I woke up this morning thinking - it is great to be in a happy state of mind, body, and soul. It is great to say it and actually feel it. To know that I surround Myself with good people and have learned that it is ok to cut ties whether it is My choice or the choice of another. There is no more dwelling - there is only living.

FB
 

9 Horrifying Facts From the Facebook Whistleblower's New 60 Minutes Interview

By Matt Novak, October 3, 2021 11:40PM

You knew Facebook was making the world shittier, but it's so much worse than you realized.

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Ms. Frances Haugen, Facebook Whistleblower

Last week, the Wall Street Journal published internal research from Facebook showing that the social media company knows precisely how toxic its own product is for the people who use it. But tonight, we learned how the Journal obtained those documents: A whistleblower named Frances Haugen, who spoke with CBS News’ 60 Minutes about the ways Facebook is poisoning society.

The 37-year-old whistleblower liberated “tens of thousands” of pages of documents from Facebook and even plans to testify to Congress at some point this week. Haugen has filed at least eight complaints with the SEC alleging that Facebook has lied to shareholders about its own product.

Fundamentally, Haugen alleges there’s a key conflict between what’s good for Facebook and what’s good for society at large. At the end of the day, things that are good for Facebook tend to be bad for the world we live in, according to Haugen. We’ve pulled out some of the most interesting tidbits from Sunday’s interview that highlight this central point.

1) Facebook’s algorithm intentionally shows users things to make them angry

Haugen explained to 60 Minutes how Facebook’s algorithm chooses content that’s likely to make users angry because that causes the most engagement. And user engagement is what Facebook turns into ad dollars.

“Its own research is showing that content that is hateful, that is divisive, that is polarizing, it’s easier to inspire people to anger than it is to other emotions,” Haugen told 60 Minutes.

“Facebook has realized that if they change the algorithm to be safer, people will spend less time on the site, they’ll click on less ads, they’ll make less money,” Haugen continued.

2) Facebook is worse than most other social media companies

Whenever we talk about social media and the ways it’s harmed society, a lot of Big Tech companies get lumped in together, whether it’s Twitter or YouTube or Pinterest. But, according to Haugen, Facebook is uniquely awful.

“I’ve seen a bunch of social networks and it was substantially worse at Facebook than anything I’d seen before,” Haugen told 60 Minutes.

Haugen previously worked at Pinterest and Google, and insists that Facebook really is worse than the rest of Big Tech in substantial ways.

3) Facebook dissolved its Civic Integrity unit after the 2020 election and before the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection

Haugen worked at the so-called Civic Integrity unit of Facebook, in charge of combating political misinformation on the platform. But the social media company seemed to think they were in the clear after the U.S. presidential election in November 2020 and that Civic Integrity could be shut down.

“They told us, ‘We’re dissolving Civic Integrity.’ Like, they basically said, ‘Oh good, we made it through the election. There wasn’t riots. We can get rid of Civic Integrity now.’ Fast forward a couple months, we got the insurrection,” Haugen said.

It’s important to remember that Facebook isn’t just destroying American democracy, it’s chipping away at democratic institutions all around the world.

4) Political parties in Europe ran negative ads because it was the only way to reach people on Facebook

One of the documents Haugen smuggled out of the company shows that political parties in Europe had to start running negative ads to get any engagement on Facebook.

Summarizing the position of political parties in Europe, Haugen explained, “You are forcing us to take positions that we don’t like, that we know are bad for society. We know if we don’t take those positions, we won’t win in the marketplace of social media.”

5) Facebook only identifies a tiny fraction of hate and misinformation on the platform

Facebook’s internal research shows that it identifies roughly; 3-5% of hate on the platform and less than 1% of violence and incitement, according to one of the studies leaked by Haugen. And yet Facebook still considers itself to be the best in the world at identifying hate and incitement on social media.

Facebook takes issue with this characterization, naturally. In fact, the company seems to think the real problem is the internet itself, at least, according to a statement the company sent Gizmodo on Sunday night.

“If any research had identified an exact solution to these complex challenges, the tech industry, governments, and society would have solved them a long time ago,” a spokesperson for Facebook told Gizmodo. “We have a strong track record of using our research — as well as external research and close collaboration with experts and organizations — to inform changes to our apps.”

6) Instagram is making kids miserable

Facebook owns Intagram, and as 60 Minutes points out, the documents leaked by Haugen show that 13.5% of teen girls say Instagram makes thoughts of sucide worse, and 17% say it makes their eating disorders worse.

“What’s super tragic is Facebook’s own research says, as these young women begin to consume this— this eating disorder content, they get more and more depressed. And it actually makes them use the app more. And so, they end up in this feedback cycle where they hate their bodies more and more,” Haugen told 60 Minutes.

And that’s all part of the business model. Facebook is making lots and lots of money from this misery. But Facebook obviously has a different take.

“We do internal research to ask hard questions and find out how we can best improve the experience for teens and we will continue doing this work to improve Instagram and all of our apps. It is not accurate that leaked internal research demonstrates Instagram is ‘toxic’ for teen girls,” Lena Pietsch, Director of Policy Communications, told Gizmodo via email.

“The research actually demonstrated that many teens we heard from feel that using Instagram helps them when they are struggling with the kinds of hard moments and issues teenagers have always faced. This research, like external research on these issues, found teens report having both positive and negative experiences with social media,” Pietsch continued.

7) Employees at Facebook aren’t necessarily evil, they just have perverse incentives

Haugen says that the people who work at Facebook aren’t bad people, which seems like the kind of thing someone who previously worked at Facebook might say.

“No one at Facebook is malevolent, but the incentives are misaligned, right?” Haugen insists. “Like, Facebook makes more money when you consume more content. People enjoy engaging with things that elicit an emotional reaction. And the more anger that they get exposed to, the more they interact and the more they consume.”

And while it’s easy to see why Haugen might believe “no one” at Facebook is malevolent, that’s quite a bold claim at this point. Facebook’s negative impact on society isn’t exactly a secret here in the 2020s.

Again, Facebook doesn’t see it that way.

“Protecting our community is more important than maximizing our profits,” Lena Pietsch told Gizmodo via email Sunday night. “To say we turn a blind eye to feedback ignores these investments, including the 40,000 people working on safety and security at Facebook and our investment of $13 billion since 2016.”

8) Haugen even has empathy for Zuck for some stupid reason

“I have a lot of empathy for Mark. And Mark has never set out to make a hateful platform. But he has allowed choices to be made where the side effects of those choices are that hateful, polarizing content gets more distribution and more reach,” Haugen told 60 Minutes.

But as Haugen herself said, it doesn’t really matter whether Zuckerberg set out to make a hateful platform. In reality, he set out to make a website for rating the hotness of women, but that’s really neither here nor there. What matters is how the platform is being used and abused today.

9) Haugen believes she’s covered by whistleblower laws, but we’ll see

When 60 Minutes talked with Haugen’s lawyer, John Tye, who works with whistleblowers, we heard about how the law protects people who talk with the SEC.

“The Dodd-Frank Act, passed over ten years ago at this point, created an Office of the Whistleblower inside the SEC. And one of the provisions of that law says that no company can prohibit its employees from communicating with the SEC and sharing internal corporate documents with the SEC,” Tye told 60 Minutes.

And while Dodd-Frank hypothetically protects employees talking with the SEC, it doesn’t necessarily protect people talking with journalists and taking thousands of pages of documents. But we’re going to find out pretty quickly just how much protection whistleblowers actually get in the U.S. Historically, let’s just say the answer has been “not much.”

https://gizmodo.com/9-horrifying-fac...new-1847791184

The steps I am taking to become a first time homebuyer. I never thought in a million years I would buy a house. I have always rented - like My whole life. But, after My Mom passed something in Me changed when it came to home ownership. Before I liked the freedom that renting gives you and of course there is the cost benefit as well - no home repairs, etc. The change I believe is that I have finally decided to put roots in the ground - to have something that is Mine - where I have the freedom to decorate the way I want (I cannot even paint an accent wall in My current townhouse) - put a big garden in, and a host of other things.

I hope My Mom is looking down from the Universe and has a smile on her face.

Downy or Hairy
 

There’s a woodpecker or two doing its thing in the neighborhood. The noise isn’t too bad, but it’s causing damage to the wood siding on the condos. I took photos of a hole it left on my condo and will send it to the HOA board. It has beautiful zebra-like markings. I think it’s a Downy or Hairy Woodpecker.

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Pictured: Downy (left) and Hairy (right) Woodpecker. Photo from BirdFeederHub.com

On your mind
 

On my mind? She has been for quite a while now and unfortunately still is.

Coming up with game plan for the day. I want to take it slow, call J and cancel in advance for Monday, but we've spoken about that. She cancels, reschedules a lot but it's different when I do it. Well since the good outweighs the bad I'm biting my tongue and forcing myself to follow through. I think I'll be able to get the last little bit of everything done before then if I execute it right.

Whats on your mind.
 

Thinking back on all the wonderful Thanksgiving meals we spent around the family table together and looking out the window from my desk and wondering where it all went so soon. Its a lonely day.

My sweet tooth is acting up. Think it’s time to make a keto lemon pound cake with cream cheese icing. Wish I had some berries but I don’t.

My family is a little annoyed because I won’t see them during the holidays, but I’m sticking to my guns.

I bought more soap yesterday. Just couldn’t resist. Caswell Massey triple-milled collection.

Everyone is getting the 1619 Project book as a gift from me. Even the little ones. I imagine most will not be excited. Oh well.

Orema's soap collection. More soap! You need a 12 Step program around that or a museum or something... just kidding. I LOVE Caswell Massey soap and if I had enough money I'd be addicted too.

Goodness. You don’t know the half of it, FSF! LOL

Luckily, I don’t like some other things as much as nice bar soap. Yes, lucky me.

:)

On Your Mind
 

Here have all the members gone?

EXCELLENT question Stone! I'd like to know too

We are headed to our beach house for Christmas and while it's good to get away and take in some ocean air and hear the tides nearby, we worry about what is in store for us during the next coming year.


We are wishing everyone a season of joy; and that life will be kind to all of us, in the coming months ahead.


:balloon:

~~

The leftovers of that Cloverleaf pizza in the refrigerator!

I want for the year to end and to see how it'll go not in a festive mood still wish you the best though

How great kids are with their wonderful unconditional love that isn't based on monetary things. My grandsons don't love me because I give them stuff. No they just love me because I'm there for them, they feel safe with me and enjoy the time we spend together. Tonight when we got to my son's place my youngest grandson didn't want to go upstairs and play with the pile of new toys he'd just scored or where the boat ton of food and treats were. He just wanted to stay downstairs, sit on my lap, watch a children's Christmas program with me and cuddle. Latter when his uncles arrived and said they'd watch him and I gave him a choice, finish the movie with them or come upstairs with me. He turned around, paused, gave the television a look then decided nope he wanted to go upstairs with grandma. That felt so good. Upstairs three different people reached out to hold him and he was having none of it. He reached out his arms, kicked to try and wiggle free and cried for me to hold him.

Everyone spoils him, his cousins too much. My older grandsons go to their room, I swear its ankle deep in toys when they don't make them pick up. My oldest and J aren't quite as bad but still, no child who isn't even two years old yet needs all that stuff. I refuse to buy them any presents – clothes, food, toys nothing like that. I'm buying them savings bonds and spending time with them. I think it works. I can't wait for the weather to get warm they really like hanging outside with me, studying plants, insects, rocks, wood. Picking berries, watching planes, cars and trucks go by. Stroller, scooter, bike rides and walks to the park. Until then we build Legos and color and scribble, read books, clean house together and do so much more indoors. Anyhow I was just thinking about how much fun we had today. I know enjoy it now while it lasts because sooner than I'd like they'll be teenagers rolling their eyes at lame ass grandma wanting to be left alone but for now it feels really nice :)

My upcoming surgery and how things went from a simple outpatient surgery to being required to be admitted for several days because my blood work came back bad. I'm not a happy camper.

Today, I go back to the Endocrinologist. The last time I went (5mos. kept putting off), my renal status was Stage 3 failure. Afraid that I'm going toward dialysis which is Stage 5. In the last appt., she asked me if I would want dialysis or palliative care. I was too shocked that I didn't ask, "well what about a donor's kidney." My brother died of renal failure in his early 60s, I am 62. Today, I will ask though not sure I want to learn the answer.

I have latent onset type 1 diabetes. She tells me (based on history) that I probably have been diabetic since childhood. Wondered why I ate candy corn about half a pound daily and failed HS algebra which was my after-lunch class, which was slept through when I had a burger and chocolate milkshake. Almost daily I had that and a salad.

Back when I was younger, and in Indiana, people didn't do labwork on children as a rule unless one is very ill. I was a sickly child, but my 2 times each Winter illnesses were cured by Penicillin shots. A bit angry about not finding out about my diabetes until age 36, I probably wouldn't have had my heart attack if I knew to make some changes. I loved candy and other sugary treats as they gave me a buzz. Didn't know I was harming myself. Sheesh, the first time I had a Coca-cola (also in my 30s), thought I had found Nirvana.