When I've gone to tech conferences over the years, I've heard talks given by fb/instagram devs about the problems they're working on, and the tools they've created to do it.
On one level it seems very alluring--pay, technical challenges, being at the cutting edge of new technology. But for me those points can't counteract the role fb has in society and what people generally think of the company.
When you retire, with very few exceptions, nothing you did in your working life will be remembered by anyone but yourself. So it's important that you be content with it. That realization has taken a while to hit me, and it's growing into a desire to retire early so I can do things that are personally rewarding and are not just goals on someone else's project plan.
For various reasons (including age and working in tech) I've considered leaving software development when I reach my 40s, to pursue something that I love doing that's a bit more tangible.
That I very much doubt. The average outrage timer is 48 hours, then everybody forgets and jumps to a new controversy. As for Facebook, many of my relatives still use it, either indirectly through WhatsApp or Instagram, or directly. Maybe my technically minded friends would care if I worked for Facebook, but even then those are far and few between. I barely remember my coworkers from 10 years ago.
A few counterpoints. The average outrage may be 48 hours, but I am sure the median is much higher. I'll boycott nestle and Samsung products forever, for instance, and have for nearly a decade and a half with nestle.
Some of my closest friends started as work colleagues, and since I retired 8 years ago I still talk to a half dozen or so, with a couple talked with daily.
You (nor I) are not everyone, and extrapolation from our own viewpoints is very nearly always invalid.
What’s wrong about Nestle? Also Samsung is strange company to boycott.
Overall boycotting both of these companies is easy because replacement products for everything they do is plentiful, widely available and the same price. Not much sacrifice here.
Having worked for WhatsApp, mostly my friends and family said, "What's That?" ... and I sighed. Of course, when I worked for Yahoo Travel, mostly they said "That's still around?", so no love wherever I work. :)
Nah. They'll remember that you paid their way through college, could afford to make their childhoods and path to "the good life" easy in general, and left them a pile of cash when you died.
> But your family and friends will remember, and not kindly, if you worked for FB.
If this was even remotely true Facebook would have had a massive impact on its usage since its consumer based. It would seem weird that the Facebook brand is so tarnished to the point that the population would still be users but at the same time tar and feather loved ones who maintain it.
Over my career it is somewhat impressive how true this has been. Across companies that say very similar things about what it means to be an employee of X, the behavior of execs and senior leadership ripples through the ranks in obvious ways. When statements from high-level people are empty or specious, you can expect to encounter the same in your own management chain.
It only takes a moment to remember this each time a FB recruiter pings me. Couldn't I be one of the people working on solving these big problems and making XX% more while doing it? It's a false choice.
True, also wgen it comes to changes up the chain. I don't buy the whole "these high level org and management changes won't affect the way work" stuff anymore.
which is what exactly? if they didn't like it, they'd be leaving in droves. tech nerds are really the only ones upset about anything that FB has done/is doing.
instead, the average person looks at what they get from FB. most of them never, not once, think at about what cost. to them it is free to use, and that's all that matters. raising privacy concerns goes no where. manipulating people's emotions isn't really doing much negatively to FB either. addicts are like that though. deep down, they might actually be aware that what they are doing is not good for them, but that isn't strong enough to fight the addiction.
The parallels with the tobacco industry continue to amaze me. People viewed that industry very negatively but continued to smoke even after all revelations about their lobbying and its health consequences came to light. It has taken decades for the number of smokers to decline substantially. I imagine that FB will similarly die a very slow death over the next 10-20 years, and even then it won't die completely (but it will be replaced by other toxic social media corporations).
It's not a lie. People can have a negative view of something and continue to do that something. They can also have that negative view without truly understanding why they have that view. People are actively trying to mislead polls with answers they think the poll is looking for, or just false info to skew numbers. FB is in the news with negative stories, so they repeat those when asked even without thinking about why.
If you asked someone about a teacher or some other adult trying to manipulate a kid, they'd obviously say that it is bad. Telling them FB is doing it with what posts they see, they don't respond the same way. They just don't get how an "al-go-rythym" can be so bad. They don't truly understand the ramifications of the hoovering up all of the data they do. They shrug their shoulders and say things like they are okay with it as long as it's not real money.
So, I stand by my stance saying it is only tech nerds that truly get what is going on here.
That’s not what you said, you said “tech nerds are really the only ones upset about anything that FB has done/is doing” which the article I provided proves that’s not accurate. Move the goalposts all you want, I don’t care, but it is certainly not only “tech nerds” that disprove of what FB is doing.
Maybe. Wasn't my intent, but let's allow the conversation to move past that.
The mass populace is not stopping their use of FB regardless of what's in the news or what these polls say about their views of FB. From the evidence, one can only surmise that people don't truly care what FB does. Most addicts don't care what their drug dealer does as long as they can get their fix when they need it.
Does the majority of the public know that Instagram == Facebook, though? Genuinely curious - non-tech folks do seem to love talking about how awful Facebook is and how they don't use it anymore, but then comes the scrolling through Instagram for 6 hours..
Look at the poll yourself, linked at the bottom of the article.
Facebook 36% positive, 33% negative.
Of course their public image has not been improving, as there is high frequency campaign from newspapers and TV news to attack their competition. CNN in particularly has wanted to deflect blame to Facebook for all of the free airtime CNN gave Trump in 2016. However, it seems to be quite a stretch to extrapolate from 2019 survey that listed 33% negatives for Facebook.
I think Jan 6 and the Big Lie are pretty clear evidence of the power of network effects. To claim I don't understand them is you trying to twist a narrative.
I actually anticipated your diatribe, but decided against making that part of my original comment. Yes, there's "no where" else for them to go blah blah blah. However, some people do actually decide to walk away from it for their own personal health/sanity regardless of how it affects relationships from not being on the platform. We see these comments all the time about "I quit FB x years ago". I'm one of them because of what I know about FB.
Every quarter or so, I tell FB head hunters to go away. I do think about the money I'm turning down, but I also like to sleep at night.
Having morals does cost money.
And yes, I do think less of the 'typical' FB employee. Everyone's story is different and I'll listen, but the presumption is that working there means being OK with enabling genocide for a nice paycheck.
On one level it seems very alluring--pay, technical challenges, being at the cutting edge of new technology. But for me those points can't counteract the role fb has in society and what people generally think of the company.
Culture is important, and it starts at the top.