Facebook engineers lurking on HN reading this: you are complicit in things like this by developing the technical infrastructure that makes it all possible. If your motivation is money, you can absolutely find that employment elsewhere.
This is a perfectly valid opinion to make, but I think everyone doing so should disclose where they work.
Additionally, I would hope they apply the same scrutiny to all companies that are harmful or don’t provide value; for me, that would include (non-exhaustive list): tobacco, alcohol, soda, fast food, junk food, high-frequency trading, gambling, and any company that is currently not or does not have an actionable plan to become carbon neutral, and that’s just off the top of my head.
Or we could just let people (and by extension advertisers) decide for themselves.
> Or we could just let people (and by extension advertisers) decide for themselves.
That's the idea of shunning though. People can make their own decisions to work wherever they please, and in response to these choices other people can likewise decide to disassociate with them.
I’m also against the action taken against the extension developer, both in principle and as someone who unfollowed everyone, one at a time.
p.s. next time you reply to a FB employee please begin your message with un-shun and end it with re-shun
\end{un-shun}
Immoral and unethical practice, unfortunately a lot of people here today fail to realize that, just because they allegedly are "in the right" camp or have the "right politics", it doesn't mean they are the right to behave like garbage toward others.
Alcohol bottles, cigarettes, sodas, burgers and high-frequency traders don't follow me around everywhere to get me to drink them. Facebook does.
Alcohol bottles don't monopolize socializing and drinking; I can still go to the bar with alcohol-drinking friends even though I would only order a soft drink. Facebook tries to, there's no way I can communicate with Facebook users unless I am also on Facebook and accept the ToS and "privacy" policy.
> A lot of the industries you mention don't try their hardest to get my attention
Huh? You don't think those industries run any advertising campaigns?
> there's no way I can communicate with Facebook users unless I am also on Facebook and accept the ToS and "privacy" policy.
This is the strangest complaint I've ever read. Are you suggesting anonymous people are able to message Facebook users without agreeing to any terms of service? I definitely can't see anything going wrong with that. Why not ask them to message you on one of the 1000 other messaging apps? No one's forcing you to sign up to Facebook, it just sounds like it's being successful at providing an easy way to message between friends.
Well.... Don't you see the problem in your own text? Yes, Reddit & Twitter exist but they are different. You wouldn't typically use those to keep in touch with family for example.
> You don't think those industries run any advertising campaigns?
Most of these industries' advertising is limited to places where advertising is accepted and relevant. I don't mind seeing branded glasses/beer taps/etc at the pub, or Coca Cola branding in fast foods. I do mind seeing these in my communication tools, even more so when a monopoly essentially forces me to use said tools.
> This is the strangest complaint I've ever read. Are you suggesting anonymous people are able to message Facebook users without agreeing to any terms of service?
I can call or text someone in America right now without accepting AT&T's terms of service. I can email someone on Gmail right now without accepting Google's ToS. Why is it so controversial?
That one was bought by facebook ages ago.
"high frequency trading"
How serious do you think the problem really is? How much of it do you think Facebook is responsible for? What would you do if you were in charge?
They all provide a value...it's called FUN, too much Fun is never good but a little bit is.
Your comparison lacks the basic understanding of having a good time.
toxicity tends to come in symbiotic pairs
Shunning is likewise immoral.
So, I have to ask. If shunning is off the table, what's the social punishment for people who do shun?
I haven't figured out the reason for the out-of-whack disparity yet. Is it because Zuckerberg lacks charisma, because he has Aspergers and people hate the awkwardness, or because FB is the tallest poppy, or because journalists have found a credentialed home on Twitter (blue check mark)?
This.
Twitter made a deliberate decision to recruit opinion-formers early on.
The face of Faceache is Zuck, with his blank expression and absurd haircut (surely after 20 years, he could find a decent stylist). The face of Twaddle (in the UK) seems to be Stephen Fry - a comic that I used to admire. Now, not so much.
I think Twaddle did a better PR job than Faceache from the beginning. I think they're still doing a better job.
/me never used either service
There are lots of great people doing great things at FB, and if we apply this standard to FB we should also be applying it elsewhere. I'm not entirely sure many major companies have been completely controversy-free... Work for Apple? well you are complicit in sweatshops. Work for Uber? Complicit in sexism and workers being taken advantage of. Work for Spotify? Complicit in artists not getting paid what they should get. I would be interested in hearing where I am allowed to work if we follow this to it's conclusion.
(NB: I don't work for facebook or any of these companies...)
"Well I GUESS I CANT WORK ANYWHERE THEN"
Really? There is a vast amount of smaller companies that are great employers and where you will enjoy your work just as much.
Besides, different people have different moral perspectives, and I assume most people at Facebook probably think the company has had a net benefit on society (even if you don’t).
Unless software engineers "vote" by going to work elsewhere, this won't change.
Looks for companies with solid ethics, and with founders who have background working at or starting other similar companies.
But not coincidentally, the pay at these companies will be at least multiple times less than at Big Tech.
> you are complicit in things like this by developing the technical infrastructure that makes it all possible
Employment status – especially at the top strata of a high-skill industry – is determined entirely by individual choice. You must first choose to apply to the company, then choose to accept the job, and then continue to make the same choice each day you don’t quit.
Every single engineer at Facebook could walk out the door and get a new job within a week. But if you’re a US taxpayer, good luck renouncing your citizenship. There is no legitimate comparison between the moral obligations of which megacorp direct deposits $10k a month into your bank account, and which geographical lottery you won based on your mother’s birthing location.
I once refused to work on a project for the USAF, and I think that decision limited my pay and promotion. But I still own my own home, and have an adequate pension.
Isn't "I'm just a cog" what the defendants at Nuremberg have usually said?
Genuinely asking: what alternatives are there that HN doesn’t consider “evil” and can provide the same remuneration and working environment?
Also consider that not every FB employee works in the Bay Area.
I have made that choice. For me it was a simple one to make.
The problem is that bad behavior is normalized and rationalized in our society, 'everyone needs a paycheck.' This legitimizes working for companies like this.
I doubt that shaming individuals works. But having thoughtful discourse about it is probably much better - let people hear the arguments and make up their mind.
With this being said, I do find it a waste that some of the best minds in the world are working towards ads and engagement businesses. Having a tool for global communication is wonderful, but their unethical behaviors are unexcusable.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Have a nice long thoughtful conversation with your friend about why you disapprove of what they're doing with their life, offer to help them find a new job if you're so inclined, but cut contact if/when they refuse to reform. Tell others what you've done and encourage them to do the same.
Shaming almost certainly does work, otherwise humans wouldn't be so inclined to try it all the time. I'm quite certain that shaming is a tactic baked into our social instincts by evolution.
But e.g. you don't see many people openly self-identifying as racists anymore.
The movie Thank you for Smoking, about a tobacco lobbyist, calls this the "Yuppie Nuremberg Defense." All manner of immorality, even shilling for a tobacco firm, will be excused away with hey man, I've got a mortgage to pay.
I once applied for a job at Phillip Morris in VA. On the reception desk (you had to walk about 30 yards from the entrance through the marble-lined lobby to get there), there was a sign saying "Enjoy smoking!"
Every office had ashtrays everywhere, and staff were provided with a carton of 200 free cigs every week.
Now while there are a lot of things that facebook probably can be prosecuted for, there are many things that they probably can't be. So I think we have an obligation to shame and shun those who act in reprehensible ways. And obviously in proportion to how culpable/complicit those individuals are.
The book's conclusion (as I recall) is that shaming is far more cruel than we commonly think, and shaming used to be more common until people realized its cruelty.
However FB is part of the FAANG group that pays top dollar. That is attracting enough good engineers, especially the type that don't care too much about the ethics of their work results.
FWIW their recruiters seem to be getting desperate in the past couple of years. Until then, I'd see a FB recruiter ping me about once every year. But from 2019 on, it's much more frequent, and I know it's not just me - there's many other people I know who have observed that, and you can find more testimonies along those lines in these comments. Furthermore, I have explicitly told them to GFTS in no uncertain terms, and I still got recruiters contacting me after. This tells me that they are feeling the crunch.
Another is that it must. Supply.
There are those who respond to recruiter contacts with "Please tell M.Z. F-U personally for me."
For those who do work at FB, we're well aware of the price of your soul.