Three quarters of adults believe FB is making society worse[1]. Maybe a moral panic has taken hold of the world, or maybe the world has recognized that FB is the business equivalent of the Paperclip Maximizer, optimizing growth metrics with zero regard for actual human happiness and societal well-being. In any case, FB--er, Meta-- doesn't have a HN problem, Meta has a national public opinion problem.
Since you disagree with the parent and are claiming the opposite as him (also without a citation), I decided to Google around for some actual data.
Here are some findings from a NBC/WSJ poll [0]...
> 57 percent of Americans say they agree with the statement that social media sites like Facebook and Twitter do more to divide the country
> Fifty-five percent believe social media does more to spread lies and falsehoods, versus 31 percent who say it does more to spread news and information
> Sixty-one percent think social media does more to spread unfair attacks and rumors against public figures and corporations, compared with 32 percent who say it does more to hold those public figures and corporations accountable.
> 82 percent say social media sites do more to waste people’s time, versus 15 percent who say they do more to use Americans’ time well.
> 60 percent saying they don’t trust the company at all to protect personal information
> 36 percent of adults view Facebook positively, while 33 percent see it negatively. And Twitter’s rating is 24 percent positive, 27 percent negative.
That's ridiculous on its face and I'd be shocked if you actually believe it. The things people will say to each other on facebook NEVER happen in real life. If nothing else, facebook has made society WORSE because public behavior has gotten WORSE over time and it absolutely STARTED on sites like twitter and facebook.
If you want to fix society, force more in-person interactions and limit online interactions. We've literally got an entire generation of kids who can barely function in society because they grew up spending 90% of their time interacting with their peers over instant messaging.
I’m with you. Facebook brings way more good to the world than bad. And the bad it brings is just amplification of what already exists. And with the Internet that amplification will happen with or without facebook.
Also the fact that much of the research / “leaks” are showing most of the issues are only happening in the US is a sort of a glaring hole in most of the arguments being made against FB. The US is just borked at the moment. Everything is red vs blue, and no one even cares what the issues are at this point.
FB is actively changing how you see the world through it by removing the content you do not like to see. This is how it yields to more divided society.
I disagree with all of those, but more specifically with
>> 1) The core product is good and useful to people/society.
Definitely not. If you had to put a numerical value on Facebook impact on society, it would be extremely negative I think. You grab attention of weak users, that end up spending so much time on your platform doing nothing instead of contributing in things that would benefit society. You create an illusion that everyone got a beautiful life, pushing some people on the verge to suicide//depression. And maybe the worst of all, you block free speech based on whatever private criterias you decide and you allow for mass brain washing by pushing ideas on your newsfeed. The only positive side is your utility of connecting people which already perfectly existed before.
The only reason why you get away with all of this is because it is so difficult to put an actual number on those.
Not a big fan of FB or Zuckerberg, but the article reeks of fear mongering. FB won't be the cause of society's downfall. There are way more powerful factors capable of causing it.
I know this was snarky and probably in violation of site guidelines, but it is my personal opinion that Facebook is the main impetus in the hatred and division between political ideals in the US right now.
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