After Initially Calling The New York Times' Report False, Facebook Confirms Most Claims Made in the Story (nytimes.com) 78
Nellie Bowles and Zach Wichter, reporting for The New York Times: Joining a long tradition of companies and campaigns that drop bad news on holidays, Facebook on Thanksgiving eve took responsibility for hiring a Washington-based lobbying company, Definers Public Affairs, that pushed negative stories about Facebook's critics, including the philanthropist George Soros. Facebook's communications and policy chief, Elliot Schrage, said in a memo posted Wednesday that he was responsible for hiring the group, and had done so to help protect the company's image and conduct research about high-profile individuals who spoke critically about the social media platform. Mr. Schrage will be leaving the company, a move planned before the memo was released.
Facebook fired Definers last week, after a New York Times investigation published on Nov. 14. "Did we ask them to do work on George Soros?" Mr. Schrage wrote in the memo, a draft of which had circulated online earlier in the week. "Yes." He added: "I'm sorry I let you all down. I regret my own failure here." This is a change from just a few days ago, when Facebook wrote on Nov. 15 that the Times report was full of "inaccuracies." The same day, Sheryl Sandberg, the company's chief operating officer, posted on her Facebook page that she had no idea the company had hired Definers.
Facebook fired Definers last week, after a New York Times investigation published on Nov. 14. "Did we ask them to do work on George Soros?" Mr. Schrage wrote in the memo, a draft of which had circulated online earlier in the week. "Yes." He added: "I'm sorry I let you all down. I regret my own failure here." This is a change from just a few days ago, when Facebook wrote on Nov. 15 that the Times report was full of "inaccuracies." The same day, Sheryl Sandberg, the company's chief operating officer, posted on her Facebook page that she had no idea the company had hired Definers.
Yeah, bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)
You're sorry you guys got caught, not that you were doing anything wrong. Please go cry me a river somewhere else.
Re: Yeah, bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
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Is anyone surprised? (Score:5, Interesting)
Elon Musk, The Google guys... (Score:3, Interesting)
The entire Web 2.0 generation has been doing this with impunity, which is part of how they overcame the 1.0 guys who were naive and pushing some limits, but not generally flaunting the law, or the expectations of most of their userbase.
While geocities, myspace, infoseek, etc had their issues, most were not outright evil and amoral like the generation that replaced them (Excluding AOL, Time-Warner, SBC etc.)
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So that means Web 3.0 will be run by actual career criminals.
Re: Elon Musk, The Google guys... (Score:3, Insightful)
Are you suggesting that Big Brother Google, Faceboot, et al are NOT run by career criminals??
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Lie first, claim you remember it somewhere, lie again. Then change the topic.
When people show the proof of your lies, blame that person and try to claim they are a liar instead.
Admit nothing, deny everything, make counter accusations
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Typical response (Score:5, Insightful)
"a number of inaccuracies" != "false" (Score:5, Insightful)
Saying that a negative story contains "a number of inaccuracies" is classic weasel-wording - attempting to give the appearance of denial without actually stating an outright falsehood (for which they could get sued, if the truth came out).
I didn't spend a whole lot of time reviewing the original Facebook statement, but I don't think they ever actually denied the central information in the Times report.
Re:"a number of inaccuracies" != "false" (Score:5, Insightful)
0 is a number.
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Oh, good point. And I like the way you think!
Where have we heard this before? (Score:1)
Lies! All lies! . . . I have no knowledge of such action. . . . The persons responsible have been identified, and will be executed.
Sounds just like Saudi Arabia
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Too funny watching the left eat their own. (Score:3, Insightful)
Silicon Valley has this Janus-like political stance where they behave like caricatures of the most amoral greedy sociopathic businesspeople while ostentatiously parroting progressive dogma as if it somehow balances the whole thing out anywhere outside of their twisted little minds. The left happily and hypocritically ate it up while the negative aspects of their behavior were carefully hidden away, but now that the curtain has been pulled back the infighting has begun and now it's funny to watch.
This isn't a blanket condemnation of business or progressives (there are plenty of outstanding people and organizations in both areas), but representative politics has a horrible way of bending the path of humanity towards kakistocracy (government by the worst possible people).
Representative Democracy is the Problem??? (Score:1)
That's some serious claim that representative democracy leads to kakistocracy. It's not perfect, but I'd love to hear if you have any ideas of what could be better. Kings and emperors tend to suck: there might be a few good ones, maybe even in a row, but the horrid ones eventually emerge and take everything down with them. True democracies also tends to dissolve quite quickly, even with severe limits on who can vote. Not everyone has the time to properly assess all the details of each and every politi
Not a right or left thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Silicon Valley has this Janus-like political stance where they behave like caricatures of the most amoral greedy sociopathic businesspeople while ostentatiously parroting progressive dogma as if it somehow balances the whole thing out anywhere outside of their twisted little minds.
Money corrupts (some) people regardless of politics but in many cases corrupt people excel in business because they already are amoral greedy sociopathic people.
The real question is, how do stop corrupt behavior from benefiting? The correct answer is laws and regulations because you cannot force ethical behavior to occur but you can penalize unethical behavior.
Re:Not a right or left thing (Score:4, Interesting)
What do you do when the lawmakers and regulators are themselves corrupt because they benefit from being negligent in their duties? Vote them out? I'm thinking we need to take the nuclear option of Plato's idea of a ruling class forbidden from owning money/property.
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No, the real question is why do people continue -- despite thousands of years of examples -- to think that building up silos of centralized authority and power will do anything other than result in corrupted institutions run by the worst possible people.
Re:Too funny watching the left eat their own. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't see how anyone can see billionaire tech bros as "the left". Their entire philosophy and business model is "leech off the many, for the few". That's about as far from socialism as you can get.
Of course they don't care if you're gay, have an abortion, are in a minority or are from another country; to them everyone is just a resource to further their own wealth and power. If they can parlay their indifference into some good PR then of course they will, but if it helps them they will not hesitate to treat anyone like shit; just because they do it indiscriminately doesn't make them progressive.
Zuck has always been an a-moral toerag; whatever belief or allegiance he professes is only what he thinks will reflect best on him.
Re: Too funny watching the left eat their own. (Score:4, Informative)
You and the OP seem to be confused about the difference between Liberal and Left. It's easy to be confused because often (especially in the US but also in the UK) the two are talked of as being the same thing, but they aren't.
It is perfectly possible to highly socially liberal (pro gay marrage for example) but also very capitalistic.
Former Tory PM David Cameron would be a good example of this. Under his government, Gay marriage was legalised in the UK. The tories are very very pro capitalist (they have privatised just about everything). Maggie Thatcher is still worshiped by many in the Tory party who voted for gay marriage. This political position best represents the likes of Zuckerberg.
You can also want to nationalise stuff but be anti-immigration. I would say that UKIP are probably an example of this. Their economic policies have seen to be designed to attract working class voters in the North (traditionally left wing voters for economic reasons) but who are more socially Conservative (anti-immigration in this example).
I'm a big fan of the political compass https://www.politicalcompass.org/ to explain this, give it a look.
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Liberal and left are nominally the same thing, but that's only one axis. There's also anarchist/authoritarian, for example, which we can meaningfully plot as up/down. One axis describes what you think should happen, and the other describes how you think it should happen.
It is perfectly possible to highly socially liberal (pro gay marrage for example) but also very capitalistic.
Capitalist is not the opposite of liberal. That is the real fallacy of thought, here. Corporatist is the opposite of liberal. Capitalism is simply a system in which we use money to control the means of production. Such a system can be highly
Call the GOP 'Definers' exploits (Score:5, Informative)
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Someone should do a movie about this new kind of journalism in service to companies and political factions. If you do it well, some might think it the greatest movie of all time.
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Re: Call the GOP 'Definers' exploits (Score:1)
Nothing like good old facts to destroy your argument. Mad you got out facted? Actually you didn't even list any. Just more repubtard doublespeak.
Prove the person you replied to wrong. Show us some citations.
sandbagged Sheryl Sandberg needs a plan (Score:2)
Sandbagged Sheryl Sandberg needs a plan to gain control over what's actually happening in the company she runs, right under her nose.
Failure to execute such a plan means exactly what you think it means.
Facebook's image (Score:3)
Facebook's communications and policy chief, Elliot Schrage, said in a memo posted Wednesday that he was responsible for hiring the group, and had done so to help protect the company's image
Protected Facebook's image all right, the image of moral bankruptcy.
Fake fake news! (Score:2)
Yay, we have fun new term!
I'm sure it's just coincidence (Score:2)
Zuckerberg lies ... (Score:2, Insightful)
Mark Zuckerberg, and the asshole corporation he founded, are based entirely on the premise that everything they say is a complete lie intended only to further their own goals.
Mark Zuckerberg is a lying sack of shit. That's what his entire empire is founded on, being a lying sack of shit.
So someone found out Mark Zuckerberg is a lying sack of shit, who paid some other lying sack of shit PR company to sp
Well then obviously the solution is... (Score:2)
Simple solution: Abolish all holidays!