I recently saw a shorter version of this video played as a commercial at the AMC Surprise Pointe 14 theater in Arizona. It’s the sort of public relations message that a corporation produces as damage control when it sees the potential for serious, perhaps permanent, harm to the company.
My first thought was that a lot of what’s said in the video borders on being patronizing, in particular the Data Science Manager’s chart of The World of False News. But then I decided that these people, who are undoubtedly extremely well paid, are sincerely struggling to figure out what they’re doing.
The catch is that in any company everything comes down from the top, and I do not believe that Mark Zuckerberg has a sincere interest in cleaning up his mess. The only thing that will scare him straight is a mass exodus of users.
Today it’s being reported that Facebook’s secret sharing of user data goes much further than previously revealed. Like the Haight-Ashbury Hippie Movement in San Francisco that started out optimistically with the Human Be-In, only to crash and burn during the strung-out Summer of Love, Facebook has turned into a bad trip.