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Comment by zaptheimpaler | Hacker News Reader

Lots of the customary knee jerk HN cynicism here but meh..

Have you seen how worn out Zuckerberg has become over the years? Do you think being held responsible by every political side for every ill in society is fun for the guy? I don't think it's a position anyone would envy.

This board is a step in allowing him to not be hold responsible for every fucked up thing that 5 billion people and bots and nation states post on Facebook. I completely believe it's genuine.

Its ridiculous that the narrative has shifted so much to blaming social networks. Social networks reflect society. Society is fucked up. It's not a problem any amount of AI or moderators or technology will fix.

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> Social networks reflect society.

This is well worn territory and no they do not. Society never has had recommendation algorithms pushing radicalizing content/communities for engagement. Nor has society been so interconnected or shared anything like a worldwide commons with content so quickly & easily spread. The outsized reach certain viewpoints have as a result of gaming this system’s focus on engagement does not reflect society’s underlying distribution of beliefs. Though with enough time it will eventually since the medium is distorting consensus. Read up on what’s going on.

Agree Zuck seems worn out, this stuff is far outside his area of expertise. It’s too bad since he’s one of the most powerful CEOs as far as board/share control, so he has more leeway to do anti-revenue, pro-society moves.

> Society never has had recommendation algorithms pushing radicalizing content/communities for engagement.

How did Marxists, Nazis, religious terrorists come to this world? The world had worse before "recommendation algorithms". Books, newspaper, TV, radio, schools, religious institutions have been used to push radical ideologies for thousands of years and still going.

Do you not think the outcome is more easily achieved though a social network than it is for a book, newspaper or radio?

I don't know which one is easy.

Social networks existed before the internet.

Easier or not, there have been literal witch burnings for centuries, mob “justice”, racism, superstition, willful abuse against minorities... inspired by “popular” trends for millennia.

There's a difference in scale and speed between witch burning mobs and fake info being spread on whatsapp. The latter likely has killed more.

If you have a reference for that, it would make an interesting read

https://www.wired.com/story/how-whatsapp-fuels-fake-news-and...

The genocide in Myanmar is also heavily linked to fake news spread on fb and whatsapp.

I never said or implied radicalization was exclusive to recommendation algorithms, so I’m not sure what you’re arguing. You seem to be confusing the existence of radicalization in history, almost exclusively by large groups with mass media control or within isolated pockets that do not spread, with the degree to which it is possible for extremely small groups or individuals to alter consensus at scale with these rec algos, on purpose or even by accident.

Also, will not continue discussion with a 5 karma temp account, sorry.

Every revolution and coup has been driven by a small group of people utilizing social networks and shared ideology to win an asymmetrical fight. Altering consensus at scale is nothing new.

>Every revolution and coup has been driven by a small group of people utilizing social networks and shared ideology to win an asymmetrical fight.

That's not true at all - where do you get that?

There was literally a coup in the last couple of weeks that didn't follow your rule.

Absolutely no sympathy. If the king of facebook is stressed he is perfectly free to abdicate. Literally every day of work he does is optional. He will never not be able to pay his rent.

What's the alternative supposed to be? Another CEO that has the absolute right to decide what goes on Facebook?

I think Zuckerberg is in an impossible decision. I think the fundamental problem is that social support for a classic understanding of the 1st amendment has fallen apart, but the legal requirements of the 1st amendment haven't changed (and personally, I don't think they should). Regardless, Zuckerberg is being forced to essentially create an extra-legal institution so that he isn't personally responsible for content moderation decisions. And he shouldn't be - no single person should have the power to decide what is fair online.

> What's the alternative supposed to be? Another CEO that has the absolute right to decide what goes on Facebook?

Why is this the only alternative? There are myriad ways to structure an organization, including many still being invented such as corporations chartered around long-term value.

An employee owned company is just one alternative, that while not without its problems, would likely produce better results for the world than the current situation.

If what ways would an employee-owned company produce better results? Unclear how that’s related (especially since much of FB stock is already owned by employees).

If the current situation is unacceptable to the society, the existence of any organisation isn’t a must.

He could just sell a bunch of his stock and fuck off to literally any place in the planet and live in exquisite luxury for the rest of his days if it was that bad.

Precisely. He wants this in the simplest sense. I think he may genuinely not know what else to do with his life, which while sad given his stupendous wealth and power, is in some part likely for some element of his success.

Zuckerberg, for all the weird uncanny valley human robot that he appears to be, lives and breathes Facebook.

I don’t think he should be so casually demonized. He’s just the same as any of us and he’s got the mother of all tigers by the tail, anyone with a shred of moral fibre and a sense of self preservation wouldn’t let go until they’d tamed it or killed it.

It's probably quite interesting to him, and also he has an incredible amount of power in a way that other billionaires do not.

"Won't someone please think of the billionaires?"

Zuckerberg made his money off of building social networks. He's welcome to retire and divest, but otherwise it's his ethical responsibly to guide their development for the public good. He's going to get flak from every side, but it's his job to pick a side and go through with it, whether it's doing nothing, reforming, or even strangling the app.

Social media is a platform. It's like holding Tim Berners Lee responsible for the entirety of the internet. At some point, the invention is far bigger than the person. You are talking about making 1 person responsible for the fate of the entire world. It's simply not realistic. I don't care if he's a billionaire or not, it doesn't make him a omniscient omnipotent god. he's just a person not some abstract representation of wealth inequality and everything wrong with the world.

Anyways, my point was that I do believe the board will be independent of Zuckerbergs oversight because he doesn't want it.

I think you're overstating how people generally feel about Zuckerberg's influence. He clearly has the most power to wield, but I think most understand the nuance that he's limited by tons of competing interests.

I think that part of the problem is that he's trying to appease people who will never be satisfied, who want to control speech and eliminate wrongthink. In doing so, he's creating enemies out of people who don't ask for much, just that the banhammer not be wielded so liberally.

Zuckerberg controls a majority of Facebook's voting stock. While Facebook the platform may have grown in unforeseen ways, Facebook the company remains ultimately (legally) under the control of one man. There is no reasonable comparison between Tim Berners Lee and Mark Zuckerberg when considering how much influence they have over their creations.

> his ethical responsibly to guide their development for the public good

No, it's not.

If society cannot function without Zuckerberg's intervention, we're doomed anyway.

The "their" in the quoted comment clearly refers to the social media platforms owned by Zuckerberg and not society as a whole.

> Its ridiculous that the narrative has shifted so much to blaming social networks. Social networks reflect society. Society is fucked up.

Society might be fucked up, but it doesn’t help that social media amplifies the crazier voices in it. I think it bears at least partial responsibility for what’s plaguing our culture and discourse.

> https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/facebook-rules-...

Summary: Engineer builds dashboard of links that get the most hateful responses. Engineer notices it's also conservative media. Engineer understands that there is a direct tradeoff between engagement (profit) and doing the right thing (not promoting content that breeds hate). Engineer quits because Facebook does not do the right thing.

If hateful content is engaging and Facebook is promoting content (putting it higher in feeds) because it is engaging, then Facebook is promoting hate.

Engineers have quit because they see Facebook's complete lack of ethics and understand that Facebook is hurting the world.

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