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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday November 12 2017, @10:06AM   Printer-friendly
from the write-a-strongly-worded-letter dept.

Both takyon and Phoenix666 bring us news of some harsh words that ex-Facebook president Sean Parker has for the company:

Ex-Facebook President Sean Parker Criticizes Facebook

Facebook's first President has sharply criticized the behemoth he helped shape:

Sean Parker, Facebook's first president, had some harsh words about the social network during an interview this week. The tech investor, also a co-founder of Napster and, perhaps most recognizably, the guy played by Justin Timberlake in "The Social Network," said Facebook was designed to exploit the way people fundamentally think and behave.

There have been "unintended consequences," Parker said, now that Facebook has grown to include 2 billion people -- two out of every seven people on the planet. "It literally changes your relationship with society, with each other," he said in published Wednesday night by Axios. "It probably interferes with productivity in weird ways. God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains."

[...] Parker on Wednesday drilled into the addictive nature of Facebook that keeps so many of us coming back. He said it's all by design, because receiving a "like" or a comment on your post gives you a little hit of dopamine. "It's a social-validation feedback loop ... exactly the kind of thing that a hacker like myself would come up with, because you're exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology."

But that didn't matter to people like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, he said. Or Kevin Systrom, founder of Instagram, which Facebook owns. Or even himself. In addition to co-founding Napster in 1999, he started Airtime, a video social network that never gained traction. Now he's the founder and chair of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.

"The inventors, creators ... understood this consciously," he said. "And we did it anyway."

Also at The Verge and Business Insider.

Facebook Founding President Sounds Alarm

Even Facebook doesn't like Facebook?

"God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains."

A view on social media shared not by some uninformed luddite, but by one of the people responsible for building Facebook into the social media titan it is today.

Sean Parker, Facebook's founding president, unloaded his worries and criticisms of the network, saying he had no idea what he was doing at the time of its creation.

Speaking on stage to Mike Allen from Axios, Mr Parker said: "The thought process that went into building these applications, Facebook being the first of them, was all about: 'How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?'"

"That means that we need to sort of give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while, because someone liked or commented on a photo or a post or whatever.


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Gaaark on Sunday November 12 2017, @04:48PM (7 children)

    by Gaaark (41) on Sunday November 12 2017, @04:48PM (#595923) Journal

    "And if you walk around without looking at your phone, you will see just how many people are trapped."

    My wife and I don't have cell phones: it always amazes me how many guys miss the really hot girl walking by because they've got their noses stuck in the damn phone! (When I was young, that was one of the great pleasures in life: standing on the corner, watching all the girls go by.) My wife can't believe the people in restaurants who don't talk to each other because they're on their phones.

    Look up and see the beauty around you, people!
    (DISCLAIMER: by really hot girl, I mean all the nerdy, nerdy girls.)

    --
    --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Sunday November 12 2017, @06:28PM (2 children)

    by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Sunday November 12 2017, @06:28PM (#595960) Journal

    Look up and see the beauty around you, people!

    This sort of reminds me of a pre-Facebook-era anecdote: I remember going to the Vatican museums and walking behind a few American families who were navigating the entire museums while holding up a camcorder and recording. They rarely stopped to notice anything -- one family member might be trying to point out something interesting, but the camera-holder would be bumping into other people and trying to "capture the experience"... rather than actually having an experience.

    At least then the view was still focused on stuff around them. Now, you go to, say, a fine dining restaurant, and you see people taking pictures of their meals with their phones. Okay -- sometimes presentation is cool and even artistic, so take a picture of your dinner if you want. But then, they'll spend several minutes posting that photo on Facebook (or other social media), then checking in every minute to see who "liked" their photo or commented on it. Meanwhile, their $100+ meal is almost the secondary concern... it's not, "Wow! I'm eating a really awesome dinner!" Instead, it's more like, "I gotta show everyone how awesome I am by posting pictures and comments about my food!" Meals used to be social gatherings too, chances to connect through conversation... not anymore for many.

    It's also becoming increasingly difficult to be the person who isn't "always connected." I refuse to participate in Facebook or any other social media; thus I end up left out of a lot of stuff going on with people I know. But perhaps it's for the best, as most of the relationships I care the most about are with people who I can still contact outside of social media. Let the addicts spend their lives getting the "hit" from their "likes"...

    For me, I don't give a crap. Honestly. What the hell do I need validation from a bunch of people I barely know? I don't even give a crap if you mod me down here. I'm just sayin' stuff... you like it? Fine. If you don't, leave a criticism or counterargument if you want. Otherwise, I don't care.

    I guess Facebook is really beginning to show how narcissistic most people are, or maybe insecure and needing external validation for their mundane everyday activities and thoughts. The people I admire most are independent thinkers, and the vast majority of them are not active on platforms like Facebook.

    I would go so far as to say that inability to disconnect from Facebook and your phone would be a deal-breaker in a relationship for me. Studies have shown the value of "being bored" or just sitting and thinking -- if you can't sit and be alone with your thoughts for an hour without your phone, you're probably not going to be as interesting a person to me.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 12 2017, @06:31PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 12 2017, @06:31PM (#595963)

      Eh I don't think it is always narcissism. Humans are social, we like to share our experiences. People who find something amazing don't often share it in order to say "how awesome am I??" Some do, but those can be ignored easily enough.

      • (Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday November 12 2017, @07:36PM

        by frojack (1554) on Sunday November 12 2017, @07:36PM (#595978) Journal

        Eh I don't think it is always narcissism. Humans are social, we like to share our experiences.

        Sharing our experiences IS at heart, narcissism. That you can't see this just shows how taken in by the whole phenomenon you are. It is invariable a form of look at me, see what I do.

        You like to share your experiences, because it builds you up.
        You could care less about Aunt Marge and her best of show at the March of Roses competition. Stupid Marge and her boring Roses.

        You tolerate Marge, because you're so insecure in the world you need someone to validate your existence, so you call it sharing and pretend it is a big happy give and take. But mostly you're in it for the take.

        --
        No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
  • (Score: 2) by turgid on Sunday November 12 2017, @07:41PM (1 child)

    by turgid (4318) Subscriber Badge on Sunday November 12 2017, @07:41PM (#595980) Journal
    • (Score: 5, Funny) by Gaaark on Sunday November 12 2017, @10:05PM

      by Gaaark (41) on Sunday November 12 2017, @10:05PM (#596007) Journal

      Wrong; I'm a nerdy, nerdy old man who was too nerdy/autistic to realise it until he was old, lol. Too nerdy/autistic to talk to females; my wife had to teach me how, although she still wishes I'd talk more.

      I'm not dirty, I just look that way. ;)

      --
      --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 13 2017, @12:36AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 13 2017, @12:36AM (#596022)

    it always amazes me how many guys miss the really hot girl walking by

    STARE RAPE! I hope you lose your job and career for your unabashed sexual harassment!

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Monday November 13 2017, @01:40AM

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Monday November 13 2017, @01:40AM (#596035)

    My wife and I don't have cell phones: it always amazes me how many guys miss the really hot girl walking by because they've got their noses stuck in the damn phone! (When I was young, that was one of the great pleasures in life: standing on the corner, watching all the girls go by.)

    I don't see the problem. What exactly are these guys missing? The chance to be reminded about how they'll never get to date one of those hit girls? They're doing the rational thing: finding something else to absorb their attention so they don't get distracted by pretty things they can't ever have, and helping to avoid depression.

    Plus, it's not like anyone ever meets dating partners that way anyway (that's considered creepy, to hit on people walking by you). Instead, people are turning to online dating apps like Tinder to find dating partners that actually are interested in them, which is far more efficient and also considerate than hitting on women on the street who have no interest in you. This is probably what some fraction of these guys are doing with their phones as they ignore the hot girls walking by.

    I entirely agree with this Parker guy about Facebook, but there's a lot more to using a smartphone than FB. I don't even have FB on my phone.