Current Events > Former Facebook exec says social media is ripping apart society

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Another former Facebook executive has spoken out about the harm the social network is doing to civil society around the world. Chamath Palihapitiya, who joined Facebook in 2007 and became its vice president for user growth, said he feels tremendous guilt about the company he helped make. I think we have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works, he told an audience at Stanford Graduate School of Business, before recommending people take a hard break from social media.

Palihapitiyas criticisms were aimed not only at Facebook, but the wider online ecosystem. The short-term, dopamine-driven feedback loops weve created are destroying how society works, he said, referring to online interactions driven by hearts, likes, thumbs-up. No civil discourse, no cooperation; misinformation, mistruth. And its not an American problem this is not about Russians ads. This is a global problem.

He went on to describe an incident in India where hoax messages about kidnappings shared on WhatsApp led to the lynching of seven innocent people. Thats what were dealing with, said Palihapitiya. And imagine taking that to the extreme, where bad actors can now manipulate large swathes of people to do anything you want. Its just a really, really bad state of affairs. He says he tries to use Facebook as little as possible, and that his children arent allowed to use that ****. He later adds, though, that he believes the company overwhelmingly does good in the world.

Palihapitiyas remarks follow similar statements of contrition from others who helped build Facebook into the powerful corporation it is today. In November, early investor Sean Parker said he has become a conscientious objector to social media, and that Facebook and others had succeeded by exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology. A former product manager at the company, Antonio Garcia-Martinez, has said Facebook lies about its ability to influence individuals based on the data it collects on them, and wrote a book, Chaos Monkeys, about his work at the firm.

These former employees have all spoken out at a time when worry about Facebooks power is reaching fever pitch. In the past year, concerns about the companys role in the US election and its capacity to amplify fake news have grown, while other reports have focused on how the social media site has been implicated in atrocities like the ethnic cleansing of Myanmars Rohingya ethnic group.

In his talk, Palihapitiya criticized not only Facebook, but Silicon Valleys entire system of venture capital funding. He said that investors pump money into ****ty, useless, idiotic companies, rather than addressing real problems like climate change and disease. Palihapitiya currently runs his own VC firm, Social Capital, which focuses on funding companies in sectors like healthcare and education.

Palihapitiya also notes that although tech investors seem almighty, theyve achieved their power more through luck than skill. Everybodys bull****ing, he said. If youre in a seat, and you have good deal flow, and you have precious capital, and theres a massive tailwind of technological change ... Over time you get one of the 20 [companies that become successful] and you look like a genius. And nobody wants to admit that but thats the fucking truth.

from TheVerge

I didn't read any of that but I agree.
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TheBiggerWiggle posted...

I didn't read any of that but I agree.

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he's right.
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Been thinking about this for a while. I get very little positive out of social media. Nothing I couldn't get in person.
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they're jealous zuckerberg is rich as balls and wanna tear him down

Facebook creeps me out, it has since it used to be called Myspace. Think about it, you put up pictures of yourself on this site on the internet for everybody to see then you start giving strangers windows into your personal life and to judge you accordingly. It's like you're constantly seeking validation that your life is good from people who aren't living it and giving them control over waht you feel,think and do daily. Fuck that. Even as a teenager I was paranoid about it.
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Yeah I hate social media. I do YouTube but that's it, Facebook is creepy not letting you delete your account
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I read all of it and I agree.

I also had a chuckle that the article censors several uses of the word shit, but didn't censor fuck.
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KillerKhan420 posted...

Yeah I hate social media. I do YouTube but that's it, Facebook is creepy not letting you delete your account

Another creepy aspect of Facebook is that people can make dummy accounts to befriend someone they know and start using that to manipulate them somehow, I know a few people who have dummy facebook accounts just to make sure their boyfriend/girlfriend stays faithful so if they cheat on them, they'll have undeniable proof through this fake friend and it's not limited to that, people use dummy accounts to plan robberies,rapes,murders and even pranks.
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tremain07 posted...

KillerKhan420 posted...

Yeah I hate social media. I do YouTube but that's it, Facebook is creepy not letting you delete your account

Another creepy aspect of Facebook is that people can make dummy accounts to befriend someone they know and start using that to manipulate them somehow, I know a few people who have dummy facebook accounts just to make sure their boyfriend/girlfriend stays faithful so if they cheat on them, they'll have undeniable proof through this fake friend and it's not limited to that, people use dummy accounts to plan robberies,rapes,murders and even pranks.

I have a dummy account, but I just use it for poker apps so that I can play without anyone messaging me and expecting a reply.
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Ban Facebook.
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tremain07 posted...

Facebook creeps me out, it has since it used to be called Myspace. Think about it, you put up pictures of yourself on this site on the internet for everybody to see then you start giving strangers windows into your personal life and to judge you accordingly. It's like you're constantly seeking validation that your life is good from people who aren't living it and giving them control over waht you feel,think and do daily. Fuck that. Even as a teenager I was paranoid about it.

Yeah, I was pretty protective of myself until I finally joined MySpace (lol) then FB... I dont mind social media, but Ive made my footprint much smaller over the last few years. It definitely has some drawbacks though, and some people have had their lives ruined by it one way or another.
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Social media has shown that society is royally fucked ATM.
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FigureOfSpeech posted...

I read all of it and I agree.

I also had a chuckle that the article censors several uses of the word shit, but didn't censor fuck.

I got a kick that CNN didn't censor Trumps "grab her by the pussy segment" when it first aired.
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tremain07 posted...

Facebook creeps me out, it has since it used to be called Myspace. Think about it, you put up pictures of yourself on this site on the internet for everybody to see then you start giving strangers windows into your personal life and to judge you accordingly. It's like you're constantly seeking validation that your life is good from people who aren't living it and giving them control over waht you feel,think and do daily. Fuck that. Even as a teenager I was paranoid about it.

facebook and myspace are two completely different social media sites
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I agree completely.

I miss the days when I could meet new people just by walking up to them and getting their number. Now that usually only works at bars, clubs and parties.
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Social media is cancer.
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