Former Facebook exec: Facebook lying about not targeting vulnerable teens, sells ability to swing elections

[ivan134]

5 hours ago, Sauron said:

Kids feeling insecure is not always the parents' fault. Not that it matters in this case.

You misunderstood the second part, I meant to say that if another institution that has access to lots of your data (for example a school) were to sell your personal data to advertisers and tell them you were an insecure kid they would get sued to death.

I expected nothing different, however that's where the line between "annoying but acceptable" and "unacceptable" lies. They should not be allowed to target weakened psyches for profit.

Sure, because modern day left and right have much in common with what they were 100 years ago. Is that how you argue over politics, by mentioning Stalin and Hitler when they have nothing to do with the topic at hand nor with any current (relevant) political faction? I'm sure your arguments are very compelling.

 

Just to get the facts straight, RIGHT NOW fascism is extreme right and socialism is extreme left. Or are you telling me they are one and the same because hiter and stalin where considered "left wing" inside their respective countries at the time?

 

What does the deah count of socialist dictatorships have to do with what I said? I called bullshit on your statement

which remains bullshit regardless of how many times you mention the nazis.

 

And let's just take a moment to appreciate the hypocrisy on display here:

social labeling? you just called all left wing parties nazis and socialists at the same time. And vague laws? I could mention a slew of bullshit laws right wing parties have written and are writing right now. No political force has been completely innocent of this in the past decades, get off your high horse and tone down the mud throwing campaign.

You're wasting your time. I would let it go before you get a warning.

[Thunderpup]

Not terribly surprised by all of this.  

 

Zuckerberg showed the world the type of person he really was when he posted on FB how they've never participated in the NSA data mining yet a few weeks later it was revealed they were one of the first companies to start doing it.  

[Sauron]

1 hour ago, Prysin said:

the intolerant left strikes again

Such a good point. Why try to make a coherent argument when you can throw out a meaningless jab instead.

[treeroy]

We've had lots of elections recently and I see from time to time a Facebook reminder on my phone saying "Remember to vote". I always wonder if everyone sees these or if they just send these reminders to specific groups of people...?

[Prysin]

45 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Such a good point. Why try to make a coherent argument when you can throw out a meaningless jab instead.

you may want to re-read your so called "coherent argument"

[mr moose]

9 hours ago, Sauron said:

I don't question the intelligence of anyone, however as far as I know certain ads and messages can have a negative effect on someone's state of mind if they are already struggling with depression, anxhiety or insecurity.

 

Sure, it may not be the worst thing on facebook, that doesn't mean it's fine. furthermore it's the part corporate facebook can actually do something about without going down the rabbit hole of closing "inaccurate" pages.

I think you are missing my point. There is no current evidence or history of targeted ads (being designed specifically to leverage a persons mental health issues)  actually having more of an impact on said people*.    The big issue here is not advertising, but are people truly aware of how much data they are sharing with facebook and how much of an intellectual void are they getting sucked into.  For the most part millions of people are happily going to continue living their life blissfully unaware that facebook know more about them than some of their family,  The sad thing is many (without mental illness) will end up buying healing stones and seeing chiropractors to treat their flu, not because of facebook ads but becasue of the other users.

 

*I could argue that in some circumstances, such ads, in order to work,  would have to be so carefully engineered that the outcome for the person has a better chance of being positive than negative.    

[mr moose]

4 hours ago, treeroy said:

We've had lots of elections recently and I see from time to time a Facebook reminder on my phone saying "Remember to vote". I always wonder if everyone sees these or if they just send these reminders to specific groups of people...?

That's worthy of investigation.  However,  I think the biggest influence facebook has on any election outcome is the fact that lobby groups and enthusiastic party members/fans can leverage the immense size of facebook to promote all manor of propaganda whether it's true or not.  Memes, stories, links to clickbait and scare articles all come from users not from facebook. 

[Sauron]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

I think you are missing my point. There is no current evidence or history of targeted ads (being designed specifically to leverage a persons mental health issues)  actually having more of an impact on said people*.    The big issue here is not advertising, but are people truly aware of how much data they are sharing with facebook and how much of an intellectual void are they getting sucked into.  For the most part millions of people are happily going to continue living their life blissfully unaware that facebook know more about them than some of their family,  The sad thing is many (without mental illness) will end up buying healing stones and seeing chiropractors to treat their flu, not because of facebook ads but becasue of the other users.

 

*I could argue that in some circumstances, such ads, in order to work,  would have to be so carefully engineered that the outcome for the person has a better chance of being positive than negative.    

Fair enough. Still, it might be considered as sharing medical information without express permission - of course the data was put there by the user but well, the "victim"'s ignorance can't really be used against them here.

[samiscool51]

Again another reason not to use facebook....

honestly once this gets onto local news facebook will be in trouble and services like twitter will have a LOT more users

[mr moose]

12 minutes ago, samiscool51 said:

Again another reason not to use facebook....

honestly once this gets onto local news facebook will be in trouble and services like twitter will have a LOT more users

nothing is going to change.  People don't care. Facebook gives people the utopian existence they can't get in reality, 100's of friends, authority on any subject they like and plenty of funny cat memes and doggy videos.

[N3v3r3nding_N3wb]

On 5/18/2017 at 5:39 AM, Sauron said:

pfffft.... hahahahhahahaha

 

sorry, I just had to laugh my ass off right there.

this guy is left leaning? was bush left leaning too?

what about europe where the most influential governments have been right wing for decades? only recently we got a couple of terms with the left wing in some countries.

Oh, look! Someone who's commenting on something that he doesn't understand!

He isn't part of the establishment. He's anti-establishment.

And, in that short time, they've made sure to really capitalize on their victories by making it nearly impossible for them to lose an election by introducing massive propaganda arms and importing a voting block that'll vote for bigger and bigger government (the modem left). They also have begun to limit free speech and the UK is basically a police state now. This makes them the modern political establishment.

Sorry, mods, I know that politics are banned, but this uneducated stupidity needs to be countered. Bullshit ignored is bullshit spread.

 

 

OT: I actually have no problem with Facebook doing this. If people are stupid enough to project their depression across the world, Facebook is under no obligation to not target them with ads relating to their emotional state. It's not exploitation -- just because they're sad doesn't mean that they're unable to make purchasing decisions, just like they can still buy things when they're drunk, high, et cetera. 

[Delicieuxz]

12 hours ago, N3v3r3nding_N3wb said:

OT: I actually have no problem with Facebook doing this. If people are stupid enough to project their depression across the world, Facebook is under no obligation to not target them with ads relating to their emotional state. It's not exploitation -- just because they're sad doesn't mean that they're unable to make purchasing decisions, just like they can still buy things when they're drunk, high, et cetera. 

And with that comment you make it clear that you have entirely no idea what depression is, or what it experiences as, and how it affects behaviour. If a person's capacity to make controlled and clear-headed decisions were not impaired by depression, then people would just choose to not be depressed. One of the things with depression is that it indeed does dull cognitive capabilities, and shrouds a mind from seeing clearly. And people with depression often make decisions to try to compensate for, or escape the depression, which can include spending choices.

 

[mr moose]

41 minutes ago, Delicieuxz said:

And with that comment you make it clear that you have entirely no idea what depression is, or what it experiences as, and how it affects behaviour. If a person's capacity to make controlled and clear-headed decisions were not impaired by depression, then people would just choose to not be depressed. One of the things with depression is that it indeed does dull cognitive capabilities, and shrouds a mind from seeing clearly. And people with depression often make decisions to try to compensate for, or escape the depression, which can include spending choices.

 

I would love to know just what experience you have with depression?  I am somewhat experience with depression/anxiety professionally, in volunteering and personally.

 

I ask becasue your comment is rather disingenuous to people with depression/anxiety.

[Delicieuxz]

18 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I would love to know just what experience you have with depression?  I am somewhat experience with depression/anxiety professionally, in volunteering and personally.

 

I ask becasue your comment is rather disingenuous to people with depression/anxiety.

Extensive, with personal experience and much public writing that is read by industry workers around the world. I don't know what you think to be disingenuous about what I wrote, but depression is a state which, amongst other things, expresses a negatively impacted dopamine availability situation within a brain, with dopamine availability delivering a person's capacity for cognitive functionality. And so, depression literally reduces a person's cognitive ability - just as taking a dopaminergic substance, such as one of countless anti-depressants, modafinal and other "smart drugs", methamphetamine or cocaine, increases a person's cognitive functionality.

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, Delicieuxz said:

Extensive, with personal experience and much public writing that is read by industry workers around the world. I don't know what you think to be disingenuous about what I wrote, but depression is a state which, amongst other things, expresses a negatively impacted dopamine availability within a brain, with dopamine availability delivering a person's cognitive functionality, and so depression literally reduces a person's cognitive ability.

It was the way you said:  " If a person's capacity to make controlled and clear-headed decisions were not impaired by depression, then people would just choose to not be depressed. "  It reads that depression is a choice and impaired cognitive function holds that choice at bay.  It is my experience that while cognitive function is effected, it's effects are different for everyone. Depression is not a choice (not by any stretch of the imagination) and even if one could choose to stop being depressed the cognitive barrier would only effect a percentage of sufferers as others would being impaired in other facets of cognitive function.  As silly as that sounds I have personally worked with people who can't function in social groups but fine in a stressful job as a manager/foreman, while others can't even hold a job but they can organise a party like nothings wrong.

 

 

[Delicieuxz]

19 minutes ago, mr moose said:

It was the way you said:  " If a person's capacity to make controlled and clear-headed decisions were not impaired by depression, then people would just choose to not be depressed. "  It reads that depression is a choice and impaired cognitive function holds that choice at bay.  It is my experience that while cognitive function is effected, it's effects are different for everyone. Depression is not a choice (not by any stretch of the imagination) and even if one could choose to stop being depressed the cognitive barrier would only effect a percentage of sufferers as others would being impaired in other facets of cognitive function.  As silly as that sounds I have personally worked with people who can't function in social groups but fine in a stressful job as a manager/foreman, while others can't even hold a job but they can organise a party like nothings wrong.

I was not meaning to imply that depression is a choice, but was actually trying to express the opposite.

 

N3v3r3nding_N3wb said:

 

"If people are stupid enough to project their depression across the world, Facebook is under no obligation to not target them with ads relating to their emotional state. It's not exploitation -- just because they're sad doesn't mean that they're unable to make purchasing decisions"

 

I responded that N3v3r3nding_N3wb's comment implies that depression doesn't impair a person's judgment or self-control, and that if it was actually the case that depression didn't impair a person's capability to process information and make judgments with full mental clarity and control, then people would just choose to be not depressed. But as depression is a state of lacking a full sense of well-being, inner satisfaction and completeness, and ability to completely and often positively process information, N3v3r3nding_N3wb's comment is made from a lack of understanding for what depression is, and experiences as.

 

Depressed people, particularly teenagers, whose diminished dopamine availability is a state of need that, depending on how severe it is, experiences as such (similar to being ceaselessly thirsty or hungry), are extremely vulnerable to manipulation from targeted marketing - particularly since self-benefiting behaviours such as purchasing new things often gives brief increases in dopamine, making a person feel temporarily better, which can lead to a person associating behaviours (such as buying things) with alleviating their depression, which makes consumer advertising targeting depressed teenagers extremely exploitative.

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, Delicieuxz said:

I was not meaning to imply that depression is a choice, but was actually trying to express the opposite.

 

N3v3r3nding_N3wb said:

 

"If people are stupid enough to project their depression across the world, Facebook is under no obligation to not target them with ads relating to their emotional state. It's not exploitation -- just because they're sad doesn't mean that they're unable to make purchasing decisions"

 

I responded that N3v3r3nding_N3wb's comment implies that depression doesn't impair a person's judgment or self-control, and that if it was actually the case that depression didn't impair a person's capability to process information and make judgments with full mental clarity and control, then people would just choose to be not depressed. But as depression is a state of lacking a full sense of well-being, inner satisfaction and completeness, and ability to completely and often positively process information, N3v3r3nding_N3wb's comment is made from a lack of understanding for what depression is, and experiences as.

I'm not entirely sure but I'm going to drop it because I might just be splitting hairs and not only is this topic is too complex for a text based discussion it will easily get out of hand and off topic.  PM me if you want to talk further.  

[Monkey Dust]

To take the discussion off in a slightly different direction; I heard on the radio last week about how peoples google searches give a much more accurate picture of them than Facebook does, as Facebook is about the image you wish to project to friends and family, not what your life is actually like. So claims from Facebook about how well they know their users might be overstated somewhat. Google on the other hand...

[N3v3r3nding_N3wb]

9 hours ago, Delicieuxz said:

And with that comment you make it clear that you have entirely no idea what depression is, or what it experiences as, and how it affects behaviour. If a person's capacity to make controlled and clear-headed decisions were not impaired by depression, then people would just choose to not be depressed. One of the things with depression is that it indeed does dull cognitive capabilities, and shrouds a mind from seeing clearly. And people with depression often make decisions to try to compensate for, or escape the depression, which can include spending choices.

 

I will be the first to say that I have very extremely limited personal experience with depression, as I have always had the mental toughness and rationality to deal with whatever life throws at me without spiraling into depression (not anything against those with depression; I'm aware that in the overwhelming majority of depression cases, it's not necessarily the fault of the person and is uncontrollable, I'm just giving limited background on why I've never experienced depression). With that said, one of my brothers and my mother both suffer from occasional bouts of depression (my brother to the point of self-harm and almost attempting suicide).

 

Now, with that said, you can't coddle someone who's depressed, as they're still a human being who should be able to make his/her own choices. With that freedom comes the responsibility of discerning for yourself what you should or shouldn't buy, and as long as Facebook and their ad slot purchasers aren't lying about their products, they can advertise to whomever they please with any targeting method they please, as long as it doesn't breach personal privacy. And, when you post anything on social media, you instantly forfeit your privacy on the thoughts you just expressed, which gives Facebook the right to structure ad campaigns around it.

[mr moose]

7 hours ago, Monkey Dust said:

To take the discussion off in a slightly different direction; I heard on the radio last week about how peoples google searches give a much more accurate picture of them than Facebook does, as Facebook is about the image you wish to project to friends and family, not what your life is actually like. So claims from Facebook about how well they know their users might be overstated somewhat. Google on the other hand...

 

Most of this is just facebook selling their advertising abilities.  It's marketing to marketers so it has to be a special kind of sales pitch (read: lying through their teeth).  Regardless of their actual abilities, you can bet your arse they have over exaggerated everything a marketing guru wants to hear. 

[PlayStation 2]

On 5/18/2017 at 6:36 PM, samiscool51 said:

Again another reason not to use facebook....

honestly once this gets onto local news facebook will be in trouble and services like twitter will have a LOT more users

Twitter isn't any better. Trust me on this; have you ever looked at any of Trump's tweets? Almost always flooded by one guy posting an anti-Trump comment chain.

This is what we in the trade call "vote manipulation".

[JuNex03]

1 hour ago, Dan Castellaneta said:

Twitter isn't any better. Trust me on this; have you ever looked at any of Trump's tweets? Almost always flooded by one guy posting an anti-Trump comment chain.

This is what we in the trade call "vote manipulation".

Yeah, a Youtuber by the name "Computing Forever" tested this. It seems that when you try to post positive stuff on Trump's tweets it, in time, will be delinked from the discussion leaving only the negative posts on top. I mean, cmon, a guy who had enough supporters backing him up and letting him become the President and you only see negative posts on his tweets? Like really.

 

I've had some of my posts removed from some discussions as well. You can see this in posts with numerous replys (easier to spot on posts with 20 and below replys), but only have 4-5 visible even when you change the settings to show sensitive tweets.

[Tomsen]

On 5/18/2017 at 11:45 AM, Prysin said:

You also have to remember, Nazi's were leftist. NOT right.

Nazi's were leftist? Really?

Nazism is a center-right fascism.

[mr moose]

5 hours ago, Tomsen said:

Nazi's were leftist? Really?

Nazism is a center-right fascism.

 

I believe many scholars argue his political leaning is not really known,  he hated communism,  marxism (particularly Jewish) and anti parliamentarian.  So it's likely that his political leanings don't conform to any of today's accepted leanings.  Personally given his history (growing up in poverty, watching his country be defeated and first years in army suppressing socialism), I think  he was most likely very dishearten with the governance of the time, of world politics and probably was more a patriot with strong disestablishment views (leaving him believing he was superior dictator).  

 

But that's just my 2 cents.

 

EDIT: although I just realised you are talking about Nazism which is a current movement.  I think you will find they are considered far right anyway.

[Prysin]

5 hours ago, Tomsen said:

Nazi's were leftist? Really?

Nazism is a center-right fascism.

let me correct myself. i was referring to Nazi's, as National Socialism, aka the policy that was fronted to the people. Facism is actually not left or right, facism is defined by the abuse and exertion of force and or coercion by a state in order to cull its subjects. Stalin was a facist, just like mussolini, just like Castro, just like Mao. The moment you engage in suppressing and persecuting opposing political or social ideas, you're a facist.

 

As for Hitlers policies, he centralized the means of production and distribution, not just as a lone dictator, but also to independent comitties that obviously reported to him personally, but he broke it down to locally and regionally controlled. The exact same way as Stalin ran his marxist empire.

The defining trait of left leaning policy is controlled centralization, whilst centrist policy wants uncontrolled/low regulation de-centralization, and right wants highly regulated de-centralization. That being said, most "right" wing parties today are actually centre left, especially in the west. even "conservative" parties arent actually right, they are centrist in nature and by policy.

 

What makes them "right" wing is their social policy (aka immigration). Left wants free immigration, because they NEED free immigration to sustain their social policies, which they sustain through taxation. Centre is either or but with regulations applied. Right is against immigration, because immigration would hurt their socio-economic policies and provide no immediate benefit to their cause.

 

Then you have the regressive left, aka SJWs in politics. One of which recently ran for presidency in a certain country. These lefties are special lefties. They do not adhere to socialist ideals, but rather to gentrification and cultivation of power. They thrive on pitting demographics against eachother, then flirt with the ones who has the most political "capital" behind it. The regressive left has no policy to offer that would actually help the voter, instead it will hurt the voter, but the effect is delayed long enough that most voters wont be able to tell if it was a change in society, or policy. Naturally the regressive left will blame society, pin it on the negatives such as "The Patriachy" or "misoginy" or "racism". But in realty, it is a result of policies put in place a decade earlier, that has finally had the socio-economic effect they were hoping for.