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Comment by freewilly1040 | Hacker News Reader

They’ve certainly faced an onslaught from the press, which has decided they are Philip Morris 2.0. It’s very unclear if that is going to translate into actual legal trouble.

If I was at FB I’d be more concerned with how young people are rejecting it.

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Facebook's legal troubles are certainly not imaginary. They are actual, they are ongoing, they are overwhelming and there's more and more coming out all the time. Zuck and Thiel themselves are named as defendents on multiple very serious lawsuits which money alone could not spare them from (and not for lack of trying - untold billions have been spent in the past 5 years to ensure Zuck's name didn't show up on lawsuits. Until it did.)

I haven't been following FB, and wasn't aware that Zuckerberg could be liable for more than financial penalties. Is it regarding Cambridge Analytics? https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/10/20/tech...

he's talking about how they may have misrepresented the business of the company to investors. the SEC has ongoing stuff about this.

This is where Matt Levine would opine "everything is securities fraud".

maybe. if nothing matters then it doesn't matter if zuck gets charged with something then.

Young people(of which I am one if 24 is considered young in this context) might reject FB but instagram(owned by FB well now meta) is probably the most engaged social media by people of younger 18-29. And whatsapp is the most used messaging platform in most regions of the world. If I was at FB, I would be most concerned with my company not being considered "cool", the potential kneejerk reaction of governments worldwide to show action(I am really skeptical that the underlying issues that led to the current issues with these megacorps would be addressed) even if there is no current legal trouble.

I’m afraid 24 is not young in this context. Teens are what these companies seem to care about (judging by the ad budget in the hundreds of millions), and in that demographic Instagram is behind both Snapchat and TikTok. It would seem that social media apps are like music: teens want an exciting new thing of their own (which, well, I have bad news about the coolness of music you like…)

Perhaps WhatsApp’s position is stickier, I’m unsure of it’s importance I’m driving revenue however.

Facebook presents an existential threat to the business of most traditional news media and they have a platform that actively promotes misinformation. The Press is doing their job: finding out what goes on inside Facebook and reporting on it. As someone not really involved either way, the responses of Facebook to legitimate questions has been entirely unsatisfactory and justifies the negative coverage they’ve received.

Facebook runs American tv and print media?

> Facebook presents an existential threat to the business of most traditional news media and they have a platform that actively promotes misinformation.

They (FB and the news media) do indeed.

I heard that Murdoch particularly hates FB & Google since he's lost so much ad money to them. As a result his papers have gone to great lengths to give Google/YT/FB, etc bad press to try to convince advertisers to advertise in traditional print newspapers like the good old days (for which they margins are far higher).

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