> In sworn testimony, Zuckerberg said Meta’s growth targets reflect an aim to give users something useful, not addict them, and that the company doesn’t seek to attract children as users.
That’s a perjury.
I suppose getting more ad revenue is useful to someone, but not the user.
Of course some of us warned that project management by A/B testing would lead to amoral if not outright immoral outcomes but wtf do we know about human nature? Turns out putting a badly made android in charge of a large chunk of culture leads to the near collapse of civilization, which I don’t think any of us would have predicted.
The whole article reads like a puff piece for Zuckerberg/meta.
They had him on the stand and these were the most interesting questions and answers? I feel like the WSJ is trying to convince me facebook is a good company trying its best and Zuckerberg is a reasonable empathetic person.
There's an incredible cultural contempt for social media, everyone recognizes the harms, but we collectively spend more and more time on social media apps.
The concept of addiction seems be quite diluted at this point. Does it really make sense to say that, because you're trying to make a product that people like, that this means you're addicting them (intentionally or otherwise) to your product?
Food should not taste good? Books should not be entertaining? Don't try to make your video game fun, or some people may become addicted.
These companies all hired psychologists to help design systems that maximize dopamine release and introduce loops that drive compulsive behavior.
Besides, they aren’t making great products and haven’t for some time. Is anyone happy with Facebook as a product? Does anyone who used Instagram before it became the a shittier TikTok / ultimate ad medium think it’s a better product today?
> Does it really make sense to say that, because you're trying to make a product that people like, that this means you're addicting them (intentionally or otherwise) to your product?
That's not what these companies did though. Their goal has been maximizing engagement and stickiness. Not enjoyment or usefulness. A company operating in good faith delivering a valuable product that serves the consumer should not be lumped in with Meta et al who have been shown on multiple occasions to be abusing psychological techniques to the benefit of their wallets and to the detriment of their users' mental health.
This was the funniest / most evil testimony I’ve seen, in any case, in a while.
Couldn’t find it in a quick skim in this article, but, he testified they don’t care about increasing user engagement (absolute lie, increasing use is goal #1 and there’s always a lead OKR tied to it), and they kept pulling up emails re: it, up to and including 2024.
> The plaintiff is a 20-year-old California woman identified as K.G.M. because she was a minor at the time of her alleged personal injury.
I didn't realize this was literally a single person claiming they were personally injured by literally every major social media company. How does that even work? What laws are purported to have been broken here? I wholeheartedly support some sort of regulatory framework around social media, but this specific case seems like a cash grab. It was already successful too, since Snap and TikTok have settled.
Corporation's lobbyists, or some other circumstances, prevent the establishment of any meaningful regulatory framework that would effectively produce a desired change in the corporation's behaviour
However the threat of thousands of "cash grabs" through private litigation causes the desired change in the corporation's behaviour even in the absence of a regulatory framework
What are the pros and cons
For example, one could argue that the "cash grabs" pose a greater problem than the corporate behaviour that would occur in their absence, or vice versa
I have been snickering at the term "grilled" for years now. All of the aggressive bullshit language being used to retell these accounts is nonsense: NOTHING HAPPENED. Nobody is held accountable, and they just got nagged at in front of class for a bit.
If you asked me, "Hey do you want to make billions of dollars breaking the law, but you might have to sit in front of some cameras every few years and answer fake questions in front of people with dementia?", then I could understand someone thinking that's easy money.
> But you don’t understand. There won’t be any science if he is taxed because then he will leave and take all the money with him.
It's sad how many people truly believe this. Intelligent people, including tech workers, many of which have mistakenly convinced themselves they're not part of the working class.
Reminder that Meta funds the Digital Childhood Alliance[1], an "anti big tech" PAC, consisting of 50 conservative groups that include Moms for Liberty, Focus on the Family and Morality in Media, that pushes age verification and the end of anonymity online[2].
The goal is to use the current moral panic to usher in identity verification systems that collect biometrics just to see or share user-generated content online, which is very convenient for companies like Meta and Anthropic[3] who need mountains of biometric and identifying data to train their systems and monetize users.
The other goal is to force all user-generated content on the internet to go through Meta/Anthropic/OpenAI/etc's AI-powered moderation systems. That means the companies will get to train on the totality of all user-generated content on the internet into perpetuity and get paid to do so.
> According to a study last year by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, the overwhelming majority of American adults have an unfavorable view of Zuckerberg.
> The percentage of adults who view him very favorably is on par with the share who believe the Earth is flat or that aliens live among us.
29 comments
[ 507 ms ] story [ 1395 ms ] threadThat’s a perjury.
I suppose getting more ad revenue is useful to someone, but not the user.
Of course some of us warned that project management by A/B testing would lead to amoral if not outright immoral outcomes but wtf do we know about human nature? Turns out putting a badly made android in charge of a large chunk of culture leads to the near collapse of civilization, which I don’t think any of us would have predicted.
They had him on the stand and these were the most interesting questions and answers? I feel like the WSJ is trying to convince me facebook is a good company trying its best and Zuckerberg is a reasonable empathetic person.
Wat mean?
https://www.wired.com/story/mark-zuckerberg-testifies-social...
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/mark-zucke...
/s
Food should not taste good? Books should not be entertaining? Don't try to make your video game fun, or some people may become addicted.
Besides, they aren’t making great products and haven’t for some time. Is anyone happy with Facebook as a product? Does anyone who used Instagram before it became the a shittier TikTok / ultimate ad medium think it’s a better product today?
That's not what these companies did though. Their goal has been maximizing engagement and stickiness. Not enjoyment or usefulness. A company operating in good faith delivering a valuable product that serves the consumer should not be lumped in with Meta et al who have been shown on multiple occasions to be abusing psychological techniques to the benefit of their wallets and to the detriment of their users' mental health.
Couldn’t find it in a quick skim in this article, but, he testified they don’t care about increasing user engagement (absolute lie, increasing use is goal #1 and there’s always a lead OKR tied to it), and they kept pulling up emails re: it, up to and including 2024.
I didn't realize this was literally a single person claiming they were personally injured by literally every major social media company. How does that even work? What laws are purported to have been broken here? I wholeheartedly support some sort of regulatory framework around social media, but this specific case seems like a cash grab. It was already successful too, since Snap and TikTok have settled.
There is a master complaint and each plaintiff files a short-form complaint
Because the injuries will vary from plaintiff to plaintiff class action will not suffice. This is why each plaintiff must file individually
To learn more: https://www.jpml.uscourts.gov/articles
Here is the master complaint for the personal injury plaintiffs
https://dn710108.ca.archive.org/0/items/gov.uscourts.cand.40...
Here is the short-form complaint for personal injury (for individuals)
https://dn710108.ca.archive.org/0/items/gov.uscourts.cand.40...
Here is the master complaint for the local government/school district plaintiffs
https://dn710108.ca.archive.org/0/items/gov.uscourts.cand.40...
Here is the short-form complaint for public nusiance (for local governments, school districts)
https://dn710108.ca.archive.org/0/items/gov.uscourts.cand.40...
Hypothetical for discussion
Corporation's lobbyists, or some other circumstances, prevent the establishment of any meaningful regulatory framework that would effectively produce a desired change in the corporation's behaviour
However the threat of thousands of "cash grabs" through private litigation causes the desired change in the corporation's behaviour even in the absence of a regulatory framework
What are the pros and cons
For example, one could argue that the "cash grabs" pose a greater problem than the corporate behaviour that would occur in their absence, or vice versa
If you asked me, "Hey do you want to make billions of dollars breaking the law, but you might have to sit in front of some cameras every few years and answer fake questions in front of people with dementia?", then I could understand someone thinking that's easy money.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/mark-zuckerberg-gr...
Text-only, no Javascript, HTTPS optional:
https://assets.msn.com/content/view/v2/Detail/en-in/AA1WBSLI...
Simple HTML:
That’s an impressive amount of arrogance.
He is producing all the value, he doesn’t need anything from other people or the system that made him
It's sad how many people truly believe this. Intelligent people, including tech workers, many of which have mistakenly convinced themselves they're not part of the working class.
The goal is to use the current moral panic to usher in identity verification systems that collect biometrics just to see or share user-generated content online, which is very convenient for companies like Meta and Anthropic[3] who need mountains of biometric and identifying data to train their systems and monetize users.
The other goal is to force all user-generated content on the internet to go through Meta/Anthropic/OpenAI/etc's AI-powered moderation systems. That means the companies will get to train on the totality of all user-generated content on the internet into perpetuity and get paid to do so.
[1] https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2025/07/25/83...
[2] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/opinion-the-child-...
[3] https://x.com/burgessev/status/2021921843192754583
It includes this gem:
> According to a study last year by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, the overwhelming majority of American adults have an unfavorable view of Zuckerberg.
> The percentage of adults who view him very favorably is on par with the share who believe the Earth is flat or that aliens live among us.
(The study is linked from the article: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/02/19/how-ameri... .)