Not that I'm one of Mark's biggest fans. I mean, honestly, the guy is a dick. You can see how much, just watch the Social Network. And no, it was not just to the DeVoss twins, those frat boy jock dorks probably deserved it.
But, see, this is where I think this problem needs to be reframed. Facebook is a medium. I am not his defender over choices he made, choices he probably made to make sure he made money from various revenue sources, to the detriment of user privacy, and, well, factual accuracy, particularly in 2016.
But ... we all know this is not just a Facebook problem. In fact, though folks are focused on it, it really was a "social media" problem. There are Russians, bots, trolls, botnets, "socks," and all other kinds of crap on Twitter, on Instagram, on Tumblr, on Youtube & Google+, and oh yeah I don't know if folks have noticed but people like to toy and troll message boards as well. It's basically an Internet problem.
What happened to the Rohingya in Burma is terrible. Carmen's posted updates about it periodically. There's no doubt Facebook played a role; so did other social media.
The thing is, the interviewee there also brings up Rwanda. And oh yeah, hate radio definitely played a role in the Rwandan ethnocide. Particularly hate radio that called the Tutsi minority of Rwanda "cockroaches" and "vermin". I think looking back at what happened in Rwanda, though, was it the fault of "radio" (as a medium) or "hate radio" (as an odious way of using it). And then, what can you do about Rwandan hate radio that prevents it while not engaging in what would otherwise be considered censorship? Moving that question forward, we all know we don't want either genocidal hate speech or fake news on Facebook, but how do we accomplish those goals without doing it in counterproductive ways. (At this point, "we' means the human race of planet Earth.)
The U.S. Congress just passed a law (SESTA/FOSTA) which was supposedly to shut down sex trafficking, but many of its critics (especially the EFF, founded by your and my friend John Perry Barlow) see this law as exactly having those problems. They just shut down Backpage.com, which some critics argue is actually going to make it HARDER to save young girls (and others) from sex trafficking, and also punish activities which, while perhaps a bit subcultural, are neither non-consensual nor illegal. The law is counterproductive. We need to avoid doing that.
I definitely think Facebook needs to be regulated. And it's absolutely correct it's beyond just the issue of whether it needs to be regulated in the U.S. It's now operating in 200 countries, with 2 billion active users. I mean fuck, that's bigger than any country on Earth. That makes Mark the equivalent of a fucking virtual emperor. Not only is he in over his head, ANYBODY would be. Even if he was a saint and not a douchebag.
Does the UN now have to regulate Facebook? BTW, that suggestion is not facetious. Maybe it needs to go to the ITU (Intl. Telecom Union).
She's the first person I thought of when I saw this gem on FB Newsroom the other day
Facebook Launches New Initiative to Help Scholars Assess Social Media’s Impact on Elections!
Quote:
Today, Facebook is announcing a new initiative to help provide independent, credible research about the role of social media in elections, as well as democracy more generally. It will be funded by the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, Democracy Fund, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the
Charles Koch Foundation 
, the Omidyar Network, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
...
The commission will exercise its mandate in several ways:
Prioritization of research agenda. The research sponsored by this effort is designed to help people better understand social media’s impact on democracy — and Facebook to ensure that it has the right systems in place. For example, will our current product roadmap effectively fight the spread of misinformation and foreign interference? Specific topics may include misinformation; polarizing content; promoting freedom of expression and association; protecting domestic elections from foreign interference; and civic engagement. Commission members will learn about Facebook’s internal efforts related to elections, and source input from the academic community to determine the most important unanswered research questions. They will also begin to work with international experts to develop research evaluating Facebook’s impact in upcoming elections — with the goal of identifying and mitigating possible negative effects.
Solicitation of independent research. As the commission identifies areas to assess Facebook’s effectiveness, it will work with Facebook to develop requests for research proposals. In accordance with standard academic protocols, proposals will be subject to rigorous peer view.
The peer review process will be managed by the Social Science Research Council, which is well placed to tap into the global network of substantive, ethical, and privacy experts. Based on input from the peer review process, the commission will independently select grantees who will receive funds from the supporting foundations, and, when appropriate, privacy-protected data from Facebook.
So I guess it's a bunch of data science folks. But I would love to hear what she's got to say about this.
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