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Re:More details about the October 4 outage by Hokusai on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @01:54PM (#28762993)
> One of the jobs performed by our smaller facilities is to respond to DNS queries. DNS is the address book of the internet, enabling the simple web names we type into browsers to be translated into specific server IP addresses.

What is the target audience of this post? It is too technical for non-technical people, but also it is dumbed down to try to include people that does not know how the internet works. I feel like I'm missing something.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by bovermyer on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:27PM (#28763517)
I'm guessing it has multiple target audiences. Those that won't understand some of the technical jargon (e.g., "IP addresses") will still be able to follow the general flow of the article.

Those of us who are familiar with the domain of knowledge, on the other hand, get a decent summary of events.

It's a balancing act. I think the article does a good enough job of explaining things.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by thirtyseven on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @01:57PM (#28763049)
With an outage this big, even a post for a technical audience will get read by non-technical people (including journalists), so I'm sure it helps to include details like this.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by submain on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @04:16PM (#28765002)
The media: "Facebook engineer typed command. This is what happened next."
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by MertsA on Wednesday October 06, 2021 @05:59AM (#28771121)
"10 backbone router commands Mark Zuckerberg doesn't want you to know. Number 7 will shock you!"
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by whymauri on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:23PM (#28763467)
Huh? I would hardly describe this as technical. Someone with a high school education can read it and get the gist. It's actually somewhat impressive how it toes the line between accessibility and 'just detailed enough'.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by riffic on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:48PM (#28763834)
I'm reading your comment as a form of "feigning surprise", in other words a statement along the lines of "I can't believe target audience doesn't know about x concept".

more on the concept: https://noidea.dog/blog/admitting-ignorance

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by 88913527 on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:52PM (#28763891)
There are plenty of technical people (or people employed in technical roles) who don't understand how DNS works. For example, I field questions on why "hostname X only works when I'm on VPN" at work.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by eli on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:01PM (#28763104)
The media. This was a huge international story.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by blowski on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:02PM (#28763118)
Both those groups of people. I imagine, they would either be accused of it being either too complicated or dumbed down, so they do both in the same article.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by Gulfick on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @03:33PM (#28764482)
Poor targeting choices.
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by shadofx on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @01:59PM (#28763071)
Teenagers who are responsible for managing the family router?
Re:More details about the October 4 outage by Florin_Andrei on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:03PM (#28763141)
> Those data centers come in different forms.

It's like the birds and the bees.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by gist on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @02:55PM (#28763925)
> What is the target audience of this post?

Separate point to your question.

FB is under no obligation to provide more details than they need to because a small segment of the population (certainly relative to their 'customers') might find it interesting or helpful or entertaining. FB is a business. They can essentially do (and should be able to) do whatever they want. There is no requirement (and there should be no requirement) to provide the general public with more info than they want subject to any legal requirement. If the government wants more (and are entitled to more info) they can ask for it and FB can decide if they are required to comply.

FB is a business. Their customers are not the tech community looking to get educated and avoid issues themselves at their companies or (as mentioned) be entertained. And their customers (advertisers or users) can decide if they want to continue to patronize FB.

I always love on HN seeing 'hey where is the post mortem' as if it's some type of defacto requirement to air dirty laundry to others.

If I go to the store and there is not paper towels there I don't need to know why there are no towels and what the company will do going forward to prevent any errors that caused the lack of that product. I can decide to buy another brand or simply take steps to not have it be an issue.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by Hokusai on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @03:12PM (#28764190)
The air industry has this solved, it's mandatory to report certain kind of incidents to avoid them in the future and inform the aviation community. https://www.skybrary.aero/index.php/Mandatory_Occurrence_Rep...

That the main form of personal communication for hundreds of millions of users is down and there is no mandatory reporting is irresponsible. That Facebook is a business does not mean that they do not have responsibilities towards society.

Facebook is not your local supermarket, it has global impact.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by tehjoker on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @04:40PM (#28765319)
One would imagine a large local supermarket going down would owe the people it serves some explanation. That's where their food comes from.

At this point, I am completely sick of the pro-corporate rhetoric to let businesses do whatever they want. They exist to serve the public and they should be treated as such.

Re:More details about the October 4 outage by jablan on Tuesday October 05, 2021 @03:11PM (#28764181)
> If I go to the store and there is not paper towels there I don't need to know why there are no towels

You don't _need_ to know, but it's human to want to know, and it's also human to want to satisfy other human's curiosity, especially if it doesn't bring any harm to you.

Also, your post is not really answering any of GP's questions. I presume you wanted to say that FB doesn't _owe_ any explanation to us, but the GP asked, as they already provided one, to whom is it addressed.