F**k you, Facebook!

[septimus]

I’m not happy about extreme wealth inequality, but I regard Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and George Soros as part of the solution rather than part of the problem. It isn’t their fault if God turned them into multi-billionaires and they are now working overtime to return their wealth to serve humanity, and to help the needy. Certainly we can’t expect the World’s Superpower to help out by sparing a few billion from its trillion-dollar F-35 program — nor should we count on “charitable evangelicals” who, even though some may have their hearts in the right place, have their heads up their asses — so Thank Heavens for the likes of Gates, Buffett and Soros!

And God knows the world needs strong help right now. The rise of abominations like Fake Cable News and Social Media has rendered American politics dysfunctional, and things may get worse throughout the world. Facebook is, all by itself, one of the biggest abettors of Evil.

I think if Gates, Buffett or Soros had billions tied up in Facebook stock they’d be self-aware enough to understand they were the problem, and perhaps work actively to address the big dilemma.

But not so with poor little Markie Zuckerberg. After the recent fall in FB share price he’s (temporarily?) off the World’s Five Richest List and is probably whining about it. He appears before Congress and pretends that he understands his stupid company helped turn the White House over to Vladimir Putin, but in reality he’s as much a sick sociopath as the dictators he helps create.

George Soros, despite the blather that emerges from the fart-holes of Trump, Hannity, Bannon and Zuckerberg, is one of the good guys and intelligent enough to understand FB’s role in subverting American elections. So Zuckerberg’s company wants to mount an anti-Semitic campaign against George Soros.

@ Markie — Your interface sucks, your whole application is crap, and you use your power to mount a campaign against one of the few people with the power and conscience to work against evil.
Fck you, you mer-fking c**!***

[MrDibble]

The impact of a rant I am otherwise totally in favour of is somewhat softened when you can’t bring yourself to type fuck, motherfucking or cunt…

[Bullitt]

Let me sum up with selected snipping and my red sharpie…

@septimus

@ Markie —
Fuck you, you mother-fucking cunt!

Zuckerberg has a lot to learn. Unfortunately his wealth blinds him and gets in the way.

[Miller]

[Moderating]
Bullit, one of the board rules is that you can’t change the text of someone else’s post when using a quote box. It’s acceptable to edit the quote down to focus on the portion you’re specifically responding to, or to emphasize a particular part of the quote, the de-censoring you did to septinus post is technically in violation.

No warning issued, but please try to avoid this in the future.
[/Moderating]

[Covfefe]

To his credit, Soros called Facebook and Google a menace to society. That’s more than I can say for many people who suddenly have decided in the last 2 years that they hate Zuckerberg.

[Voyager]

I hope everyone who supports the OP (as I do) has turned off their Facebook accounts. I have. More time for the Dope.

I used to work at the main FB campus before it was the FB campus. I should have left them a turd.

[Bullitt]

Miller — got it. Understood.

[Heffalump_and_Roo]

I hate Facebook as much as the next person, OK more than the next person. The negative impact of that company was obvious a long time ago. I’ve never had an account, except for 2 days, after which I got blocked.

But the criticism seems a bit unbalanced.

Mark Zuckerberg didn’t know about the Soros oppo research. Once he found out, the guy who hired the oppo research team was fired.

Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg and Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg have denied knowledge of the Definers efforts until after it was revealed by a New York Times report last week. Facebook has since cut ties with Definers.

Sandberg had to walk back her statement, but Zuckerberg didn’t in that article.

While I’m skeptical that Zuckerberg wasn’t dancing around the issues in this interview, he was at least forced to talk about this issue. He reiterated that he didn’t know about the Soros research, but he admitted that he’s responsible for the entire company, so that’s not the point.

He admits that he needs help from governments and even perhaps regulation because Facebook can’t handle all of these issues by itself.

Like Gates and Buffet, Zuckerberg and his wife have pledged 99% of their Facebook stock to a charitable foundation called the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

The aim of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is to “advance human potential and promote equality in areas such as health, education, scientific research and energy”

Formation December 1, 2015; 2 years ago
Founders Priscilla Chan
Mark Zuckerberg

Endowment 99% of their Facebook shares, valued at $45 billion (pledged)
Website chanzuckerberg.com

This is a video [Priscilla Chan is trying to change the fate of an entire generation] of Priscilla Chan speaking about the CP Initiative. In the video, there’s a guy who is straight out of jail, hired to help them, in their criminal justice reform area. They’re trying to help children and have a goal of curing all diseases by the end of the century.

Unlike the Gates Foundation (which also gets funded by Buffet money), the CP Initiative looks like more of their assets are being used to help people in the US and many of the causes are US causes.

It seems to me that Gates takes wealth generated in the US and distributes it to other parts of the world. Gates makes a philosophical point about why they do this, but I like that the CP Initiative does things more directly.

[Gatopescado]

@Heffalump_and_Roo

They’re trying to help children and have a goal of curing all diseases by the end of the century.

It’s good to have goals. :rolleyes:

[kaylasdad99]

@Heffalump_and_Roo

They’re trying to help children and have a goal of curing all diseases by the end of the century.

@Gatopescado

It’s good to have goals. :rolleyes:

I happen to favor that goal, even without the rolleyes. And ISTM that an achieveable intermediate goal would be the elimination of communicable diseases. Which would seem to require a program involving immunology. Maybe there’s a way that the propagation of anti-vax cant could be hindered.

[asahi]

@Heffalump_and_Roo

Mark Zuckerberg didn’t know about the Soros oppo research. Once he found out, the guy who hired the oppo research team was fired.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/11/29/facebook-sheryl-sandberg-george-soros-1034611

Funny how she didn’t know about the Soro oppo research, considering that seems to be what she demanded.

[septimus]

New Documents Show That Facebook Has Never Deserved Your Trust.

… internal discussion that led to Facebook Messenger’s sneaky logging of Android users’ phone call and text message histories. … Facebook [pretended] that Messenger had never collected such data without clear user permission. In newly revealed documents from 2015, however, Facebook employees discuss plans to coerce users into upgrading to a new, more privacy-invasive version of Messenger “without subjecting them to an Android permissions dialog at all,” despite knowing that this kind of misrepresentation of the app’s capabilities was “a pretty high-risk thing to do from a PR perspective.”

… This kind of disregard for user consent around phone number and contact information recalls earlier research and investigation exposing Facebook’s misuse of users’ two-factor authentication phone numbers for targeted advertising. Just as disturbing is the mention of using call and text message history to inform the notoriously uncanny PYMK, or People You May Know, feature for suggesting friends.

… In 2015, partly in response to concerns about privacy, Facebook [pretended to make] it more difficult to acquire data about a user’s friends. However, the documents suggest that [several large] companies were “whitelisted” and continued to receive privileged access to user data after the API change—without notice to users or transparent criteria for which companies should be whitelisted or not.

… Both before and after Facebook’s API changes, the documents indicate that the company deliberately granted or withheld access to data to undermine its competitors. In an email conversation from January 2013, one employee announced the launch of Twitter’s Vine app, which used Facebook’s Friends API. The employee proposed they “shut down” Vine’s access. Mark Zuckerberg’s response?
“Yup, go for it.”

… The New York Times published a blockbuster story about Facebook that exposed how the company used so-called “smear merchants” to attack organizations critical of the platform. The story was shocking on a number of levels, revealing that Facebook’s hired guns stooped to dog-whistling, anti-Semitic attacks aimed…

[septimus]

The British government has published a report on Disinformation and ‘Fake News’. Facebook, with its long history of lying both to its customers and to government regulators, is the star villain in the report.

[Green_Bean]

All this stuff about the horrors of facebook is AWESOME! I’ve spent so many years going, “yeah, sorry, I’m not on Facebook” so very many times. I wasn’t trying to make a point. I’m just lazy, antisocial, and self-conscious. But now, I get to pretend that I avoided facebook because I’m smart!

[digs]

Yeah, I’m not on any social network. Hate drama, hate any extra work.

Apparently, that’s weird for an artist, a writer, a teacher…and a member of my sister’s oversharing family.
(which means dozens of people bug me about it every week… “Whadjoo MEAN you’re not on facebook/twitster/behance? Well, I’ll just have to snap ya… Oh. Ok, hit you up on Instagram instead…what? You’re not? Whoa, you must have huge principles, man…”)

Like Mr. Green Beans, I’m starting to look like I’m this rebel with hella morals, who’s cutting himself off from this generation’s Electronic Crack to make an ethical point.

I’m fightin’ tha pow-ah… by doin’ diddly-squat!

[WillFarnaby]

Of all the people who have been victimized by FB, you go to the ramparts over a multi-billionaire political activist.

[Green_Bean]

@digs

Yeah, I’m not on any social network. Hate drama, hate any extra work.
…
Like Mr. Green Beans, I’m starting to look like I’m this rebel with hella morals, who’s cutting himself off from this generation’s Electronic Crack to make an ethical point.

Online social activity is also risky because you frequently reveal more than you intended. For example, I now know that in his 17 years on this board, digs has never realized that I’m a lady Bean.

(No apologies necessary. As long as you don’t mix me up with Stringbean its all good)

[kaylasdad99]

@Green_Bean

(No apologies necessary. As long as you don’t mix me up with Stringbean its all good)

That would make for a singularly uninteresting succotash, wouldn’t it?

ETA: Yes, I DO realize that I’m taking shocking liberties with the requirements for the elements that comprise a succotash…

[digs]

@Green_Bean

Online social activity is also risky because you frequently reveal more than you intended. For example, I now know that in his 17 years on this board, digs has never realized that I’m a lady Bean.

Oops, nice to meet you, Lady Bean! I was just riffing on one of my childhood heroes, Mr. Green Jeans. (Always loved those “supporting actors”: Andy Devine from Wild Bill Hickok, Art Carney on the Honeymooners…)

I occasionally get gender-conflated here, but I don’t mind. If half the people here think I’m the other gender, then I must be well-rounded and open-minded.

[septimus]

@WillFarnaby

Of all the people who have been victimized by FB, you go to the ramparts over a multi-billionaire political activist.

Does it bother that nobody ever knows — or cares — what you’re babbling about? Or is that supposed to add to the allure of your … unique … 'Net presence?