I don’t understand why people complain about Facebook, Google etc... being evil. Our laws are outdated and incomplete. Putting pressure on companies to wilfully do the right thing is fucking stupid and not sustainable. Pressure should be put on governments so that the laws keep up with technology and innovation to protect the fundamental rights of citizens. Corporations will never, and should never play this role. They should follow the law. Companies work within the framework of the law. Most/All companies will do whatever they can to maximize their profit. Even companies that advocate for corporate social responsibility almost always do it because positive public relations effect their balance sheets. Facebook has started to care about privacy now. Not because it’s the right thing to do. In the profit/loss equation it makes sense for facebook to invest more in that direction now. It’s like asking companies to pay higher taxes voluntarily. They are only obligated to pay the absolute minimum tax the law allows them to. Just like you and me. Tldr: Don’t hate the player. Hate the game. Stop being fucking stupid and get TC. TC: 270k
Well this explains a lot, good to know Facebook's logic
Amazon is significantly less ethical than Facebook in my opinion. Never paying any taxes and putting enormous burden on society is evil. That’s like an extremely rich man reaping all the benefits of a great country and paying nothing in taxes. Don’t even get me started on the well documented impact on small retail businesses. It’s really about perspective. I love ordering from Amazon. Great service
OP fuck you. You posted this thread unprompted and you attack anyone who contradicts your thinking. These edgey college hires...
"we can ignore basic ethics and privacy because money. Oh, and no governing body told us not to."
Basic ethics and privacy is your opinion. Personally I don’t think there is anything wrong about using data that can personally identify you to show you ads. But hey, lets get on the privacy bandwagon.
The issue is consent. Facebook had data that was exposed to developers in ways they didn’t know was possible and no one knew. And then that data was used maliciously. No one is saying the issue is using data to target people for ads. EVERYONE does that. There was a huge breach of trust here. Also the more recent issues aren’t even privacy related. They’re just really poor engineering. I feel they handled it as best they could tho.
While the laws are being formed, which take a long time, we need to look at short term and quick fixes. The methods you propose are not good enough and there are enough lobbyists to prevent the laws from going through quickly.
It’s not perfect, but it’s the only mechanism we have. There are also intermediary mechanisms the government has to tackle urgent crisises. If the alternative is that companies should be inherently ethical, that is just childish. How will that work exactly?
Also lobbying in the US is broken. We need laws to fix that too. But capitalism...
As the Zuck once said, "I don't want to live in a world where someone else is making the world a better place better than we are”
Haha that’s awesome
Gavin Belson said that, but you already know it lol
Dont even get me started
I can reasonably expect you not to store passwords in plain text. And bar employees from accessing those passwords. Change my mind
You’re right. That’s incompetence, not evil though
Eye of the beholder. Your profit model is to monetize data. I don't consider that a moral "good". "Evil" is not "operating within the confines of the law". It's a question of morals, which is subjective by nature.
Law is created out of reaction; rarely can laws predict how technology will be used against the current of goodwill. Lawmakers simply do not and cannot know what is possible with every given technological advancement. That’s why corporations should and do bear the burden of responsibility to begin with, in order to guide innovation and its use cases in a direction that moulds with a “normative” moral framework.
Laws have had 10 years
My point is not that corporations should be evil. It’s that they will always prioritize profit whether you like it or not. You cannot fault them for maximising profit within the legal framework. People need to be mad at laws not changing fast enough. Not at companies trying to make a buck
If you run a restaurant business, expect people will critique the quality of food and service, especially if it is a high-end restaurant. If your clientele includes Al Capone and gang, you'd face criticism that other restaurants don't. People praise and criticize Oppenheimer for the atomic bomb too, depending on their views.
Except, using user data after the user deleted their account; selling data that is not yours and ignoring your own TOC; telling the Congress you do not sell to foreign states, and get caught selling to Chinese government 3 months later; tricking kids to pay micro transactions into $1000's "as long as it makes money" and then fighting the laws on this; banning people you politically disagree with. This is all definitely evil: you willfully skirt the laws and then blame the lack of laws... It's like blaming the rape victim because she "was asking for it".
I used Turbo C but is been a while ...