You are picking up extra shifts on the Facebook PR defense today. I like the aggressive attitude. See you back at the Meta offices tomorrow! Can't wait for the company Halloween party over VR.
Not the parent, but I hate Facebook because of the negative impact it had on my psychology, feeding my depression and anxiety for years before I broke free and stopped using it. That was about 10 years ago.
They seem to have only gotten worse since then in many ways. And I was an adult when I started using it. I can’t imagine what some of these intrusive social media products are doing to kids.
So I dislike and no longer use Facebook. And also, I do hate it.
I’m usually a pretty positive person and would rarely use the word “hate” in respect of another person. I reserve that word for very few scenarios. But I have to say that in this case it’s perfectly fitting.
and yours seems to be an attitude of blaming only the individual. Obese? just a lazy fatso. Lung cancer? just a nicotine junkie. etc.
I think you are also being too simplistic and neglecting the complex interactions between personal responsibility and the dependency on the environment we as a culture inhabit and create.
The impact of large corporations optimising consumer behavior is not zero, otherwise they wouldn't spend so much money on it. So those corporations also share partial accountability to the problems they helped create.
The product "facebook" being a tool does not preclude the company "facebook" from accountability.
> and yours seems to be an attitude of blaming only the individual.
Yes. Because I like to think I'm living among grown ups, not among children where nanny state is needed.
> Obese? just a lazy fatso.
Not everyone of course (sometimes it is disease), but most obese people are.
It is not necessarily bad. Maybe someone decided they are happy being obese, lazy and enjoy sugar in food, that's their choice and their responsibility.
> The impact of large corporations optimising consumer behavior is not zero, otherwise they wouldn't spend so much money on it.
And grownup adults are responsible to recognize these tricks and don't use it when it harms them.
Same as with Coca-cola, which also does millions of these tricks affecting consumer behavior. I drink Coke occasionally, and partly because of their ads everywhere, otherwise maybe I'd drink more water. But I know when to stop.
Hate might be strong, but this is kind of like naming your tech company "computer." "Meta" is used across so many industries in the tech sector, and outside. Now it's tied to the stink of "facebook."
> from being disrespectful or cruel to each other.
I'd say it is disrespectful to bring your own grief as an argument in a rational discussion. Keep your personal life out of discussing technical or political discussions.
> And we bring those emotions to everything we do.
No we don't. At least those of us who have grown up.
I think that most people here would agree that social media, and Facebook in particular feeds off people's tendency to get addicted to... it. Of course you can "get off" or use it thoughtfully. Many do, but many don't, not realizing how it changes your perception of reality and by extension your personality and relationships. Looking at the amount of plainly false information spreading in these networks, I wouldn't necessarily collectively characterize the userbase as a bunch of free thinkers. Sadly.
Sorry to hear that. I'd prefer to live in society where there's rule of law and basic freedoms, including freedom to conduct business even if I or someone else disagrees with how that business operates.
And some of us think that the category of “legal business” should be restricted a bit more, just as we don’t allow alcohol and marijuana producers to sell to minors, or financial institutions to loan money at high interest rates with self-enforced, obliquely-hinted-at physical penalties.
My response was an intentionally flippant statement, and very self-aware as a "first impression" type thing. I don't actually hate Facebook, or their new name (but I don't think it's very good).
Sorry that went over your head, I didn't mean to trigger a lecture.
My point was that Google's rebrand DIDN'T work. Very few people know Google as Alphabet. They still know it as Google (the people on the street that is). So, will Facebook's rebrand have the effect of Bell Atlantic + GTE's rebrand as Verizon, or will it have the effect Google's rebrand as Alphabet?
Really not true. The same number of people will know Facebook as owning them as do now. Like now people are like, "you know Instagram is owned by Facebook right?"
Well, the splash screen says "Whatsapp from Facebook", and the description on the Google Play store starts with "WhatsApp from Facebook is a FREE messaging and video calling app."
So, it's out there, even if people haven't changed the way they think.
Google didn't change its org structure for consumer-facing rebranding purposes. It was a move for the market/investors, to separate out more clearly the (lack of) profitability of individual sectors and acquisitions of the company that don't happen to be ads or search. Alphabet was about creating internal transparency.
That's the story. At the same time their former CEO made quite a few statements that did not sit well with the management of the daughter companies, Google's reputation is such that some distance really doesn't hurt in the PR department.
We still think of Alphabet as Google. So while Facebook may effectively become Meta, people will still say "Facebook does X" when they should technically mean "Meta does X".
Doesn't that defeat the purpose of the rebrand? If Facebook is going all in on Meta, wouldn't they want people to think Meta does X instead of Facebook does X? Especially if they're trying to distance themselves from the increasing stink that is Facebook.
People on the street don't know about Alphabet is what the above post implied. People will not know about Meta as well hence everyone will still say it is own by Facebook which gotten so much negative feedback that it had to change its name to Meta but essentially still the FB who is own by that Zuck guy.
The reason the person-on-the-street doesn't care about Alphabet is that people don't interact with any Alphabet company except Google. Waymo? Calico? Loon? Wing? Hardly any ordinary people think about those. (Maybe some day, but not today.)
By contrast, lots of ordinary people interact with WhatsApp and Instagram. It will be/feel different when they're "owned by Meta" vs. "owned by Facebook."
So if the Whatsapp and Instagram brands are stronger than Facebook / Meta, what will the point be here, to distance and separate the sullied Facebook brand from the not-yet-sullied Whatsapp and Instagram brands by using an intermediary vanilla Meta brand?
Depends on what we mean by "work". My impression is that Google didn't change its name due to shame or for consumer branding, but rather to better reflect the company's structure where not everything is Google anymore. In the case of FB, the change could be in part due to bad reputation and in part consumer oriented.
My understanding was Google's rebranding was mainly targeted at investors so that when financials were reported, it would be split out between Google vs. other divisions. It would make sense that most everyday people wouldn't know about this.
FB's rebrand seems targeted to everyday consumers, so I would bet their brand strategy would change to cater to that, in a way that Google/Alphabet never cared to.
Maybe but I'd be surprised. How many (both tech folks or news articles) really associate Fitbit/Waymo/DeepMind primarily with Alphabet instead of Google? Even clicking a recent story which refers to it as an Alphabet subsidy they reference it as "DeepMind, which is owned by Google parent Alphabet,".
This might be the nicest thing I’ve ever said about Comcast but I think their slow roll-out approach was better (from a PR perspective) than what facebook is doing. There was no big bandaid pull where Comcast was suddenly Xfinity it just sort of... happened?
Did it really happen though? I still see stuff with Comcast on it. Like technician trucks, random web pages, postal mailings, etc. It seems to me that they just came up with the term Xfinity and then slowly associated it back with the Comcast name, so now both Comcast and Xfinity can be thought of as terrible companies.
"Let's change our brand. We will get the suckers to think we are creating a better digital future!"
"We will continue to make people more miserable, and me wealthier?"
(I like FB groups. It's not all bad. I do believe the company, and their acquisitions, are not good for adolescents psyche, or even most adults up to 40.)
Heck, it seems to be doing some of its worst damage to the over-60 crowd.
Me, 20 years ago: I wish Dad would try to learn how to use a PC so he could understand what I’m studying.
Me, 10 years ago: I wish Dad would try to learn how to use the Internet so I wouldn’t have to manage increasingly digital regular personal business stuff for him now that Mom’s gone.
Me, today: I am delighted that Dad never took an interest in the online world and will happily serve as a phone to Internet proxy for him the rest of his life, and Snapfish makes good money off me now that I’ve presented my dad with the stereotypical reason his generation started using FB: a grandchild.
an interesting idea but the technology just isn't there.
even if the technology were here, ultimately the things people enjoy involve reality - eating, vacations, traveling, etc.
I'd go the other extreme actually and make some sort of "superreality"
if you ask a million people "what brings you joy" - the vast majority of the answers will involve spending time with other people in person. video games, social media, etc. only serve as a gateway to reality. a "metaverse" would ultimately be at odds with this.
Eh, the tech isn't there until it is (PalmPilot/iPhone).
An example of something that's already here: call of duty. Spending time with others while casually playing is a fun time. It's challenging, requires communication, you shoot the shit, laugh, drink, etc. I already refer to it as plugging in.
Sure I prefer a lake house, or skiing in the mountains, but that's expensive, and not accessible to most. I think too if the environment trends into more chaotic areas you can expect people to spend more time inside, thus more demand for digital experiences.
Meta (previously Facebook) is the ultimate social manipulator.
Your site is losing popularity to a new social media app for phones? Buy that app. Make it basically the same as your version of social media.
Your previously purchased app is losing popularity to an app devoted to ephemeral videos and pictures? Shamelessly copy that app's functionality in every app you own, and even make an exact duplicate app to commodify that feature. Run the competitor into the ground when they refuse to sell to you.
Your collection of almost-the-same-social-media-sites is threatened by a foreign competitor? Lobby for that foreign competitor to be banned from one of the largest single-country markets in the world. That doesn't work? Spread FUD about the foreign competitor's evil. That's doesn't work? Lobby for intense regulation in the social media space to prevent any competitor from ever showing up again.
A series of scandals, leaks, and general scummy profit-seeking behaviour sullies your name even among tech illiterate folks? Change your name so those people can't keep track of what's going on and launder your reputation.
I can't stand Meta. I think Zuckerburg might just be the antichrist (mostly kidding on this one). But I have to hand it to him: he is very savvy at this whole business thing.
I agree but relax with the antichrist stuff, we don't want the justifiable hatred of him to turn into antisemitism like it already is in the conspiracy circles
I wouldn’t really call it savvy. Most people can think of these tactics but many people wouldn’t actually do it. The difference is he doesn’t care about unfairly screwing other people over for his own personal gain. I bet you he rationalizes it like it’s just competition. A multibillion dollar company that can hire 10,000 with a snap of a finger vs a million dollar startup. Yup, just competition.
Genuinely curious, what part of the parent comment is "unfairly screwing other people over for his own personal
gain"?
Seems like ordinary business moves to me to buy up competitors. The competitors are paid pretty large sums for their sale so not sure who's being screwed over here.
Google " radicalization by social media "
Normal people can't quit social networks, they are part of iot life. If you can put them aside, you are not normalnby definiton.
Might as well say that cars, computers, television, and clothes are "screwing the consumer over" if your definition is they are part of life and "normal" society can't function without them.
Facebook continues its transformation from a website to a video game. They created React to turn the static web into a real-time experience. They realized the browser isn't meant to be a game engine, so they are developing another "web" called the Metaverse, which is really just a big distributed video game. It will be successful i.e. addict hundreds of millions of people.
If you thought Facebook proper had negative social effects, wait for the Metaverse to fully roll out... "Optimizing" the human experience has its limits.
Google created Alphabet as an umbrella company so that Google search would be isolated legally from all their other non-money making projects. There was no shift in the company mission/focus.
Facebook the company is rebranding to Meta. Unlike Google/Alphabet this move marks a shift in the company focus from Facebook as the company’s main product to developing products for the Metaverse.
The video announcement is extremely wild to me. It is essentially just Zuckerberg talking to you directly for an hour and twenty minutes, with occasional interviews with others. It's like a full-length feature film in both length and production quality, with an emotionless main character and dystopian plot.
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[ 236 ms ] story [ 3021 ms ] threadFacebook who? There's nobody here by that name.
You don't like a company X, you don't use its products, that's it.
Hate is destructive.
Neither a prejudice against “emotions”
They seem to have only gotten worse since then in many ways. And I was an adult when I started using it. I can’t imagine what some of these intrusive social media products are doing to kids.
So I dislike and no longer use Facebook. And also, I do hate it.
I’m usually a pretty positive person and would rarely use the word “hate” in respect of another person. I reserve that word for very few scenarios. But I have to say that in this case it’s perfectly fitting.
Obese? Hate Coca-Cola. Lung cancer? Hate Philip Morris. Broke a leg in car crash? Hate BMW. Depressed? Hate Facebook.
Facebook is just a tool. How you use it, it is your responsibility.
I think you are also being too simplistic and neglecting the complex interactions between personal responsibility and the dependency on the environment we as a culture inhabit and create.
The impact of large corporations optimising consumer behavior is not zero, otherwise they wouldn't spend so much money on it. So those corporations also share partial accountability to the problems they helped create.
The product "facebook" being a tool does not preclude the company "facebook" from accountability.
Yes. Because I like to think I'm living among grown ups, not among children where nanny state is needed.
> Obese? just a lazy fatso.
Not everyone of course (sometimes it is disease), but most obese people are.
It is not necessarily bad. Maybe someone decided they are happy being obese, lazy and enjoy sugar in food, that's their choice and their responsibility.
> The impact of large corporations optimising consumer behavior is not zero, otherwise they wouldn't spend so much money on it.
And grownup adults are responsible to recognize these tricks and don't use it when it harms them.
Same as with Coca-cola, which also does millions of these tricks affecting consumer behavior. I drink Coke occasionally, and partly because of their ads everywhere, otherwise maybe I'd drink more water. But I know when to stop.
I hate to say it, but if your relationship is ruined, it's not Facebook to blame.
It is a core life skill, and based (admittedly entirely) on your posting history here, you lack it completely.
This is not an emotional support forum. If you don’t want to have your relationship discussed, don’t bring it here, that’s it.
The pot calling the kettle black it would seem.
> This is not an emotional support forum.
We are all humans here, and humans have emotions. And we bring those emotions to everything we do. To deny this is extremely naive.
There is nothing to be gained from being disrespectful or cruel to each other. Quite the opposite in fact.
There is. I pointed to a flaw in the argument.
> from being disrespectful or cruel to each other.
I'd say it is disrespectful to bring your own grief as an argument in a rational discussion. Keep your personal life out of discussing technical or political discussions.
> And we bring those emotions to everything we do.
No we don't. At least those of us who have grown up.
Sorry to hear that. I'd prefer to live in society where there's rule of law and basic freedoms, including freedom to conduct business even if I or someone else disagrees with how that business operates.
I wouldn't want to destroy any legal business.
But destroy it? That'd be too much.
Meta could do a bit of that, too.
Sorry that went over your head, I didn't mean to trigger a lecture.
For ordinary people, "WhatsApp is owned by Meta" is going to feel really different from "WhatsApp is owned by Facebook".
It’s probably a smart move on Facebook’s part. Doesn’t stop them being terrible though.
Well, it depends on if they want to keep the Meta name clean from scandals. But I doubt they manage too. It’s a company DNA issue at this point.
I hope (and feel) like the ruse will not work.
WhatsApp and Instagram are much stronger brands, and are not already branded "Facebook WhatsApp" or "WhatsApp by Facebook".
That's not going to change.
Well, the splash screen says "Whatsapp from Facebook", and the description on the Google Play store starts with "WhatsApp from Facebook is a FREE messaging and video calling app."
So, it's out there, even if people haven't changed the way they think.
Disclosure: I worked for WhatsApp until 2019
Google is responsible for alphabets web services. Check out Wikipedia for actual examples like waymo (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphabet_Inc.)
We still think of Alphabet as Google. So while Facebook may effectively become Meta, people will still say "Facebook does X" when they should technically mean "Meta does X".
By contrast, lots of ordinary people interact with WhatsApp and Instagram. It will be/feel different when they're "owned by Meta" vs. "owned by Facebook."
FB's rebrand seems targeted to everyday consumers, so I would bet their brand strategy would change to cater to that, in a way that Google/Alphabet never cared to.
The day facebook went down for some hours, she woke me up complaining "the internet was down"
They tend to do better with PR slight of hand. Maybe because they get it’s all a political boondoggle and SV companies are run by finance wonks.
You still have a point.
"We will continue to make people more miserable, and me wealthier?"
(I like FB groups. It's not all bad. I do believe the company, and their acquisitions, are not good for adolescents psyche, or even most adults up to 40.)
Me, 20 years ago: I wish Dad would try to learn how to use a PC so he could understand what I’m studying.
Me, 10 years ago: I wish Dad would try to learn how to use the Internet so I wouldn’t have to manage increasingly digital regular personal business stuff for him now that Mom’s gone.
Me, today: I am delighted that Dad never took an interest in the online world and will happily serve as a phone to Internet proxy for him the rest of his life, and Snapfish makes good money off me now that I’ve presented my dad with the stereotypical reason his generation started using FB: a grandchild.
even if the technology were here, ultimately the things people enjoy involve reality - eating, vacations, traveling, etc.
I'd go the other extreme actually and make some sort of "superreality"
if you ask a million people "what brings you joy" - the vast majority of the answers will involve spending time with other people in person. video games, social media, etc. only serve as a gateway to reality. a "metaverse" would ultimately be at odds with this.
An example of something that's already here: call of duty. Spending time with others while casually playing is a fun time. It's challenging, requires communication, you shoot the shit, laugh, drink, etc. I already refer to it as plugging in.
Sure I prefer a lake house, or skiing in the mountains, but that's expensive, and not accessible to most. I think too if the environment trends into more chaotic areas you can expect people to spend more time inside, thus more demand for digital experiences.
Your site is losing popularity to a new social media app for phones? Buy that app. Make it basically the same as your version of social media.
Your previously purchased app is losing popularity to an app devoted to ephemeral videos and pictures? Shamelessly copy that app's functionality in every app you own, and even make an exact duplicate app to commodify that feature. Run the competitor into the ground when they refuse to sell to you.
Your collection of almost-the-same-social-media-sites is threatened by a foreign competitor? Lobby for that foreign competitor to be banned from one of the largest single-country markets in the world. That doesn't work? Spread FUD about the foreign competitor's evil. That's doesn't work? Lobby for intense regulation in the social media space to prevent any competitor from ever showing up again.
A series of scandals, leaks, and general scummy profit-seeking behaviour sullies your name even among tech illiterate folks? Change your name so those people can't keep track of what's going on and launder your reputation.
I can't stand Meta. I think Zuckerburg might just be the antichrist (mostly kidding on this one). But I have to hand it to him: he is very savvy at this whole business thing.
Seems like ordinary business moves to me to buy up competitors. The competitors are paid pretty large sums for their sale so not sure who's being screwed over here.
I had to reply because I can't downvote.
They deserve it: they commit the evil for far smaller a payoff.
If you thought Facebook proper had negative social effects, wait for the Metaverse to fully roll out... "Optimizing" the human experience has its limits.
Maybe they had incredible foresight.
Facebook the company is rebranding to Meta. Unlike Google/Alphabet this move marks a shift in the company focus from Facebook as the company’s main product to developing products for the Metaverse.