Facebook must be broken up

[Revoltingest]

I heard that Walmart is planning to roll out some alternative to Amazon. I thought competition was how capitalism was supposed to work, but it seems like a lot of these giants have no real competition.

I don't have a Facebook account. I don't really care much for social media. RF is more my speed.

I noticed that Walmart started competing with Amazon
a couple years ago when I was buying tires..

 

[Deidre]

Sunstone has a thread running now about evil. An example of evil would be Facebook. I deleted it recently, not deactivated it, after dealing with a hacker. Facebook has no customer service to help with such matters, so I deleted it and never looked back. I can't believe how little I miss it.

I do like Amazon though, for some things, but I can see it becoming problematic in this regard, too.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Nothing that has hundreds of billions of dollars tied up in it would have minimal consequences if it failed. Just because the market isn't in something you can touch doesn't mean it isn't a vital part of modern industry.

I'm not sure. Maybe short tern, but everything making it a profit would find elsewhere. And I doubt there would be much impact in people's real life. There are alternatives for communication, advertisers a perpetually hungry sharks, and if even no, heaven forbid we meet mostly face to face again and local businesses profit from that. And advertisement is a form of life lower than scum, and it would be great of that was entirely erased from all memory amd never to return.
Over all, I suspect a mass dying off of Facebook, etc., would be of net benefit for everyone.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

I do like Amazon though, for some things, but I can see it becoming problematic in this regard, too.

I know. I remember people saying Walmart had everything, but that I laughed at because they don't. Amazon, on the other hand, it has damn near everything. And if you need something you can't find in a real store, Amazon can have it to you tomorrow or the next day. Even during a global lockdown.
I remember when AT&T was bust up for way less.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

From: Facebook antitrust lawsuit: Dozens of states and the FTC sue company for alleged anticompetitive behavior - CNN


If this succeeds it will be a new reminder in our digital age that free markets don't exist when we allow companies to get 'too big to fail.' Hopefully they're also setting their sights on Amazon for similar reasons.

Facebook shouldn't "just" be broken up. It should be completely dismantled and destroyed. Or at least, its business model should be.

There should be laws against making money of off people's data.
If facebook wants to SELL my data to advertisers, then they must first BUY that data from me.

ie: they should be paying me to use their services. And the more data I share, the more they should pay me.
And this data should be very expensive.

And the same goes for google and all the other privacy rapists in cyberworld.

 

[HonestJoe]

I agree, Amazon is doing more damage on a global scale than Facebook by a long mile.

But Facebook did more damage to Trumps election campaign.

 

[Deidre]

I know. I remember people saying Walmart had everything, but that I laughed at because they don't. Amazon, on the other hand, it has damn near everything. And if you need something you can't find in a real store, Amazon can have it to you tomorrow or the next day. Even during a global lockdown.
I remember when AT&T was bust up for way less.

Totally agree. It can be addicting, because they literally have everything. I'm amazed at how well their logistics are, even during Covid, they still managed to get things out only a few days behind.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

But Facebook did more damage to Trumps election campaign.

That's not correct.

In fact, use of facebook is what got him elected in the first place. And the same goes for Brexit.

Ever heared of Cambridge Analytica? You should read up.

Both the Trump and the Brexit campaign used that same strategy. Psychological profiling based on massive amounts of facebook data, resulting in targeted advertising compiled specifically to make voters swing in a certain direction. The psychological profiling informed the ad campaign in such a way that the campaign knew exactly what to say to whom (very much including fake news) in order to psychologically manipulate them into making certain decisions.

The strategy come right out of the military's playbook of psychological warfare. Literally. If you follow the money and the technical know-how from the tech used by cambridge analytica, then that is exactly where you end up: military departments. These are the kinds of practices that US military employs in countries like afghanistan etc, to make the population "accept" US presence and culture.


The tech is extremely scary. It sounds ridiculous, but it is proven to work.
So much so that it can actually predict when you will be ordering pizza. So much so that it can make you order pizza.


ps: using such practices on citizens, is actually considered a war crime and abuse of human rights.
The technology is even blacklisted for export, as it is considered weapons-grade tech.

It is how the Brexit campaign managed to get a "pro" vote and it is how Trump managed to get elected.

If facebook wouldn't have been such a privacy rapist, then neither would have ever happened.


You don't have to believe me. Look it up. Cambridge Analytica.
Steve Bannon played a very dirty role in both campaigns as well. He was one of the financers.