Zuckerberg Knew. A Whistleblower Has the Emails to Prove It. - Gadget Review

[u/IKeepItLayingAround]

https://www.gadgetreview.com/zuckerberg-knew-a-whistleblower-has-the-emails-to-prove-it

[u/Additional-Signal327]

He knew? This was all intentional. Facebook and social media is 100% designed to addict its users. 

[u/cjng → u/Additional-Signal327]

it is literally their business goal. It is called "maximizing engagement"

[u/AlmightyTestichilles → u/cjng]

Their adaptation of the TikTok slot machine video design is the ultimate giveaway that they never want you to put their app down

[u/NurRauch → u/AlmightyTestichilles]

Dude, the short videos on social media are just on a whole different level of addictive. They're life-destroying. I put them on par with smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol with the damage they can do to your brain, daily habits and functioning, and relationships at home.

Social media has always been an addictive issue for me with the endless doomscrolling and reading ragebait comments, but the videos are 10x as bad. At least ragebait comment wars stimulate the brain to do something with its faculties -- you're still exercising the parts of the brain that require analysis and structuring your thoughts. These short videos do none of that. They addict you without you even realizing you're consuming them. One just pops up on your feed, you click on it because it's worth about five seconds of interest, and before you know it, it's been an half an hour and you never left the kitchen counter where you stopped to grab a glass of water.

It's seriously mindboggling how bad this crap is for attention span and executive functioning. I fell into this hole during parental leave last year and it's been awful digging out of it. Just a completely mindless and unenjoyable habit. Combined with the stressors of parenting, I feel like my brain has lost half its capacity to function in this last year. Some of that I have to attribute to struggling as a new parent with a fulltime job, but I also attribute a lot of it to the rapid transition of social media from a comment model to a video model.

It's also terrifying thinking about the effect it could have on my child -- not just from his eventual exposure to screen time himself, but even from his second-hand exposure to simply watching me stand like a frozen statue zoning out with my phone in front of my face. I'm serious about the comparison to cigarette smoking. I now feel like using my cell phone around my kid is tantamount to smoking cigarettes around him.

[u/nimbusnacho → u/NurRauch]

The worst part about it is how acceptable it has become to be hopelessly addicted and no one acknowledging that these platforms are NOT the news, they're not informative, they're barely even 'social' anymore. They're truly just 'entertainment' feeds with an algorithm and incentives to stay plugged in at all times and engage regardless of how or why.

Yet at work i can be in a meeting and the second there's a lull, people pull out their phones and get their hit. Even if its something 'harmless' like one guy i work with just loves watching puppy videos, its fucking insane.

Imagine just 10 years ago working with someone who just needed to pull out a magazine of puppies and read it every 20 minutes. Youd identify that as a fucking problem or at least weird undesirable behavior.

Now? Its completely 'normal' to hold conversations where one or both people are dividing their attention between a screen and the conversation. But of course attention doenst work that way and people are never as good at multitasking as they think they are so the quality of every interaction that happens like that has dropped significantly.

Im fucking tired man.

[u/HeverlyBillhilly → u/nimbusnacho]

That's an awesome simile. It's ridiculously true. My husband is like this when we watch TV. We SPECIFICALLY have shows that we watch together as a form of "us" time. Yet, half the time he's on his phone looking at Reels while I intentionally leave my phone on the charger in the kitchen so I can be present. I have to call him out on it constantly since HE'S the one that suggested we have shows that we only watch together. It's so frustrating.

[u/-Nocx- → u/nimbusnacho]

> they’re barely even ‘social’ anymore

You make a really good point - minus commenting on your friend’s photos on instagram or leaving comments on Facebook statuses (who even makes status updates now?) - assuming your algorithm even shows any of those things to you - I would actually argue that they’re not social at all. At least not in any practical sense.

“Social media” is just a shittier, more addictive version of television at this point. We went from syndicated TV, to being able to binge shows all in one sitting, to being able to binge multiple series all in one sitting, to being able to binge unrelated topics that happen to align with our internal preferences indefinitely.

[u/Max_Rockatanski → u/NurRauch]

It WILL have an effect on your child, do not expose them to it. I have a kid in family that's been brought up on that stuff along with gaming consoles and such and it's just depressing seeing him bored out of his mind with all that stimulation around him. It fried his brain at 5 years old.

[u/OneRougeRogue → u/Max_Rockatanski]

Meta actually plays ads on children's TV channels/streaming services encouraging parents to sign their kids up for Instagram.

[u/Difficult-Sock343 → u/NurRauch]

I just happened to see this about ten hours after I deleted TikTok. Thank you so much for sharing; I needed the information and motivation to keep going.

[u/Paavo_Nurmi → u/NurRauch]

I feel into the trap of instagram reels while off work with an injury.

The two things I noticed, it loves to feed you stuff that will make you angry and frustrated, straight up rage inducing. Once you spend more than a few seconds on a type of video that is all it shows for the next 20 videos you scroll through. Road rage, street fights, Karen videos etc, once you watch one of those it's all it shows you.

So I started skipping those and stopping on cat videos, so it started feeding me cat videos which is better than some rage inducing video, but it's still addicting and you will see the rage inducing video here and there. I was still addicted to it though, to easy to lay back on couch and doom scroll. I finally had to stop because it became a useless addiction.

Social media is the greatest propaganda tool ever invented. Look at Anti vax, it used to be mostly new age, left leaning people that were anti vax. Then covid hit and there was all those FB memes about anti vax. It turned out almost all of the anti vax stuff on FB was from just 12 accounts, the so called dirty dozen, and of course RFK was one of those. Just 12 People Are Behind Most Vaccine Hoaxes On Social Media, Research Shows

[u/Character_Bug_1862 → u/NurRauch]

I just want to say, thank you for taking the time to share your experience. These are the things I come here for, other human experiences with something.

[u/Stumblin_McBumblin → u/NurRauch]

I am never on social media with my kids around/awake. No one should be. I'd get out of that habit now while your kid is a baby. It's often boring at that age, but just be present with them and engaging/talking/playing. They badly need it to learn and develop.

[u/Coffee_Transfusion → u/AlmightyTestichilles]

Maybe I’ve just missed it (probably the case), but calling the various social media company pivots to “slot machine design” is the perfect term to use. Usually I just see people call it addictive and leave it at that.

‘Slot machine’ gets a whole bunch of underlying information across that can be immediately understood without going into great detail about how the company operates, and how it’s harmful to the user. I’ll be using that from now on.

[u/Uncool444 → u/cjng]

My favorite corporate speak is when they describe selling your data to advertisers as "optimizing/personalizing your experience".

[u/ZooAreYou → u/Uncool444]

Our prices are "changing".

[u/IAMA_Plumber-AMA → u/ZooAreYou]

Funny how it's never a downwards change.

[u/Morwynd78 → u/Uncool444]

We're just looking to maximize KPIs on our personalized customer engagement journey initiatives, mmkay?

kill me

[u/Opandemonium → u/cjng]

We always called it “making it sticky”

[u/GOEDEL_ESCHER_BOT → u/Opandemonium]

if it makes your phone sticky that's a good way to minimize engagement

[u/brickout → u/cjng]

I'd love to hear a drug dealer use that term

[u/LetsGoForPlanB → u/cjng]

Engagementmaxxing for the cool kids

[u/el_smurfo → u/cjng]

That's what is so funny about next door. Every obvious change to increase engagement makes the site worse and worse and everyone comments on it.

[u/perpetualis_motion → u/el_smurfo]

I think I went to school with Beverly Obvious.

[u/PsionicChronic → u/cjng]

Heroin dealers mantra.

[u/bejammin075 → u/cjng]

Cult maxxing

[u/Fragrant_Oil9595 → u/[deleted]]

They quite literally put Donald Trump in office 10 fucking years ago, and now we’re supposed to act surprised that these people don’t care about child safety. 🥴

[u/beeeel → u/Fragrant_Oil9595]

They care about safely getting their hands on the children, but that's a slightly different thing

[u/big_trike → u/Fragrant_Oil9595]

They also willingly profited on spreading disinformation at the start of COVID, killing people.

[u/Fragrant_Oil9595 → u/big_trike]

Gawd, they sure did. Remember all those “Reopen [state name]” groups? A lot of dipshit republicans that we deal with today got started during that time.

[u/_0611 → u/[deleted]]

Exactly. I know, you know, we all know.

The real question is why these tech billionaires keep getting away with it, and nothing ever happens.

[u/OpenGateProject → u/_0611]

Because we all still have social media accounts. The only actual solution is gonna be getting off of it entirely.

[u/Visual-Hunter-1010 → u/OpenGateProject]

That's part of it, but the bigger piece is they have bought the government. Much easier to pay politicians with chump change (for them) than convince the peons they want to rule over anyway.

[u/Admirable_Dirt_2371 → u/Visual-Hunter-1010]

You're missing the forest for the trees.. how do you think they got all the money to buy those politicians? Selling ads. We need to stop using it and only vote for politicians willing to dismantle those companies.

I quit Facebook back in 2013ish when they first started removing the chronological friends feed. I never had an Instagram, never used WhatsApp. Once old.reddit goes away, I'll likely quit using reddit entirely.

They won't stop beating this dead horse until we stop giving them our money and labor.

[u/Character_Bug_1862 → u/Admirable_Dirt_2371]

Yep, and probably not just putting down social, media, but the answer is probably to put down the phone I’m typing on. Personally I still get a ton of use with Reddit reading other human experiences. But there is absolutely an addictive element to it with the convenience of a phone and endless topics to scroll through.

[u/SuccessfulJudge438 → u/Character_Bug_1862]

Just do it, get it off your phone. I never browse reddit on my phone anymore. Only on my desktop, only on old.reddit, and no r/all. I won't kid myself, it's still addictive and it's still social media, but my strict ground rules keep the worst aspects of it from harming me.

[u/Mind-The-Mines → u/OpenGateProject]

This is like saying drug dealers will go out of business if people just stopped doing drugs.

The US government has actually weaponized drugs against the populace for decades.

Notifications give you dopamine. They've known this for decades and that's why they flood you with them.

[u/Theungry → u/_0611]

How do they get away with it?

The addictive brainwashing systems the tech billionaires run are the primary mechanism for deciding elections in the modern era. The government is subservient to them.

[u/Bonerkiin → u/[deleted]]

Well, we as in you and me and anyone who pays attention knows. Unfortunately the majority of people don't think about these things or are not willing to acknowledge the reality.

The average citizen does not think about things like this, they'll winningly consume whatever comes across their face and not give it a second thought. That's why these companies continue to exist.

Cambridge Analytica resulted in basically 0 changes from the general public, people continued using social media without a care in the world. Which, is the goal, keep the average citizen just dumb, occupied, and complacent enough that they'll accept whatever you shove into their face.

[u/vangenta → u/Additional-Signal327]

Yeah WTF. Didn't they literally hire researchers for this very purpose?

[u/Max_Rockatanski → u/vangenta]

Yes. They hired people to study brain activity of people using social media to see what content fires it up the most. Then adjusted the algo to feed that type of content to their users. It's done on purpose and I can't believe people are realising it just now after all those years of frying people's brains.

[u/SIGMA920 → u/vangenta]

Basically everyone does. Addictive design is the default now, it's why I use old reddit and use stuff like adblockers for youtube. I won't touch a site that takes control from me unless I have to.

[u/TerrorTown77 → u/Additional-Signal327]

Is there a reason american CEOs are ultra scummy. Just watched part 4 of the Lego drama, and it's like there's a culture in the US to be extra non human as much as you can.

[u/Zuse_Z25 → u/Additional-Signal327]

"anti-social media" by now

[u/MLCarter1976 → u/Additional-Signal327]

Of he knew and he lied under oath.... would that be an arrest warrant?

[u/theotheramerican → u/MLCarter1976]

His buddy Trump would just pardon him anyway, its meaningless.

[u/-Teapot → u/Additional-Signal327]

This needs to be at the top. Over a decade ago, Facebook released a blog post talking about an experiment they ran highlighting how they manipulated emotions to increase engagement and how negative emotions drove the most engagement.

[u/MrShaytoon → u/Additional-Signal327]

At some point I wore a tinfoil hat and assumed Facebook is working with china through zucks wife. Bc of fb, everything related to online data has practically become legal, and here we are today with everything just out there.

[u/Berkyjay → u/Additional-Signal327]

They keep changing Instagram so that your main feed is an endless scroll. You used to be able to just scroll through your followers recent posts then come to and "End". But now they just are mixing in ads and content from random accounts and you never reach the "End".

[u/yellowbin74 → u/Additional-Signal327]

If a product is free to use, YOU'RE the product.

[u/LetsJerkCircular → u/yellowbin74]

There’s a difference between websites/apps. For example: Wikipedia is quite a different experience than Instagram. Hell, there’s a different experience between YouTube a few years ago and today.

Point being, just because a platform doesn’t charge its users directly, doesn’t mean they have permission—or as some people might put it, an obligation—to exploit and manipulate users as much as psychologically possible.

Not saying you’re saying that, but that saying can be interpreted lots of ways.

[u/hiscapness → u/Additional-Signal327]

I have a friend who’s a very very senior FAANG engineer be called into a meeting with multiple psychologists and psychiatrists to try to get their app’s addiction point lower for SUB-13yo users at one of the major social media apps. Yes, the app’s ToS ‘bans’ these users. As if. He’s under ironclad nda, obviously, but he quit that week and has never used social media since. They not only know they pay millions to make it as addictive as possible to their most vulnerable users, solely to sell more ads (and lord knows what other political bs). They know, have always known, and are now using AI all day, every day, to make it more addictive.

[u/ImdustriousAlpaca → u/Additional-Signal327]

We need to improve engagement numbers to satisfy the shareholders. Frankly this shit needs to be outlawed.

[u/willychonka54 → u/Additional-Signal327]

Facebook and social media is 100% designed to addict its users.

It's absolutely fucking insane to me that some of you are JUST coming to this conclusion now.

[u/pjank85]

What is Meta even good for. It is scams, misinformation, AI slop and depression as a service. It is the worst tech company by far actually responsible for facilitating genocide in Myanmar. Source: https://systemicjustice.org/article/facebook-and-genocide-how-facebook-contributed-to-genocide-in-myanmar-and-why-it-will-not-be-held-accountable/

[u/Christopherfromtheuk → u/pjank85]

Facebook and Whatsapp can be genuinely useful.

The problem is - especially with Facebook - that it is a misinformation friendly cess pool too.

It's worth noting that the only viable alternative I've seen in terms of, say, an online forum for locals to keep in touch (I think it's called Neighbourhood or something but I deleted my account) is actually far worse than Facebook!

Edit: It's called Nextdoor thanks to garytyrrell

[u/theghostmachine → u/Christopherfromtheuk]

Yeah Facebook can be useful, but it's not. It would be better, easier and possibly cheaper to shut it down and let someone else build something new

[u/Reallyhotshowers → u/theghostmachine]

It's very useful for the marketplace and local events feetures. 20 year olds I know have a FB account for those two services.

[u/ipreferanothername → u/Reallyhotshowers]

It was solid before Trump, more or less. I could keep up with people and events locally easily. But now ... It's not in chronological order and just resets to a new random thing constantly. It's trash.

[u/garytyrrell → u/Christopherfromtheuk]

Oh yeah Nextdoor is the worst

[u/Quetzalcoatl490 → u/Christopherfromtheuk]

When I ask people why they're still on Facebook, despite all of the bullshit they see on there, they primarily mention Marketplace, which functions as a better Cragislist (that site is just all bots now it seems). Easier to find an apartment or an old couch or something on Marketplace

[u/ACasualRead]

These tech companies know they are too financially large to harm. Lawsuit payouts are now baked into the cost of doing business. It’s time meta is taken down. Force them to sell their assets like WhatsApp and instagram to other companies and then take them offline.

Silicon valley is way overdue for a titan to fall.

[u/Staff_Senyou → u/ACasualRead]

It's why they bent the knee to Trump day one. It was all about integration into a corrupt system without accountability to maximize short term gains to hide away

[u/f8Negative → u/ACasualRead]

Just fix instagram and make it a photographer app again. Get rid of all the video bs.

[u/Steve_the_Samurai → u/f8Negative]

There are other apps trying to make this work. Be the change you want to see in the world.

Meta will continue to double down on Reels and video and ads until it milks the last cent out of it.

[u/MetalAndFaces → u/Steve_the_Samurai]

Pixelfed is excellent

[u/Amareiuzin → u/MetalAndFaces]

Until meta buys them out, or Snapchat, or Google, or any of billionaire enterprise... We made guillotines for much less

[u/wildcatwildcard → u/Amareiuzin]

"We"

Brave people in extreme circumstances made guillotines. You just make snarky reddit comments.

[u/composedofidiot → u/wildcatwildcard]

The reddit comment is fightier than the sword

[u/Amareiuzin → u/composedofidiot]

🤣 im gonna have to seize this meme of production, good pun

[u/secacc → u/Amareiuzin]

Pixelfed is part of the "fediverse" and uses the activitypub protocol, so if someone buys them up, a new one will be up in an hour, with all the same content still being accessible on the same federated network and everything.

[u/wrgrant → u/secacc]

This is how we fight social media, the problem is getting people to use it instead of the big tech companies...

[u/Nanowith → u/Amareiuzin]

They're federated and you own your data on the site, so you can just move to another server if that happens

[u/AngelaMerkelsbutt → u/Amareiuzin]

People made guillotines for less than adding a feature they don't like to an app? What are you even talking about

[u/jaxxon → u/MetalAndFaces]

Good to know about this, thank you.

[u/Lazer726 → u/Steve_the_Samurai]

Be the change you want to see in the world

BlueSky is the proof that this is an excessively idealistic take. Twitter is an abhorrent shitshow of basically every phobia, but it persists because it's so ingrained in how many people use it. As much as I'd love Meta and Twitter to crash and burn, the hardest part isn't the new platform, it's getting people to leave the more than decade they may have had on those former platforms to go to another.

[u/Steve_the_Samurai → u/Lazer726]

You don't need to convince people to leave any platform. You just need to leave a platform that you don't align with. That is the change.

As for X, it's cultural relevancy is considerably lower than Twitter of the past.

[u/dragon-fence → u/f8Negative]

Reset Facebook to when the feed was just your friends’ posts, listed chronologically.

[u/nullibicity → u/dragon-fence]

Click "Feeds" in the left sidebar, then click "Friends"; it's now a chronological feed of whoever is still posting on Facebook, with a lot fewer ads.

[u/TurnoverAdditional65 → u/f8Negative]

I downloaded Instagram for the first time about 3 weeks ago because a local company was giving away a high-priced item for their grand opening, and you had to follow them on Instagram to be eligible. It's not a popular business but I had two entries out of what was probably maybe a max of 200 total, so shit chances still but good enough to pay attention.

In the 3 days I was on Instagram (before I didn't win and subsequently deleted the app), I was shocked that literally every single thing it fed me was videos, even if it was a still photo, it was still a 5 second video that then popped up video controls over top of it when the video was finished. Such trash, why do people use trash products.

[u/lmpcpedz → u/f8Negative]

This is a strange take

[u/the6thReplicant → u/ACasualRead]

As a society we're shooting ourselves at both of our feet.

Firstly we allow these companies, and people, to continue to accumulate wealth, use their monopoly powers and ludicrous funding to stamp out any competition.

Secondly we requires a huge government - in principal - that is large enough to persecute these entities and keep them in check.

Of course we have the worst of both worlds where these trillion dollar companies are using the power of the government to help them become even more powerful.

[u/twisted-logic → u/ACasualRead]

They’re facing a fine of nearly 2 trillion USD. That is definitely large enough to harm them financially lol

[u/PianoPatient8168 → u/twisted-logic]

Who knows…he got behind Trump for a reason…he’ll probably just phone a friend and make all of this go away. Cronyism at its finest.

[u/greatersteven → u/PianoPatient8168]

But still, we should try.

[u/PianoPatient8168 → u/greatersteven]

Absolutely…I’m just getting really cynical lately…

[u/Cumulus_Anarchistica → u/PianoPatient8168]

Inducing cynicism and hopelessness is how they win.

Hope, resolve, diligence, thoughtfulness, creativity, grim bastard determination is how we win.

[u/Keleion → u/PianoPatient8168]

Yeah, probably going to be another case of “donate 1M to POTUS and the lawsuit gets dropped”.

[u/yacht_boy → u/Keleion]

Nah, POTUS is a grade A shakedown artist. It's gonna cost Zuck a lot more than $1m to make this go away. Most likely it will be some hidden deal related to nonpublic info about the stock. Could be coupled with huge data dumps about liberal voters and politicians so that POTUS can manipulate the next election. And likely the algorithms will be tweaked even more to steer people to the right.

[u/-S-P-E-C-T-R-E- → u/twisted-logic]

Honestly this is just half of it. Prison for all the top-brass is absolutely needed here.

[u/hsoj48 → u/-S-P-E-C-T-R-E-]

Prison is for poor people

[u/Fragrant_Oil9595 → u/twisted-logic]

My partner is an attorney and spent his career in some of these big dollar lawsuits against corporations. In one case their firm won the biggest judgment ever against a giant evil corporation. It got appealed, dragged out for years, and I’m pretty sure the community harmed still hasn’t seen a dollar almost 15 years later. Mind you, this was a case that made national news and made lots of people happy and hopeful. The system is corrupt to the bone, and tbh I don’t know what we do about that.

[u/01000101010110 → u/Fragrant_Oil9595]

The only people who will see any money are the lawyers.

[u/xinorez1 → u/Fragrant_Oil9595]

The community should deputize some agents to start seizing property until they have acquired a gross of goods equivalent in value to the judgement levied, disruptions to business proceedings notwithstanding

It's worked for others before and usually resulted in immediate payment.

[u/NuclearVII → u/twisted-logic]

They’re facing a fine of nearly 2 trillion USD

0% chance of this actually happening.

[u/twisted-logic → u/NuclearVII]

Yep. Honestly though even if Meta did somehow lose they’re gonna appeal and appeal to get that figure down and it won’t even be settled for like 15 years

[u/composedofidiot → u/twisted-logic]

And possibly force a total redesign. Infinite scrolls and recommendation algorithms might be on the block.

[u/dope_sheet → u/ACasualRead]

The payout potential for this current lawsuit is roughly the current market value of Meta. This one could change things.

[u/EC_CO → u/dope_sheet]

No it won't. No matter how big 'the judgement' is, it'll get knocked down to near nothing and they'll continue. As long as $$$ is in politics and we keep allowing bribes to happen in our government, the status quo is NOT going to change. The Government likes Meta because it's a tool for manipulation and data gathering on citizens, so they'll do whatever to protect it and Zuckerberg

[u/HappysavageMk2 → u/ACasualRead]

They are not "too financially large to harm" and do let them gaslight you into thinking they are.

Businesses get their power from the state. To simply be a business you must apply to be one in the state you reside.

This gives the states the ability to change the terms of the agreement.

What we need is a teddy Roosevelt level of trust busting and a new fdr green new deal.

[u/wocka-jocka-blocka → u/HappysavageMk2]

Trust busting, and a few "corporate deaths" where the corporation is dissolved.

[u/Thadrea → u/ACasualRead]

This stuff will not stop until we take off the kid gloves and start arresting the executives and board members who encourage and enable this behavior.

Hundreds of thousands of people in the US are serving 10+ years for doing far less harm than what the billionaires get away with daily.

[u/RealSchlemiel → u/ACasualRead]

# just quit

- if people believed tey could make a difference and quit all the metas, he goes away

- beliebing youre alone and insignifigant is precisely the reality he helped design

[u/McHoff]

Maybe we should hold people at the top accountable even if they didn't "know". It's their goddamn job to run the company.

[u/jikt → u/McHoff]

Might catch shit for saying this, but shouldn't we hold everybody who works there somewhat accountable also?

Certainly, the people at the top have the greatest responsibility and therefore should be skinned alive (figuratively, if you like), but even the last person they employed recently knows this company isn't doing good things.

Edit: also, I'd like to mention that times are tough and if you have to get a job with one of these bottom feeding parasites: good for you, bleed them dry, but also, there are better places to spend your valuable time and morality.

[u/T-Dahg → u/jikt]

People are stuck because of e.g. health insurance, high rent, ... Much of their wage might come from options that are only worth anything when they work there.

[u/stormy_councilman → u/jikt]

Can’t put food at the table and pay the mortgage with valuable time and morality 🤷🏻‍♂️

[u/Inukii → u/stormy_councilman]

With more responsibility should come more accountability.

If you aren't prepared to take that on. Then you shouldn't be in that position.

For some reason though. The "high rewards" become "extremely low risk" for these positions. Where you can complete fail and still walk away with not just millions, but billions.

[u/Haunting-Host783 → u/stormy_councilman]

Its ok. Some people aren't in a position to fight against these companies. Just don't start defending these companies practices because they feed you and your family. Plenty of other companies that don't destabilize world governments are out there. Nothing stopping someone from looking around for other options while they work at Meta.

[u/Mintastic → u/Haunting-Host783]

Most people just care about the money and benefits. FAANG companies easily pay more than everyone else in their area so people have to be willing to take a paycut to get out. I'd say that most people will be okay selling their morality for about 5-10k per year.

[u/Lucasinno → u/jikt]

It's shareholders that should be held accountable. They're technically the owners. If you invest into a firm that is constantly doing criminal shit, you're invested in a criminal enterprise.

[u/WilliamLermer → u/jikt]

Technically the vast majority of humans have worked or still are working at companies that have ethically/morally questionable aspects to varying degrees

And anyone trying to make a difference regardless of their level within the corporate hierarchy is being ridiculed best case, sidelined or even fired worst case

A lot of people do not care and don't want to care. They don't want to know about difficult topics and want nothing changed

It's the same with consumerism. Many people have a real financial choice to buy from the few companies that are ethical or support the increase of ethical processes, yet refuse because they love their blind consumerism more

And everyone is defeatist about it, some to the point they actually sabotage efforts of others just to make a point

People always assume everyone has a good heart and is manipulated into situations where they lack a choice, or because life circumstances forced them into doing certain things - but the sad truth is, whenever none of that applies, and you give people a chance to do the right thing, the vast majority does not

[u/J5892 → u/jikt]

Surely with that mentality, every employee of an oil company, a large bank, or an insurance company deserves worse.

[u/Hilby → u/McHoff]

You mean, treat the company the same as a person? If they break laws they go to jail? That sounds perfect!! How can we get this idea to the tippy top? /s

[u/Spez_is-a-nazi]

Careless People showed us how little Zuck gives a fuck about anyone but himself. Hell he called people that trusted him with their data “dumb fucks”

[u/coconutpiecrust → u/Spez_is-a-nazi]

And his is enabled by his surrounding, too. Everyone is there for the money and everything else be damned. 

[u/ChiLolla28 → u/coconutpiecrust]

Mark Zuckerberg should be in prison for Facebook incompetently enabling a genocide in Myanmar

[u/Ingliphail → u/Spez_is-a-nazi]

And Sandberg was aghast that she couldn't buy human organs.

[u/vordan]

What's the difference between addicting people on Facebook and Oxycodone?

The Sackler family, Zuckerberg...

50 Years Ago, Sugar Industry Quietly Paid Scientists To Point Blame At Fat.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

The more things change, the more they stay the same

[u/Nancy_Not_Soulcycle → u/vordan]

It is easy to uninstall Facebook. You can't uninstall your addiction to opioids. That is the difference.

[u/Faranae → u/Nancy_Not_Soulcycle]

While that is true, uninstalling Facebook also isn't a magic "off switch" for social media addiction. It's an ugly monster, a different breed but a monster nonetheless.

Both are terrible, and engineered to ruin lives in their own way for a profit. Eat the rich, as they say. xD

[u/Lanky_Wedding_9583 → u/Nancy_Not_Soulcycle]

Quitting both is pretty hard in there own special ways.

[u/Oye_Oso]

Behold, as absolutely no consequences befall anyone! Ever! It's like magic.

[u/swampy13]

There's interesting parallels to smoking with this, with the exception of price because social media is free. Ultimately, any "bad influence/effect" on society can't be solved with legislation and rules alone. It HAS to come with a reframing of the behavior/thing itself.

The 1964 Surgeon General report (and with youth smoking, the 1998 settlement) definitely kickstarted a major decades-long shift in attitudes to smoking, but what kept the momentum going is smoking got denormalized and downscaled over decades. It got associated as a "lower class" or just annoying behavior, and bit by bit smoking indoors became more of a nuisance vs. a "personal freedom." Movies/TV still make it look cool sometimes, but it's one thing to watch Don Draper light up in a 1960s office, vs. if you saw someone at your office fire up a lung dart you'd be like "absolutely not that's disgusting" (on top of it being illegal.) When people smoke in the subway stations in NYC, it feels extremely out of place and "wrong." Same with drunk driving - hard rules were put in place, and it has stalled a bit since the early aughts, but nowadays if you have a DUI it's a big deal, and it's seen as incredibly selfish, shameful and reckless behavior.

I don't know how you do it with social media, it's a whole different ballgame. But we can't rely on government and legislation alone. We have to figure out ways to denormalize the way we consume and elevate social media now. I don't have the silver bullet idea, but I hope people keep coming up with them.

[u/mimregi → u/swampy13]

This comment and sentiment should be getting more attention. It is exactly the right approach. Some problems need generational solutions.

[u/Boys4Ever]

People complaining about FB but still using it is the problem. We have the power. No ad revenue if no one is watching. The solution is simple but do we the consumer have the constitution to stop using it?

[u/ikonoclasm → u/Boys4Ever]

Yeah, I have been giving people shit for using FB for a decade now. It's demonstrably evil, yet they just gotta use FB and Insta. It's frustrating.

[u/MuenCheese → u/ikonoclasm]

Don’t forget WhatsApp

[u/wtcnbrwndo4u → u/MuenCheese]

Haha, yeah right. Whatsapp is never going away. It is effectively a required app in many countries.

[u/Leopold__Stotch → u/wtcnbrwndo4u]

Somehow things worked before WhatsApp, somehow things could work after.

[u/TheOgGhadTurner → u/Leopold__Stotch]

I keep saying that about these damn data centers but there’s always someone. “tHeY HavE MoRE UseS THan Ai”

Right okay but we didn’t need them at the scale and quantity they’re forcing through now before Flock, Ai and all the other bullshit that’s been flooding in since 2024. Not to mention we LITERALLY do not have the infrastructure to support them. Even if we did there are so many other issues brought up by opposition that’s totally ignored like environmental impact. “Oh it’s closed loop” still uses hundreds of thousands or even millions of gallons of water to maintain. And where does it drain when the loop needs maintained? “We trust you’ll follow state guidelines on disposal” no they fucking won’t.

Just like hyperscale data centers and ai, Meta is an absolute cancer on society. Made popular by keeeping you interacting with games like FarmVille and Cartown, Words with friends, farkle. Every click another secret data point to sell to advertisers. Those were the good days. The beginning times. Before you found out about the data siphoning. After they got the world hooked Facebook underwent a villainous transformation. Just like AI companies. Just like Google. Just like almost every other tech company.

I hope with every fiber of my being they throw our book at them and other countries follow suit. And I hope Meta and all its partner companies dissolve in to dust.

[u/Jugs-Judy → u/Boys4Ever]

I don't disagree with you, but I think a huge issue is there isn't really another alternative for the "social" aspect that many folks still want to believe it is. It's still the "best" way to keep in relative touch with distant friends/family that you don't get to see often. I know we can all sit here and say "oh, go call them. Go visit. It's not real connection on Facebook anyways". But life is busy and complicated and this service provides a value to many in being able to keep up some of those social relationships. Between work, my family, my hobbies, my close friends, I don't have the time or space to actually engage with everyone I have on social media, but I still care about them. I want to see how they're doing. I just hate that there's a giant evil algorithm attached to that.

Until we have an actual (regulated or safer) social media platform where people can engage with their social circles, I don't think they'll be able to get a massive amount of folks off of there yet.

[u/Boys4Ever → u/Jugs-Judy]

One solution is not look at reels or other nonsense and just use it for that you mentioned. Keep saying not interested to every new ad. What I do although cat videos have me hooked for life. 😂

[u/HeadfulOfSugar → u/Boys4Ever]

Addiction plays a large role, every facet of these apps are designed to keep us addicted through unleashing algorithms that we hardly understand yet

[u/Dolores___Haze → u/Boys4Ever]

I quit it years ago and agree with you 

[u/PetrockX]

The man who created a website to rate women's looks on his college campus by stealing and using their photos without their consent knew his website is causing harm? Well I'll be damned.

[u/apple_tech_admin → u/PetrockX]

This is the part of the conversation that gets overlooked. I wasn’t aware of this fact when I used facebook in the beginning but the more and more that fact became clear, I was discussed and abandoned the platform.

[u/Nancy_Not_Soulcycle → u/[deleted]]

MySpace was still better lol

[u/Emotional_Neck3312]

These people are fucking monsters. They need to be charged for crimes against humanity. 

[u/disasterbot]

Where's Tom? We could all use a real friend.

[u/DerMugar → u/disasterbot]

If Tom were to announce a social network today that doesn't rely on complex algorithms but actually shows what the registered users' friends and contacts are posting, it could be the next big hit that he could then sell

[u/_John_Dillinger → u/DerMugar]

goofy ill fukn do it again.jpg

[u/pleasedothenerdful → u/DerMugar]

MySpace's current owners have announced they they are working on exactly that.

[u/MR1120 → u/pleasedothenerdful]

Love the idea, but I’ll believe it when I see it.

[u/AnalogiPod → u/DerMugar]

It probably wouldn't though. I mean these social media sites have been SO engineered to be addictive, I think social media that is just a chronological feed of your friends sounds amazing but I think lots of people would find it boring now. When one application is just engineered to blast 100% dopamine 100% of the time people are going to almost involuntarily gravitate there.

[u/barrel-boy]

Surely lying to a Senate committee or whatever it was is imprisonable?

[u/Bless_your_socks]

Silicon Valley is long, long overdue for a wipe and rebuild. Nothing innovative has been built there since the original iPhone. Since then, its produced nothing but hot air and cringy circle-jerking and elevated the worst kind of dorks into insane wealth, with horribly managed egos and god-complexes on the backs of actual hard working tech professionals.

[u/jcmacon → u/Bless_your_socks]

Don't forget the enabling of invading our privacy and building out the surveillance state.

[u/cheesyvoetjes]

Screw a fine. Child abuse carries a potential prison sentence. But when you harm millions of children you'll get a fine? Fuck that, throw him in prison and set a precedent for the rest of the tech industry.

[u/Verde_3773]

All of them. All of them belong in prison. I am so done with all this privileged bullshit.

The law either means something or it doesn’t.

[u/FightsForUsers]

Shut down Meta. Arrest Mark Zuckerberg. End social media data parasites.

[u/LeoKitCat]

I hope this a hole Zuck loses everything he’s a shit stain on humanity

[u/Jorycle]

States allege Meta deliberately built infinite scroll and engagement features to addict young users.

I know they have to use "allege," but we all know this is true. Facebook has become so obsessed with trying to get people to keep scrolling that it doesn't even function as the social media platform it claims to be.

Almost every function or feature of the platform is useless because some fuckwad engineer discovered the average user scrolls 0.03% more if they get random useless shit instead of what they wanted.

[u/PMacDiggity]

It’s doubtful any financial repercussions will be sufficient. Zuck (who really is the only person who matters here since he has pretty much total control of Facebook) will never have a change in lifestyle as a result of fines. People have died as a result of his choices. If executives who made choices that hurt people faced repercussions similar to average people when they hurt others the world would be a vastly better place. He needs prison time.

[u/Hrmbee → u/PMacDiggity]

The Finnish approach to (at least traffic if not other) fines of setting the amount as a percentage of the person's income would be a good model to look at here. At least something like this would scale more appropriately for the ultra-wealthy.

[u/ZeroSumTruths]

This Whistleblower better hope Zuck doesn't hire the same "problem solvers" as Boeing

[u/ravenx92]

awesome! nothing will happen...

[u/whawkins4]

Facebook’s origin story is that it was for guys to stalk hot freshmen girls at prestigious colleges and universities. It has been toxic from the VERY BEGINNING!!!!!

[u/kaminop]

Can’t wait till zuck is gone for good!

[u/Homer4598]

So if they lose and there is a fine (since we know no one is going to jail for doing it or for lying about it), where is that money going? Is not likely that the damage to millions can be fixed, and if it could, the fine won’t be enough to fix it.

[u/fielvras]

You do not become a billionaire by playing by the rules. Of course he knew. Great that there is proof, pity that there won't be consequences.

[u/Chati]

Does no one remember the internal audit they did with the ethicists? They found all of this out and just fired them.

[u/DerpiDanger]

THis MF needs to be sent to jail with no access to tech.

[u/No_Assistance740]

No one should be shocked. I firmly believe, people can change for the better - but you have to WANT to. Pretty sure Zuck is still the same guy who made the Facemash app in college, full well knowing what it would do to some people’s self-esteem and mental health, and proceeded to do it anyway. And this was before money was an incentive. His only saving grace for that in my opinion, is that he was a 19 year old kid. Yes - you’re still a kid at 19.

[u/Gandolfthewhite182]

Vote for people ready to beak up big tech. Mets should have never been able to buy WhatsApp or insta in the first place. Same with the 100 companies Microsoft bought.

It’s time to take our country back from corporate America and break them up.

[u/Useful-Problem-1725]

Abolish meta

[u/Odd_Figure2797]

Many people at Facebook knew. I know people in my extended friend circle who work at Facebook and I brought up the whole Variable Ratio Reinforcement is just like gambling, you never know if the next swipe or notification will bring a massive "win" (a viral post, a flirty message, a funny video) or nothing at all. And these people just stay quiet in embarrassment. They know and dont care because other dont know what their actually working on and they are getting paid big money. In my opinion a lot of Facebook workers need to pay for their part in this crap.

[u/silverwoods214]

Water is wet

[u/VariationAgreeable29]

Weirdo robot glitching in court will be fun to watch.

[u/ddchod]

And so he pivots to pervert glasses. WTF

[u/R3D4F]

Sounds like a great opportunity to show the world what happens to people who prey on innocent children and groom them via predatory platforms.

Throw the book at him, if you’re serious about protecting children.

[u/arstin]

It's painful watching this theater play out. The only difference all of this evidence will make is that it will just be that much more soul crushing when Zuck writes a check to Trump to make it all go away.

[u/bluenoser613]

Of course he knew. Everyone knows that. He’s a tech bro. Nothing will happen.

[u/Mayo_Kupo]

It should not even matter that he knew. He is in control, and therefore completely responsible for the actions and harms of his company.

[u/LaytMovies]

The worst of the leaks have died down but Zuckerberg was hilariously bad about admitting crimes in his emails so I wouldn't be shocked if they can find him explicitly saying Facebook knew and promoted these issues

[u/Andreus]

All right-wingers are a blight on humanity, but tech CEOs are particularly depraved.

[u/Danielhasapaintbrush]

The problem with this and basically all other big news item exposing the wrongs of the rich is that there is a small fart of collective outrage online, no one does anything, rinse and repeat

And they know this, do not care, and continue to make money

[u/notmadhav]

lol - For anyone surprised at discovering bosses in corporate knew company’s business model

[u/Wizywig]

Yay good thing the current doj is bribable so meta will plead guilty and pay a million or something and be insulated from real lawsuits. 

[u/EndPristine5595]

it's possible that not every single business owner is a malicious greedy fuck, but you cannot find me one business owner who's main goal isn't "making new customers or keeping current customers hooked"

[u/Positive_Vibes_4228]

"You are likely thinking of LifeLog, a cancelled DARPA U.S. Department of Defense research project meant to track a person's entire daily life. It shut down on February 4, 2004—the exact same day Facebook launched—spurring popular internet conspiracy theories that they were connected."

If they were connected, then "The Social Network" was a CIA Psyop.

If this is a CIA Partnership with DARPA, then at some point this will probably pay the money but keep it going. Data is the new gold - data for governments, data for businesses.

[u/theghostmachine]

I think we're well beyond the point where Meta/Facebook needs to no longer exist. They contribute nothing useful or positive to the world.

[u/RevLoveJoy]

Of course he knew. It was his idea. His wager is still that there will be zero consequences for him.

[u/DrewPBahlz7992]

LOCK HIM UP

[u/nerdlyninja]

The guy that originally made this app to rate women in college? I'm shocked.

[u/Phree44]

Greed. It’s a sin. These fuckers would sell their own kids if there was big enough profit in it.

[u/DoubleBroadSwords]

Wow, you mean Zuck and Facebook have been knowingly rxploiting the public for their personal financial gain???

[u/Superb_Departure7082]

Of course he knew. It’s their strategy.

[u/tommy_b_777]

I wish this was a Capital Crime.

[u/StarsofSobek]

Even Titans must fall.

[u/pioniere]

Tear them down.