> Nice spin on it, but Facebook is still a bad actor (despite what you say).

This needs to be a conclusion, not a premise. I do not have a firm belief about whether or not this is true, but I keep seeing people list bad things about FB and draw a straight line to “thus it is evil”. Ideally, we would list the good/bad it does and assign weights to these points to determine if it is net harmful.

I want to be convinced, HN, but when I read comments like the ones in this thread (FB has no positive value whatsoever for its users, FB sells users’ data), it makes it hard for me to appraise.

At its foundation, Faceboot is a man-in-the-middle attack dressed up to attract users. The standard "web 2.0 defense" was that these companies would remain benevolent in the interests of their users to maintain their own profits. The onus was really on them to demonstrate that trusting third parties with our communications is a reasonable thing to do. The more time passes, the more blatant the evidence gets that this is not true.

> The onus was really on them to demonstrate that trusting third parties with our communications is a reasonable thing to do.

In general, I agree, but the context here is dozens of HN commenters claiming that FB is a bad actor/net negative for the world. These commenters cite lists of gripes about the company, many legitimate, some illegitimate, but get hand-wavy when someone asks about the "net" in "net negative".

I'm not rejecting the conclusion, here, by the way! If the company is ultimately bad for society, this line of questioning should embolden the consensus HN opinion.

The metric of "net (negative)" is nonsensical on a multidimensional question, due to varying utility functions.

Faceboot directly optimizes to increase time spent on their site, wasting human potential.

Faceboot also provides an effortless way to check in with loved ones after a disaster, easing human suffering.

Two people will look at both of these facts, value each one differently, and come up with a different "net".

Furthermore, it is not appropriate to give Faceboot all the credit for either facet! People could check in with text messages, and people would be in dopamine loops even with software purely under their control.

So the only thing we can really do is discuss each facet independently, in the context of first principles / morals.

I personally think much of what is wrong with Faceboot is due to the conflict of interest from a third party mediating social relationships, and the inhuman scale of centralization. But the more that comes out about inherent social media narcissism, I also see that there is no silver bullet.

I agree with much of what you wrote, but disagree that the question is nonsense. From a specific utilitarian perspective, "wasted human potential" only matters in so much as it impacts human suffering. If we want to maximize pleasure and minimize suffering, the units are still the same in both opposing points you mentioned - it is just really, really hard to measure.

In practical terms, coming up with qualitative points and weighting them in a good-faith-but-ultimately-arbitrary-manner is good enough, and something that everyone does constantly. For example, I suspect the average HNer weights "wasted human potential from FB" more than "benefit of disaster reporting from FB" (which I also agree with - however "benefit of disaster reporting" almost certainly outweighs "detriment from nebulous analytics firm scandal").

> If we want to maximize pleasure and minimize suffering, the units are still the same in both opposing points you mentioned - it is just really, really hard to measure.

It's not hard - it's impossible. Even we fully agree on a specific metric, a situation still has to be weighed against possible alternatives and integrated on timescales longer than our lives. A very basic example of this is a company optimizing for "profits", but they're actually optimizing for short term profits at the expense of going out of business two years later. The future is unknowable in the same exact sense that every NP-hard problem is. Heuristics are the only way to tackle this.

> coming up with qualitative points and weighting them in a good-faith-but-ultimately-arbitrary-manner is good enough, and something that everyone does constantly

Of course, which is why I'm referring to "Faceboot" even while recognizing that people get utility out of it. I just think that focusing on arbitrary pairs of specific facets is already headed down the path of madness, which is why I stated my initial critique in terms of basic principles.

> Heuristics are the only way to tackle this.

Yes. This is why every single comment of mine in this thread recommends a specific heuristic with which to tackle this exact problem.

The heuristic is the sum of what individuals are willing to put up with or not -- not something you can calculate and then just prescribe for everybody.

> net negative

How do you weight the individual criticisms, or individual benefits to achieve an objective positive/negative score? How do you weigh "installing spyware to see what companies we might buy" against "share photos with nan"? How does the Facebook "only visible to people you interact with enough" algorithm affect the previous question's balance?

Without the weighting I think we've easily reached the point where the number of negative revelations is incessant and the benefits declining (thanks in part to that previously mentioned feed algorithm).

I think that may be the the point, to get too many people from acting on what they have enough of, to "let's talk some more first".

Such discussion wasn't required of anyone before they were allowed to express support or praise, so why would it be required from anyone who reached the point of boycott or criticism, before they are granted that they have reached that point?

I mean, it's fine to ask people why they think what they think of Facebook, but why refuse to accept others are moving for good reasons, maybe for better reasons than others have for not moving -- and ask them questions while letting them pass, without attempting to delegitimize them until they "explained themselves"?

> This needs to be a conclusion, not a premise.

What makes you think it's a premise and not a conclusion?

> Ideally, we would list the good/bad it does and assign weights to these points to determine if it is net harmful.

I have 11 years of data points and experiences about FB, I'm not going to enumerate all of them whenever there is another. I'll just say "typically fucking Facebook".

At this point, I don't even feel obligated to remember it all -- I can trust myself enough. We do that with "evil" people in our lives, too. We don't remember every dirty detail. We remember that there were a bunch of things, and that overall, we had it at some point. I save the conclusion and the checksums and that's enough.

If you think I'm operating on a premise, instead of having come to a conclusion, how is that not you operating on a premise?

> I want to be convinced

Maybe, maybe not. What you are doing is delegitimizing even the conclusions others arrived at, by simply calling all of that mere premises. You saw a bunch of posts that struck you as knee-jerk, so all of it is knee-jerk.

You have to form your own opinion either way, that burden is not on others. Do you also expect anyone who says anything positive to give some kind of thorough, 1000-page assessment of all the benefits and cons? No, of course not. Same goes for criticism.

I for one don't care about the "evilness" of people I never met. For me the harm done through ignorance or fear or "evil" (which is just another form of weakness really) or not caring enough is the same harm.

> At this point, I don't even feel obligated to remember it all -- I can trust myself enough. We do that with "evil" people in our lives, too. We don't remember every dirty detail. We remember that there were a bunch of things, and that overall, we had it at some point. I save the conclusion and the checksums and that's enough.

> If you think I'm operating on a premise, instead of having come to a conclusion, how is that not you operating on a premise?

A mental conclusion can be a discussion premise. It doesn't invalidate your conclusion to say it should be a conclusion not a premise, because you're asserting a premise in a discussion which you are not (yet) supporting.

Also consider that you have seen eleven years of data points and experiences from the point of view of a small subset of users; there could perhaps be an equivalent cache of positive datapoints which tend to be significantly less interesting to report on.

Thus, supporting your point with concrete examples is how you contribute to a discussion, because then you and any adversaries can challenge you on the merits of your argument.

That's what the conclusion/premise separation is about.

> Also consider that you have seen eleven years of data points and experiences from the point of view of a small subset of users; there could perhaps be an equivalent cache of positive datapoints which tend to be significantly less interesting to report on.

You know what a thief can be like? 99.99% of the time, they don't steal. They sleep, they brush their teeth, they do all sorts of stuff, and every 2 weeks they take all the savings from an elderly woman.

How often you do need to see someone doing that to consider them a thief? Would you really care about any positive stories after seeing what you saw?

> That's what the conclusion/premise separation is about.

You can't speak for that other person. Let them respond for themselves.

> You can't speak for that other person. Let them respond for themselves.

Sounds like you're more interested in competing with someone than talking about ideas.

> Would you really care about any positive stories after seeing what you saw?

...yes? Of course? I don't automatically dehumanize that hypothetical person for their deeds, whether I approve or not, or believe there should be consequences. Like, doesn't Facebook collaborate with law enforcement in tracking down predators and scammers and the like? It's not as simple as "bad. go away."

You should remember enough to make a proper argument, dude. A solid conclusion needs solid support.

> Sounds like you're more interested in competing with someone than talking about ideas.

No, I want to talk about the idea they expressed, not what you read into it. I can only do that with them.

> ...yes? Of course? I don't automatically dehumanize

Who's talking about dehumanizing? How is considering someone a thief dehumanizing?

edit2: Facebook is a company. It can't be dehumanized, it's not a person in the first place. People in it are responsible for what they do. Someone who fought shitty decision and then left is different than someone who, say, hires a firm to smear critics. That goes without saying as far as I'm concerned. But my thief example refers to Facebook, you see? Just because apparently my argument isn't easy to follow for everyone, doesn't mean it doesn't stand.

So, where is the dehumanization? Who is being dehumanized when someone comes to the conclusion that FB is on the whole "bad"? Because we're not appreciating all the good, supposedly? When someone is a thief, or a murderer, or a company is, then all their fantastic properties they may have is interesting for their personal friends. But not to the police, judges, or wider society. They know that the person has probably a lot of reasons for how they became that way, and nice sides to them, but they already have their own friends, it's simply completely out of scope of the subject at hand, unless it's directly related to the "crime".

> Like, doesn't Facebook collaborate with law enforcement in tracking down predators and scammers and the like?

Yes, and that thief who sometimes robs elderly women who then freeze to death outside, also has child, and he's very great with that child, and he's singing in a choir, and all sorts of great things. But you don't judge a meal by the freshest ingredients, but by the most spoiled. You judge a person by their worst deeds, and likewise a company. Again, we're talking about judgement with a capital justice here, not being friends, thinking we're better, or thinking they're evil and we're good, or any of that.

> You should remember enough to make a proper argument, dude.

I think my argument is just fine, and it even seems to get to you a little.

edit: And what post of mine are you even referring to? Where did I make an argument without examples? I was responding to someone else complaining that everyone who thinks Facebook is "evil" (let's just say bad) is operating on a premise. I was responding to that general point, I'm not decebalus1, who in turn didn't have "Facebook is evil" as their main point either.

Their main point, if you would follow the guidelines, hasn't been addressed by anyone. Their main point is the first two paragraphs, the rest is bonus. How come you are trying to teach how to "make a proper argument, dude", but didn't notice that?

Oh, and clicking buttons instead of reasoning kinda gives away who is interested in discussion, and who is interested in dehumanization and censorship.

I'll list a few:

Conducting psychology experiments on people without their consent (or awareness of it)

Documented evidence that Facebook as it is now decreases people's quality of life, but they don't want to mess with their formula because that's what brings the dollars in.

Theres many more. But these two are the biggest I can think of off the top my head.

There are certain forums in which the groupthink makes discussion of certain topics in good faith impossible.. sadly, HN is one of those when it comes to Facebook being anything other than cartoonishly evil.