Who doesn’t love a good coincidence? Alfred Hitchcock used to say that you’re entitled to one coincidence per movie. After that you’re just being stupid. Well, Facebook just had its coincidence and would be wise not to try selling us another.
Barely 12 hours after a whistlebower goes on “60 Minutes” to pretty much reaffirm, with internal documents, what most of us have long known, the whole friggin’ Facebook system collapses, due, Facebook tells us, to some of its own boffins in its server cave flipping the wrong switch.
Riiiiight. (For the record, I do not think that story will hold up.)
After The Orange God King, Tucker Carlson, Ted Cruz and maybe Marjorie Taylor Greene I don’t know if any public figure has less credibility right now than Mark Zuckerberg or any other top Facebook executive. Who believes anything he says?
Most likely Zuckerberg will be “invited” to appear again before some Congressional committee and explain how his (publicly-traded) company, which he dominates like few other CEOs, continued to let his Instagram platform provoke young girls into eating disorders and suicide while having research in hand to prove it was doing exactly that.
Given the tech sophistication of some of our most powerful elected officials — I’m thinking your Chuck Grassleys, Tommy Tubervilles, Diane Feinsteins and the like — I would not expecting a robust cross examination, no matter how good their staff preparation might be. And beyond a lack of functional understanding of algorithms and confusion in the face of slick Silicon Valley-speak, there’s the fact that in a fundamentally bought-off Congress, where Senate reelection campaigns are now pushing $60-$100 million, Facebook throws too much money around for anyone, Republican or Democrat, to push too hard for any “reform” that diminishes its revenue.
We long ago passed the point where Facebook could make a credible argument that it isn’t a publisher, like The New York Times, The Washington Post or the East Boogertown Sentinel, and therefore can’t be sued for spreading flagrant lies. Lies, you know, like how horse dewormer is a better bet for beating a pandemic than a vaccine that’s protected over 180 million without a single death attributed to an adverse reaction.
So I don’t see Capitol Hill, where Facebook served as a willing messaging vehicle for insurrectionist rioters, doing much if anything to truly reduce the now clear and definitive harm unregulated social media is doing to a gullible, unsophisticated world.
What might move the needle a bit isn’t any outrage over a system that provokes depression and suicide in young girls, and convinces none-too-bright average Joes to get off their barstools and attack the Capitol. What might … might … matter a lot more is if Facebook’s stock takes a slide and it’s investors decide that that is a bridge too far (i.e. farther than inducing suicide in children) and sues Zuckerberg/Facebook for insidious damage to their portfolios.
The head-spinning rationale that, like gun manufacturers, Facebook can’t be sued for the damage its products do, has never made sense. The “We’re not a publisher” dodge was never credible given Facebook’s obvious reach and impact on over nearly three billion users. (The Times and Post would kill for three billion sets of eyeballs every day.)
But in this moment Republicans won’t touch Facebook because the rampant fear-mongering, hysteria and misinformation it injects into the so-called conservative base, is a toxic accelerant for fanaticism as it tries to retain minority rule in the United States. (Waaay right-wing posts have been the most-trafficked sludge on Facebook for years.) Meanwhile, Democrats, who make regular hem-of-the-garment kissing pilgrimages to Silicon Valley for campaign cash are so convinced they’re going to lose it all — again — next fall they’re not about to make more than a few tut-tutting noises, wring their hands, clutch their pearls and hope someone else quickly replaces Zuckerberg as Sinister Robo-Nerd #1.
It’s unlikely I’ll be here when the clock turns over to Jan. 1, 2200. But my bet is that the Dawn and Reign of the Social Media Algorithm that we’re living through right now will be regarded as the single most deleterious influence on this era.
I like to remind friends anguishing over “the state of things” that — at least until we hit the fatal tipping point — there is a counter-balance to the stupendous landfills of venality and criminality choking the headlines. And right now there’s no story making that counter-balancing effect clearer than Devin Nunes suing … Devin Nunes’ Cow … and Devin Nunes’ Mom.
In the era of Donald Trump and social media, these two statements haunt me.
Are you as amazed as I am at the indifference so many people have to their own personal privacy? Practically every day there’s another revelation of prying, “data-mining”, bogus security “filters” and the astonishing trade going — with your personal information. Where you are. Where you go. What you buy. Who you call and text. All of it literally making billions for the tech giants — Google, Facebook, cell phone carriers — while they heavily promote themselves as benevolent giants “bringing us together”.
You know what I’m talking about. Those gorgeous families perpetually promoting their endless vacations to balmy locations. Those bronzed boasters photographing their grotesque toes wiggling contentedly in the foreground of an idyllic beach. Those smug snowbirds constantly reminding you that they have ample time and money to spend the winter months engaged in poolside bingo marathons. Worst of all, those Minnesota expatriates who provide constant updates about the temperature differential between their old and new home states. Traitors!
Think I’m over-reacting? Well, I’ll have you know that Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) plagues millions of citizens in northern states, causing us to stare catatonically into full-spectrum lights, binge on Vitamin D supplements, huff ionized air, and go bankrupt buying crap from garden, golf and fishing catalogs that we can only use a few weeks out of the year. You think that’s fun?