, you can co-opt and change them. You get to drown some currents and magnify others by simply providing infrastructure and funding. It can be as simple as providing a speaker system to a protest and deciding who gets to use it.

Its a question common to campaign contribution and whether super PACs are to be considered free speech.

> It can be as simple as providing a speaker system to a protest and deciding who gets to use it.

That isn't a problem. Private individuals are not required to abide by a fairness standard when it comes to speech. Taken a step further talk radio stations are often extremely right wing are not required to fairly convey an alternate position. I am fine with that because as a consume I am not forced to consume it.

Multiple radio stations exist in parallel and you dont have to listen to any of them. Once you put up one speaker system at a location, like a central park that is the focus of a protest, you drown out everyone else. You are in control of the communication infrastructure and bought yourself an authority position.

The question of who is providing and controlling infrastructure is a real threat to protest movements, as it is easily possible to co-opt a political movement through funds this way.

We have clear limits on what lobbying is allowed to do and what kind of interference in a democratic system through funds is prohibited. Take vote buying as an extreme example or simply the ordinary regulations over campaign financing. We dont have that clear cut rules for what is acceptable in the case of non parliamentary political movements. Calling the targeted funding and co-opting of political movements problematic is appropriate in my opinion.

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