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You are here: Home / Politics / Media / Open (Speculation) Thread: FaceBook Wants Us to Pay No Attention to Those Grubby Scriveners

Open (Speculation) Thread: FaceBook Wants Us to Pay No Attention to Those Grubby Scriveners

by Anne Laurie|  October 19, 202111:00 am| 54 Comments

This post is in: Media, Open Threads, Tech News and Issues

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Facebook is upset about misrepresentations.

I just rolled my eyes so hard, I saw my childhood memories. https://t.co/tDtykcbdQf

— The Hoarse Whisperer (@TheRealHoarse) October 18, 2021

I find it hard to imagine a better way to get everyone’s attention focused on the proposed Big Upcoming Story! But then, if I were smart like Mark I’d be rich like him, at least according to the many highly-paid Mark minions…

I've written dozens of stories off internal Facebook docs and discussions and I've never seen the company issue something like this. The only logical conclusion is that the company sees all my stories as 100% accurate. https://t.co/rV2YoyHP8W

— Ryan Mac ?? (@RMac18) October 18, 2021

Apropos of nothing, struck by this column two years ago from @ProfGalloway:https://t.co/WRscjQQteC pic.twitter.com/JII5VDJwcf

— James Fallows (@JamesFallows) October 18, 2021

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Previous Post: « Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Working Towards the Future
Next Post: The Patience of Joe(b) »

Reader Interactions

54Comments

  1. 1.

    lee

    October 19, 2021 at 11:26 am

    The second tweet is spot on. The reason FB is reacting the way it is to this story is because it is very close to the truth (if not the actual truth).

    These folks have the receipts and FB is worried.

  2. 2.

    Old Man Shadow

    October 19, 2021 at 11:27 am

    Any company that is too evil for Apple (Motto: “our suppliers include child labor and put up suicide nets!”) is really fucking evil.

  3. 3.

    cain

    October 19, 2021 at 11:27 am

    @lee:

    If any entity needs their come uppance it is Facebook.

  4. 4.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 11:28 am

    I truly don’t understand why FB is in any way concerned about this and frankly I’m not sure that they actually are. They could literally put a banner ad at the top of everyone’s page saying “you losers are our property, now get to work, slaves” and they wouldn’t lose 1% of their users. Everyone, especially their users, know what they do to their users. Their users simply don’t care.

  5. 5.

    Jeffro

    October 19, 2021 at 11:29 am

    OT but it looks like trumpov just, Just, JUST couldn’t stand the media and public fawning over a black man, even an accomplished and dead one – he went to the trouble of putting out one of his dumb press releases bashing Colin Powell.

    GQP, demand better representation please.

  6. 6.

    Benw

    October 19, 2021 at 11:30 am

    God keep me from ever completing anything. This whole book is but a draught – nay, but the draught of a draught. Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!

  7. 7.

    mrmoshpotato

    October 19, 2021 at 11:32 am

    @Benw: What?

  8. 8.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 11:35 am

    he went to the trouble of putting out one of his dumb press releases bashing Colin Powell.

    @Jeffro: if he’s bashing Powell about My Lai, which the press seems hellbent to not even mention, I could get on board.  But somehow I doubt that’s on the agenda.

  9. 9.

    Baud

    October 19, 2021 at 11:36 am

    How did Professor Galloway get a hold of the Baud! 2020! campaign playbook?

  10. 10.

    Jeffro

    October 19, 2021 at 11:36 am

    @The Moar You Know: he’s not…it’s all about Powell being a ‘RINO’ (ie, he was anti-trumpov)

  11. 11.

    Benw

    October 19, 2021 at 11:38 am

    @mrmoshpotato: scrivener made me think of Bartleby, which made me think of my favorite Melville quote!

  12. 12.

    VOR

    October 19, 2021 at 11:41 am

    @Jeffro: I suspect TFG’s core supporters saw Powell as a RINO. After all, Powell supported Obama in 2008. They probably view Powell as insufficiently fawning to the Great Orange Leader. I think Powell was not a Trump supporter in 2016, which is clearly not acceptable to the MAGAts.

  13. 13.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 11:42 am

    he’s not…it’s all about Powell being a ‘RINO’ (ie, he was anti-trumpov)

    @Jeffro: well of course it would be.  I’m never going to look for his digital diarrhea but one really doesn’t have to, we all know what he’s gonna say anyhow.

  14. 14.

    cain

    October 19, 2021 at 11:45 am

    @The Moar You Know: 
    Each day I am thankful that menace is not on twitter spewing his toxicity.

  15. 15.

    Jeffro

    October 19, 2021 at 11:45 am

    @The Moar You Know: Oh, I know – I wasn’t looking for it, just saw a tweet about it.

    Worth mentioning to the Republicans in your life – just another example of trumpov disrespecting the military.

  16. 16.

    mrmoshpotato

    October 19, 2021 at 11:49 am

    @cain:

    Each day I am thankful that menace is not on twitter spewing his toxicity. 

    Same.  Especially since assholes in the media would still be jerking off to it.

  17. 17.

    schrodingers_cat

    October 19, 2021 at 11:50 am

    Bad as FaceBook is in this country it is ten times worse in other countries. In India for example, BJP supporting groups/pages face zero scrutiny. Even calls for genocide are not enough to get you banned.

    Face Book’s is getting rich selling an promoting blood lust.

  18. 18.

    Just Chuck

    October 19, 2021 at 11:50 am

    @Jeffro:

    GQP, demand better representation please.

    That would require better people.  He represents them perfectly.

  19. 19.

    germy

    October 19, 2021 at 11:54 am

    I remember whenever I used to listen to music on youtube, I’d get recommendations for Ben Shapiro and Prager U.

    I was just listening to music, I wasn’t watching political videos. And yet they’d try to steer me to “conservative” media.

    My copyright account is following exactly one person (russell crowe) and despite this my recommended for yous are ALL right wing and anti vax stuff pic.twitter.com/kqoytUcaN7— Dennis Bees and Spooky Hurt (@dennisbhooper) October 19, 2021

    when I joined from a brand new Proton email address and said my sole interest was video games: pic.twitter.com/0QAdu1dSM2— AnonWorker (@AnonWorker1848) October 19, 2021

  20. 20.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 12:00 pm

    That would require better people.  He represents them perfectly.

    @Just Chuck:  I don’t think this can be said enough.  For decades, the GOP elite played the rubes, freaks, psychopaths and racists in this country for their own benefit and thought they could keep that vast majority of GOP voters under their control, because the idiot brigade didn’t understand how anything worked and wouldn’t be able to get anything done on their own.

    Then the idiot brigade caught a break and got one of their own into the presidency.

    That he didn’t understand how anything worked either was the only reason we’re all not in re-education camps learning Mein Kampf by rote and ratting out our neighbors for food.

    Trump is one of their own.  Just smart enough to break a nation and steal everything he can, and in no way interested in helping anyone that can’t help him do one of those two things.

  21. 21.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 12:02 pm

    Face Book’s is getting rich selling an promoting blood lust.

    @schrodingers_cat:  Like COVID, all Facebook wants is more hosts.  Neither has any reason to do less damage.

  22. 22.

    trollhattan

    October 19, 2021 at 12:09 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    Guessing Cadet Bone Spurs was sexually aroused by My Lai and a staunch member of Team Calley.

  23. 23.

    Brantl

    October 19, 2021 at 12:14 pm

    I don’t think it could possibly hurt to start calling FaceBook, FacePlant; it’s truth in advertising, and it is a start toward giving them the reputation they so richly deserve.

  24. 24.

    Scout211

    October 19, 2021 at 12:15 pm

    At the beginning of the FB craze, I didn’t get an account because of my profession. As a mental health provider, it’s best to appear as a neutral blank slate to clients. And FB had about zero privacy controls back then. FB stalking was a thing and it was easy to do. Clients admitted to me that they tried to find me on FB.

    I used to get emails from FB pretending to be friends or family that had FB accounts asking me to be their FB friend, but I just needed to get an account. Thank goodness they stopped that deceptive practice.  But the fact that they began with deceptive practices, exploitation and serious privacy lapses makes me unsurprised that they are where they are today.

    I never joined and I never will. I could do so more easily now that I am retired but I never will.

  25. 25.

    RandomMonster

    October 19, 2021 at 12:27 pm

    I deactivated my FB account a few weeks ago when the 60 minutes whistleblower story was revealed, just so I could put in comments to FB about how they profit from misinformation and politicization. Can’t say I miss it so deleting the account is the next step.

  26. 26.

    schrodingers_cat

    October 19, 2021 at 12:27 pm

    @The Moar You Know: Yes FB is worse than COVID though, Zuckie is intentionally evil.

    Article14’s journalist went undercover and joined 4 BJP-Sangh FB groups and wrote about what he saw.

  27. 27.

    Dee Lurker

    October 19, 2021 at 12:44 pm

    My spousal unit got an FB account because it is literally the only way to acquire local event information. Within a week she was sharing disinformation about law enforcement deficiencies leading to increases in violent crime. It took me a solid hour to refute the article sufficiently for her to dial down the outrage. The article zeroed in on her limbic system and pushed. I can only presume FB could analyze the metadata from her search history and recognized the vulnerability to copaganda. Outrage merchandising works. I am sure it is every bit as psychologically addictive as nicotine and FB knows this. They exploit mental health for profit with the full scope of data analytics based on what their users freely provide to them. My SU studies CRT academically for crying out loud. I have no doubt there is an exploitable vulnerability in my psychological make up that could be used by FB for profit. That is why I will stay away from it no matter what. Fuck that noise.

  28. 28.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    October 19, 2021 at 12:47 pm

    I would be a tad more worked up about Facebook if their chief accusers weren’t the MSM who are just as bad with the gaslighting and narrative manipulation.  Yes, people use Facebook to reinforce their crazy, but they getting that crazy in the first place from the MSM with it’s incessant mantra of both sides are wrong, like when one side is Astrophysicists and the other side is Flat Earth conspiracy theorists.

  29. 29.

    Just Chuck

    October 19, 2021 at 12:58 pm

    I deleted my FB account a couple years ago after realizing it was just a net negative in my life. I’m slightly amused that the date when the final deletion went through was July 4.

    My girlfriend is on facebook daily, so she curates all the funny memes and cute animal videos for me by showing them to me on her phone. Actually hearing another human laugh at something funny shared with them is something no reaction button can provide.

  30. 30.

    J R in WV

    October 19, 2021 at 1:05 pm

    Many years ago, when my email account was still virginal, I began to sign up to FacePlant (love that !!) and slowly stopped typing…

    Still haven’t completed that task at least 20 years later on.

    I was at work in a location disused for years by the time I retired…

  31. 31.

    Cacti

    October 19, 2021 at 1:06 pm

    @The Moar You Know:  Truth telling about American warmongers after they’ve passed is verboten in the national media.

    The My Lai cover up and the Iraq WMD UN speech are unavoidable parts of Powell’s public legacy, everywhere but the United States.

  32. 32.

    Timurid

    October 19, 2021 at 1:09 pm

    Oleg Deripaska is going to go through some things…

  33. 33.

    catclub

    October 19, 2021 at 1:16 pm

    @The Moar You Know: I agree.  Nobody can point to any laws, or more importantly, SEC regulations, that FB is breaking.

    They may take a reputational hit, but will they lose 60% of their user base?

  34. 34.

    catclub

    October 19, 2021 at 1:18 pm

    @Cacti: ​
     

    Truth telling about American warmongers after they’ve passed ist verboten

    Future Kissinger reference? He is still alive, btw.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    October 19, 2021 at 1:19 pm

    @catclub: 

    He lives, but is he really alive?

  36. 36.

    Taken4Granite

    October 19, 2021 at 1:23 pm

    @Scout211: I used to get those e-mails as well. One of them mentioned two people and a business they thought I would want to connect with. One of the people was a legit connection, a distant relative who teaches English in Japan. The other person and the business (a furniture store) were in Birmingham, England. I have never been to Birmingham and don’t know anybody who lives there.

    I, too, never joined FacePlant. For me it just never reached the threshold of “the advantages of having this outweigh the disadvantages of having this”. I did eventually join LinkedIn, which at least has non-nefarious ways of monetizing your data (e.g., identifying you to companies as a potential prospective employee). And something called ResearchGate, whose business model I never have figured out–it seems to involve sharing copyrighted scientific publications.

  37. 37.

    catclub

    October 19, 2021 at 1:24 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     

    Face Book’s is getting rich selling an promoting blood lust.

    So Radio Rwanda was just a trial run.

  38. 38.

    Kristine

    October 19, 2021 at 1:28 pm

    @Benw: @The Moar You Know: First thing I thought when I saw the headline was my writing software. I thought “Hey, no, Scrivener’s cool.”

  39. 39.

    catclub

    October 19, 2021 at 1:28 pm

    @Taken4Granite: ​
      The interesting thing about all these “i am not on facebook’ posts is that it is clear that having a completely fake FB identity is not useful to normal people, since FB is for connecting (in principle) with other real people.

    Making a fake ID on FB and then telling your friends that Mortimer Snerd is really you, does not really work.

  40. 40.

    Jeffro

    October 19, 2021 at 1:32 pm

    @Timurid: I just saw that!  Christmas is arriving early, it seems.  =)

  41. 41.

    senyordave

    October 19, 2021 at 1:41 pm

    In case you detest Joe Lieberman (as I do), but occasionally need to be reminded of just how loathsome he really is, Digby has a story up on her website about the help that Lieberman received form one Karl Rove when he ran against Ned Lamont.  He then repaid his debt by opposing the public option and lowering the Medicare age in the Obamacare negotiations, positions he had previously supported.  I hope that piece of shit rots in hell.  He deserves it when you consider how many people died as a result of his machinations that helped make medical care unaffordable for so may people, not to mention that he was the biggest cheerleader of the Iraq war, something he is proud of to this day.  I’m sure the hundreds of thousand of dead Iraqis don’t bother him a bit – after all they were only Muslims.

    https://digbysblog.net/2021/10/18/disgusting-betrayal/

  42. 42.

    Ruckus

    October 19, 2021 at 1:51 pm

    @Jeffro:

    I see a flaw in your comment.

    TFG, also known as SFB, among other eiptatehs, is their idea of a better representative. Dumb as a post, racist as a white, pointy hood and a cross, supposedly made money by screwing people, hated by their opposition, he is their perfect candidate. He is a prime example of misdirection that allows them to continue to increase the amount of money they can get (steal) and keep.

    We have to understand that their political goals and ours are at the opposite ends of the spectrum. And Joe Manchin is one of them, no matter what it says on his business card. He’s made a chunk of money from the dirtiest power source on the planet, wants to continue to do that, even against the desires of the party he belongs to, against the betterment of his supporters and constituents, against the planet, against common logic. He doesn’t want to actually help the people of his state, or the rest of the country, if it effects him in any way but especially monetarily.

  43. 43.

    Ohio Mom

    October 19, 2021 at 1:52 pm

    I stay in Facebook mainly because of a handful of local and statewide disability organizations. Some of their pages function like discussion boards, some announce events like training workshops, some are focused on legal advocacy and legislation. It’s stuff I think I ought to keep up with but in the end, not sure how useful any of it is to me.

    And Facebook Marketpkace. Though I haven’t bought anything, it satisfies my shopping urges during Covid.

    When I do look at the mishmash that is my timeline (I think that’s what it’s called), I can’t figure out what those posts are doing there. And then I look at *one* video of a cow giving birth and the next time I stop by, it’s goats, elephants, hedgehogs, you name it, giving birth.

    The last thing I want to use Facebook for is keeping up with people. If I don’t already know how someone is doing, I obviously don’t care. Probably don’t wish them ill but not interested in hearing about their vacations.

  44. 44.

    Ruckus

    October 19, 2021 at 2:10 pm

    @Ohio Mom:

    The concept of FB is not a bad one, an online communications bulletin board. The actuality of FB is far more than that and that’s the problem.

  45. 45.

    laura

    October 19, 2021 at 2:14 pm

    I yield to no man in my deep and burning distain for the flabby scrotum of a face that is old sanctimony joe l. He can die in a fucking fire at a water plant. He can rot in a gutter and he can choke on every platitude he lectured us with regarding the need to support the impeachment of President Clinton.

    I never ever saw the point of Facebook- still don’t. The Social Network reinforced my decision to avoid at all costs.

  46. 46.

    Ruckus

    October 19, 2021 at 2:20 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I would believe that Zuckerberg likely has a prayer rug with $$$$ on it because that is all he believes in.

  47. 47.

    Betty

    October 19, 2021 at 2:26 pm

    @cain: Sadly, Politico types put his ramblings on Twitter for him.

  48. 48.

    Jeffro

    October 19, 2021 at 3:17 pm

    @Ruckus: tfg is our worst possible human being, and therefore, they think, their best representative.  I get that.

    Except he kept losing during his whole four years in power, and now the whole GQP is (nominally) out of power completely.  And he keeps doing this abysmal things that make it impossible for his support to climb any higher.  So he’s not really their best representative.

    They’d do so much better with a Rick Scott or Nikki Haley.  Let’s hope they never figure it out.

  49. 49.

    The Moar You Know

    October 19, 2021 at 3:53 pm

    I can only presume FB could analyze the metadata from her search history and recognized the vulnerability to copaganda. Outrage merchandising works. I am sure it is every bit as psychologically addictive as nicotine and FB knows this.

    @Dee Lurker: you have the mechanism right, and as an FYI, some of the first hires FB made were ex-Phillip Morris folks, so you’ve got the addiction thing right as well.

    Far as I’m concerned it’s dangerous as hell.  AI with a direct feed to unknowing human brains.  It’s not even a contest.

  50. 50.

    WhatsMyNym

    October 19, 2021 at 4:51 pm

    @catclub:

    Making a fake ID on FB and then telling your friends that Mortimer Snerd is really you, does not really work.

    Why not?? My friends wouldn’t care. I just used FB to keep up with some distant friends and relatives. Otherwise it’s locked down for outsiders.

    ETA: Yeah, I know this probably won’t be read.

  51. 51.

    Ruckus

    October 19, 2021 at 5:35 pm

    @Jeffro:

    They’d do so much better with a Rick Scott or Nikki Haley.  Let’s hope they never figure it out.

    Quit giving them advice!

    Of course if they read it here they will immediately discard them as choices….. mmmmmm

  52. 52.

    Scout211

    October 19, 2021 at 5:58 pm

    @WhatsMyNym:

    Otherwise it’s locked down for outsiders.

    Sure, but what about the insiders?

  53. 53.

    different-church-lady

    October 19, 2021 at 9:31 pm

    My fuckin’ god, I’ve been calling Zuckerberg a sociopath for YEARS. It’s nice to see some validation.

  54. 54.

    different-church-lady

    October 19, 2021 at 9:38 pm

    @Ruckus: My theory is Zuckerberg is more addicted to “success” than money. Money is nice, and all, but validation of his worldview is a more important measure. What gives it away is the Facebook addiction to metrics: the number of “friends” you have on Facebook is quantifiable (and that quantification is socially addictive), and the number of Facebook users is a measure of success more than money is. The very easiest part of the Facebook formula is leveraging the lizard-brain belief that “more automatically = better”. And it’s pretty clearly top-down.

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