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[–] 209 points 1 year ago* (4 children)

Facebook used to have a team dedicated to analyzing their apps' risks to children's and teenagers' health. The team concluded that there are indeed many serious health risks for both children and teenagers, especially teenage girls. Shortly after, it got disbanded, and all its recommendations completely ignored.

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  • [–] 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    When the news about that came out, around a decade ago now, I deleted my Facebook profile and tried to tell all my friends/family using FB that ... this is pure fucking evil and they should also get off FB.

    They all gaslit me, pretended that news wasn't real, and acted like I was a paranoid delusional maniac.

    Nowadays we have basically the same kind of conclusions regarding TikTok and other platforms that focus on short form video content... well, actually even worse conclusions... and they come from actual peer reviewed scientific journals...

    But you'll still get people saying 'brainrot isn't real'... when uh, yes thats a clumsy term, but it is basically confirmed at this point that TikTok is as addictive as a drug, ruins your motivation and attention span, fills your with mis and disinformatiin, ruins and warps your self image and self esteem, promotes wildly irresponsible and often illegal financial mindsets/strategies... etc etc...

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  • [–] 62 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (6 children)

    That's how targeted advertising works yes. Not much of a reveal there?

    I guess people need the obvious pointed out, and yeah fair enough.

    Before I get dogpiled: I'm not defending them. I'm saying it's sad people actually think or thought the bar was higher than this. You can tell me Google, Xhitter, whatever did the same and I'd say the same thing. You're the product. You. Are. The. Product.

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  • [–] 76 points 1 year ago* (1 child)

    I am sure you already know, but the objection here is going after kids. literally profiling and then abusing their vulnerabilities for profit. this isnt your standard cereal box advertising, I think this is something much darker and more disgusting.

    edit: added word

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  • [–] 18 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    I hear you, I'm saying this shouldn't have been news to anyone.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago* (2 children)

    Even teenage girls?

    You seem to be saying that teenage girls should have known FB was manipulating them and just closed the app.

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  • [–] 15 points 1 year ago

    No, I don’t think they meant the kids should have known better, but rather the adults should have known to keep them away from social media because it’s the ultimate cyber predator.

    God knows what a hyper-specific ML model is going to do for them

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  • [–] 32 points 1 year ago* (2 children)

    I didn't see the testimony, but I did read her book.

    When most people think "targeted advertising", I think they are thinking about something like: this user is a middle-class woman between 18 and 25 who enjoys bicycles, so we'll show her ad X.

    According to Wynn-Williams, Facebook/Meta is doing things like detecting when a user uploads, then immediately removes a photo--detecting that as a moment of emotional vulnerability (that is, the user was feeling self-conscious about their appearance), then bombarding them with ads in that moment for beauty products.

    I think the former is 'obvious' to most people, but the latter probably isn't--probably because Meta and other advertising companies have put a lot of effort in to keep this on the down low--which is why Wynn-Williams is speaking about it publically.

    (not accusing you of defending them BTW, just my 2¢ that this goes beyond what most people would consider obvious, imo)

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  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Book worth a read? Saw it on sale earlier and looked interesting

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  • [–] 19 points 1 year ago

    I got it from the library, so I won't comment how much money it's worth.

    Hard to say I enjoyed it, since the conduct described within is nearly without expection horrifying. I expect that most people on Lemmy would probably be unsurprised by it.

    I found it to be a pretty quick read, and I'm glad it's out there. If you're interested in the topic I'd say to give it a shot.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    I was just venting really, I'm not actually surprised this isn't common knowledge. My bar for humanity already had tunnelled through the Mantel during covid, I think it's in the outer core by now.

    I don't disagree with anything you're saying either.

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  • [–] 22 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    It is absolutely baffling that people don't realize that people are the product. I've had some folks tell me that they understand and "don't care" because the service is "free" or whatever, but then they get angry and freaked out when the platform knows exactly what they're thinking, or at least seems to know.

    There's definitely a deficit in understanding and education on what corporate social media really does.

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  • [–] 14 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    a) yes

    b) what I find really concerning is that they may have already figured out how to change people's behaviour: what they think is funny, what they think is appropriate to say/do, where they want to travel to (if at all), how they feel about certain celebrities they like or dislike, what is believable or not believable, how they feel about certain politicians, who to vote for. Some people are probably more easy to sway on certain topics than others are. It's not a stretch to guess that they probably already know various paths to make individuals into something they currently are not.

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  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    People downvoting you don't realize how much of a science advertising is.

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  • [–] 8 points 1 year ago* (1 child)

    I think that's true in general, but not why I was downdooted.

    My guess was the downvotes are people assuming I don't think it's worse to manipulate children vs adults and that I was somehow okay with it apathetically.

    I'm also an asshole occasionally when I see frustrating and disturbing things like this, so my kneejerk response is maybe where I fucked up.

    I really need to get into the habit of letting a post stew in preview for a hot second before I let loose my mental vomit lol because I sometimes get my ass kicked for not communicating what I'm actually trying to say effectively.

    Edit: Lemmy has been pretty kind to me for my clarifying edits when I do this to myself though, so thanks guys. Like this one :)

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  • [+] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 child)
  • [–] 14 points 1 year ago* (1 child)

    I wonder how prevalent adblocking is among the younger generations

    Speaking of advertising being a science like another person commented, it means it's data driven.

    https://backlinko.com/ad-blockers-users

    https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2024-july-global-statshot

    Lots and lots: https://www.ecosia.org/search?q=how+prevalent+is+adblocking+by+generation

    But more to the point:

    Women in every generation block less ads however, which I found interesting.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    The difference is this is tracking and targeting minors.

    And just because it is the status quo does not mean the general public is aware of it or the actual extent. It needs to be spelled out to them how and why.

    Honestly I find it hard to believe any teens are on Facebook now, maybe IG is still cool? Nothing like before. Idk I don't think teens are on those platforms really

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  • [–] 45 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Wake me up when something gets done about it other than a fine that amounts to about half a day's profit for them.

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  • [–] 22 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    /s Meanwhile, in some Signal group: “Should we suicide her or do you guys figure she might have some ICE-worthy tattoos?”

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    [+] 20 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)
  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (22 children)
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  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Don’t all social media and internet companies do that? It’s all a case of machine learning. I can’t open Insta these days without being blasted with reels of boobs, cleavage etc. My wife gets reels of cooking, dancing etc. It doesn’t have to do anything with our searches or viewing. They’re using our personal information to create a model and shoving targeted content based on that down our throats. This has the highest probability of increasing engagement on their platform.

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  • [+] 21 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 child)
  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Lemmy is far from normal, it is not profitable as a social media platform and is reliant on donations and generosity.

    Google AdSense does similar things to meta, as does amazon. This is far from a misuse, of the technology as that implies that this isn't accomplishing the intended goal, which, aside from laws trying to differentiate children from adults, it does.

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  • [–] 12 points 1 year ago

    Meta purposely pits extreme sides of every issue you could think of, gender, race, class, religion, even vegan, against each other. Every hate comment is great news for Meta. Hate comments mean that person is engaging so they will feed them more of that content and further drag them into their hateful beliefs. And why do they do that? To show them shirt and knicknack advertisements while they're frothing at the mouth.

    Fuck Mark Zuckerberg. He's one of the worst humans on the planet and deserves terrible things to happen to him.

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    [+] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 child)
  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I pirated her book (because fuck her, she was a Facebook exec) and learned that she had a gnarly near-death experience as a child when she got attacked by a shark at the beach.

    I didn't finish the book due to a combination of laziness and my general revulsion at anything Zuck adjacent, but if you have the stomach for it there's a cool shark attack story in it for you at least.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (9 children)

    Ban optimisation without popular consent!

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