[HN Gopher] Meta executives 'inadvertently' identified in OnlyFa... ___________________________________________________________________ Meta executives 'inadvertently' identified in OnlyFans bribery suit Author : perihelions Score : 300 points Date : 2022-10-13 06:50 UTC (16 hours ago) (HTM) web link (gizmodo.com) (TXT) w3m dump (gizmodo.com) | cm42 wrote: | hi hello yes i was told these databases were only going to be | used for Stopping The Terrorists(tm), Saving The Children(tm), | and/or Stopping The Spread(tm) | | a bunch of surveillance state simps in a comments section called | me naive and said it's against the law to use a product in a | manner other than directed, so this could never possibly happen | | nobody ever could have predicted this [specific series of events | and actors] | | i guess this is what they mean by a black swan event | | v strange. such tragic. | | statue of liberty weeping again | jt2190 wrote: | > ... these databases... | | Can you clarify? From the article it sounds like this is some | kind of "blacklist" database (sort of like a "known spammers" | list) that is somehow is used in the industry to deny traffic | to certain domains. Is it a government database? | | Edit: It sounds like these databases are owned/maintained by | Meta: | | > If anything, plaintiffs allege that these John Does went | rogue by manipulating and corrupting automated processes and | databases that Meta had established for purposes of combating | terrorism, deploying those methods to attack competitors of an | adult-entertainment company, and then 'attempt[ing] to cover | their tracks' to ensure Meta could not learn of their aberrant | behavior," Meta's motion says. | | Meta further argued that, even if true, any decisions to | penalize OnlyFans' competitors would have been protected by the | company's First Amendment rights, and the limited liability | protections offered by Section 320 of the Communications | Decency Act | seibelj wrote: | cm42 wrote: | I blame it on the Tumblr ban, which effectively did to the | internet what Regan did to mental hospitals. | | It's laughably easy to get any given furry porn connoisseur | to call you a bunch of names simply by agreeing with them | (but not using the approved buzzwords), betraying their | borrowed knowledge and shallow understanding of basically | every part of any given problem. | | I have nothing but contempt for the class of people who have | pivoted to the "I'd rather be kind than correct" schtick | after being neither kind nor correct, which are the type to | "like" a false (but feel-good) response to a true (but | unpopular) statement, as if Truth is decided by ratio. | | Maybe that's what they teach in this Basic Science Class | everyone seems to have taken - I wouldn't know - I guess I | was in the Advanced Science Class. -\\_(tsu)_/- | [deleted] | [deleted] | [deleted] | eptcyka wrote: | What business incentive did Facebook have to hire Nick Clegg? | DrBazza wrote: | Political influence and knowledge of the UK system. | | It's a well trodden path. Credit Suisse paid almost a million | for ex-PM John Major to work 'part time' for them after he left | government. | thinkingemote wrote: | Political knowledge, useful for lobbying and all sorts of other | stuff. | | He was inside the cabinet after all. | revolutukr wrote: | He knows where the bodies are buried, how to bribe politicians, | and which ones to bribe. | gadders wrote: | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture | stephc_int13 wrote: | The fish rots from the head. | | What it means is that whenever an organization is corrupt, it | should be considered to be the responsibility of the top | management. | | Corruption itself is a symptom. | spywaregorilla wrote: | Are you claiming it is impossible for an individual to be | corrupt if their CEO is not? | | edit: correct->corrupt | retrocat wrote: | I don't think that's what they're claiming at all. I think | what they're claiming is that it's far easier for individuals | to be corrupt if their CEO is similarly corrupt, which is a | completely different claim. | stephc_int13 wrote: | No. | | Unhealthy organizations do not become unhealthy because of a | few rotten apples, but because of mismanagement. | yaseer wrote: | Political flamewars are Off-Topic on HN, but I have a feeling | there's very few Nick Clegg fans amongst HN's UK readership. | | Out of curiosity though, does anybody here have a positive take | on Nick Clegg? | | I'm interested in your take, not interested in arguing. | mft_ wrote: | Not hugely positive, but I had some sympathy for him once upon | a time: I suspect he was a well-meaning but not especially | strong leader of his party, who went into the coalition with | mostly good intent. Once there, mind, I'm not sure why he | didn't fight harder, and he lost all of the goodwill he'd built | up during the election campaign through some of the policies | that the coalition enacted. | | I appreciate he'll have made an absolute boatload of money, but | going to Facebook seemed a very odd choice. Or maybe he judged | that his public profile couldn't be saved, and cashing in in | the US was his best option? | ColinHayhurst wrote: | Why odd? He falls as Deputy PM of 67m in the disUnited | Kingdom, takes a payrise and more importantly rises to be | Deputy Emperor of ~3bn in the World Wide Wall. | mft_ wrote: | Odd because I would have thought he'd be able to see how | badly working for Facebook would ultimately reflect on him, | and I would have thought he'd have more pride in his image. | I'd have expected to see him pop up in some well-meaning | public role that could lead to some image rehabilitation, | rather than doubling down. | | But as said, maybe he judged that his image was already | beyond repair, so at least he could get rich instead. | jimduk wrote: | Agree with this. The Lib Dems had an existential crisis at | that time (2010) as Labour and the Conservatives were both | fighting for the centre ground and it seemed that would | become the norm (deeply ironic given Corbyn, Brexit and Truss | later). | | So Clegg rolled the dice on getting proportional | representation rather than first past the post to solve this | and lost. He also had a go at being less of an opposition | party (where you oppose) and more of a coalition party like | in Europe to get things done (post the financial crisis). | This failed. | | Everyone hates him for tuition fees, but apparently George | Osborne told him to vote against the huge raise. Had this | happened I doubt people would remember him with the malice | they do. | | Finally, he always seemed an ethical person (Lib Dems usually | are excepting local election shenanigans), so the charges | seem odd and out of character, but so did the move to | facebook. | specialist wrote: | I don't have a dog in this fight. | | > _apparently George Osborne told him to vote against_ | | Ha, the Conservative coaching the Lib Dem how to be a Lib | Dem. That's a good friend. | | As others have commented, opposition parties have to | oppose. | | Further, #1 job of party leader is to build the party. | Especially for an upstart. That playbook includes symbolic | defeats. To show everyone what you stand for. | benmmurphy wrote: | It could be that his ethics have been compromised by his | wife. She was part of the Acciona scandal in Spain | (https://www.theolivepress.es/spain-news/2014/10/18/uk- | deputy...) | lambertsimnel wrote: | That's a reasonable take, except | | > So Clegg rolled the dice on getting proportional | representation rather than first past the post to solve | this and lost. | | Clegg compromised on a referendum on the "Alternative Vote" | (i.e. what Americans call "Instant Run-off Voting" and | Australians call "Majority Preferential Voting"). | Alternative Vote isn't proportional or even semi- | proportional. I think he considered it a worthwhile | compromise: | | 1) on the grounds that it's a form of Single Transferable | Vote (which also has proportional forms), and | | 2) on the assumption it would increase votes for smaller | parties and hinder the major parties from forming | governments in the face of opposition by a majority of | voters (the received wisdom being that there was a block of | like-minded centrist and left-of-centre voters that was | inefficiently divided between Labour, the Lib Dems and | others, to the advantage of the Conservatives - but Clegg's | deal took place after more than a decade of Labour's votes | having unusually been the most efficient, and Clegg was | considered part of the Lib Dems' "Orange Book" faction | which was less friendly to Labour and the left than Lib | Dems typically are). | pessimizer wrote: | I'd bet that there would be more Clegg supporters here than in | most places. The Liberals are basically EuroTories, and Clegg | the version of Blair that had a Dutch mother. Sort of the | perfect social liberal fiscal conservative paneuropean. | | edit: He also sold out his professed ideals for personal | financial success, so he makes other people feel better for | also doing that. | zarzavat wrote: | > Out of curiosity though, does anybody here have a positive | take on Nick Clegg? | | Clegg is as close you'll find to a neutral politician. He | doesn't seek to do good, nor does he seek to do evil. He is | simply out to increase his own power, and apparently wealth | too. | | Yes he plunged an entire generation of students into debt, but | he didn't do so maliciously. They were simply in the way. | Moissanite wrote: | DrBazza wrote: | In terms of personality he seemed pretty decent and | professional. | | Perhaps it's just rose-tinted lenses, but as every year | advances, the current crop of politicians in all parties just | seem to be worse, and more childish than the previous lot. And | that's a hard act to follow. Yet here we are. | umeshunni wrote: | > but as every year advances, the current crop of politicians | in all parties just seem to be worse | | Or you're just getting wiser. | yaseer wrote: | Yes, I had several issues with Blair, Brown and Cameron for | different reasons, but it seems like both parties have | produced a strikingly poor crop of leaders ever since that | generation holding the 'centre ground'. | nelsonic wrote: | Most of the comments in this thread relate to LibDems rolling | over on university tuition fees. Are there any focussed on the | actual topic which is Clegg accepting a Bribe? | ZeroGravitas wrote: | The actual topic is his name being attached to a claim that | OnlyFans bribed him (and others at Facebook). | | It doesn't really add up to me, but I don't know how these high | level bribes work in practice. I would have thought big | business would have a smoother routine worked out than | transferring money to accounts in people names. | | But I find it odd that the perfectly reasonable claim by Meta, | "why are you suing us if it was OnlyFans who bribed our | employees to do something that benefits OnlyFans but not us" | gets spun as being further proof that Meta was up to something. | | I'm happy to believe Meta are up to something scummy but this | all feels a bit random. | jandrese wrote: | Accepting bribes to shut down accounts linked to a particular | company's competitors seems plenty scummy to me. | bena wrote: | From what I understand: | | Meta has Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and others. | | When Meta tells law enforcement that user | xxxBobTerrorist69xxx is a terrorist based on information they | have from their apps, law enforcement listens. They can also | ban that person from all of their platforms. These platforms | are used by content creators for findability, just like any | business. | | If the only place you can advertise is your own platform, how | are you going to draw people to your platform. | | The plaintiffs are arguing that OnlyFans used connections to | Meta executives to then have them use their position to lock | creators on competing platforms out of important advertising | platforms. | | So far, it seems like Meta itself isn't the issue here, it's | people who work for Meta. Which is a little hair-splitty | considering some of the people involved. But if Rob Walton is | caught snorting coke off of a hooker's ass, we don't say | "WalMart" is doing it. | LeifCarrotson wrote: | It appears that the mods have compiled several threads on the | topic into a single HN post, merging comments below ArsTechnica | and Gizmodo (and possibly other) articles on the same topics, | which confuses some of the discussion. Yes, there are some | which are focused on the actual topic - note that it's an | anonymous tip alleging a bribe as part of a lawsuit, not | irrefutable proof/actual confession/final conviction. | neilv wrote: | > _alleged Meta employees added their accounts and others linked | to OnlyFans competitors to databases used by companies | internationally to identify malware and accounts linked to | terrorism._ | | If this is true, I'd guess the situation might not only include | issues of bribery, a quasi-public platform silencing speech, | interfering with commerce, etc. | | It sounds like it might include abusing/compromising/eroding | mechanisms intended for protecting people against violent | attacks, as well as other aspects of national security. | tradertef wrote: | >> it might include abusing/compromising/eroding mechanisms | intended for protecting people against violent attacks, as well | as other aspects of national security. | | who would have thought that could happen.. | Consultant32452 wrote: | This seems like clear defamation. Facebook told lies about | their users to other organizations which resulted in financial | losses. Of course, IANAL, but it's super fucked. | _rm wrote: | It's probably not news that politicians aren't good upstanding | people. | | It is nevertheless surprising that every 4 years everyone gets | riled up in favor of one of them. | | The message "the only winning move is not to play" gets drowned | out by their megaphones I guess. | thesaintlives wrote: | Honest Nick? Surely not! | lostlogin wrote: | Story time? | sneak wrote: | The problem here is platform-based censorship. | | Corruption in the system is just a symptom of the root problem of | Meta/Instagram getting to decide what you are not allowed to see. | [deleted] | tibbydudeza wrote: | Once a politician - always a politician - it was "consulting" | fees. | gw99 wrote: | Send in more lawyers! | LeifCarrotson wrote: | Source filing: | | https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23131224-76-main#doc... | | Page 10, lines 26 and 27 say the names are Nick Clegg, Nicola | Mendelsohn, and Cristian Perrella. | | To be clear, this is a motion from OnlyFans lawyers, and they're | trying to communicate that the anonymous tip should not be | considered reliable information. Not even the plaintiffs are | claiming to have evidence of a demand to go with the bribe. But I | expect it should be enough to subpoena the financial records that | could prove that the information is true. | pictiPig wrote: | I'm surprised nobody had linked to this yet.. the I'm sorry song | | https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KUDjRZ30SNo | vixen99 wrote: | Nick Clegg is a former Liberal Democrat who became deputy Prime | Minister in a coalition with the Conservative Party in 2010. | Following this, his Liberal Democrat party lost 49 of its 57 | seats at the next election. He subsequently got a job with | Facebook. | Arnt wrote: | Oh, it's the same Nick Clegg? Do you have any idea why he | didn't insist on a new electoral system when he had the chance, | even if it meant sacrificing everything else? | SideburnsOfDoom wrote: | They tried and failed in 2011 | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alternativ. | .. | thinkingemote wrote: | He did insist! The country had a referendum after he got in. | It was one of the main pre-conditions for the coalition. | | He did sacrifice everything because of that too! (Ref lost, | low if not the lowest ever turnout, party lost huge support | generally and he exited politics failed) | ljf wrote: | He/the Lib Dems weren't pushing for a referendum though - | that wasn't part of their manifesto was it? | rogual wrote: | He got his referendum, but the Tories promptly ran ads | saying proportional representation would hurt babies [1] | and it didn't pass. | | [1] https://eu-browse.startpage.com/av/anon- | image?piurl=https%3A... | gpderetta wrote: | That's almost as bad as the Brexit busses! | ZeroGravitas wrote: | Same guy ran the two campaigns. | mijoharas wrote: | That link is dead for me. Do you have any more | information on that? (I've not heard of this). | mijoharas wrote: | never mind, took a bit of googling, but I found some info | on it.[0] | | Christ that's in bad taste. | | EDIT: wanted to add this quote from [1]: "On 5 May, David | Blunkett, one of the Labour Party former-government | ministers who had supported the 'No' campaign, admitted | that the PS250 million figure used by the 'No' campaign | had been fabricated, and that the 'No' campaign had | knowingly lied about the figure and other claims during | the campaign." | | So it does seem like it was a testing ground for the | brexit busses. Just make a bunch of stuff up. | | [0] | https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/feb/25/no- | to-... | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_United_Kingdom_Alt | ernativ... | rogual wrote: | Ack, sorry, I'm from a time when you used to be able to | just link to things on the Internet. That is indeed the | ad I meant. | | There were a couple of others where the proportional | representation would hurt a soldier or an old lady | instead. | | I remember feeling like I had learned a little bit about | how the world worked, seeing that campaign succeed. | Arnt wrote: | My question has been answered, but somehow I cannot find | a way to feel satisfied. Rather... oh god no, say it's | not true, _please say it 's not true_ and yes I do | realise it's true. | denton-scratch wrote: | All political careers end in failure. | SideburnsOfDoom wrote: | > Nick Clegg .. became deputy Prime Minister in a coalition | with the Conservative Party in 2010. | | He has fallen a long way since then. It's a remarkable descent. | vmilner wrote: | The traditional destination for spectacular Uk political | falls (EU Commissioner) has been blocked. | jen20 wrote: | When Clegg left office, however, it had not. | vmilner wrote: | Well, he lost his parliamentary seat in 2017, post- | referendum, and there were no new UK commissioners | created after that (Julian King was appointed in 2016 and | was the final one.) | pjc50 wrote: | He's probably paid a great deal more as Facebook VP and has a | less stressful job which doesn't involve dealing with the | press or public nearly as much. Looks like an ascent to me. | revolutukr wrote: | LatteLazy wrote: | Many people here in the UK view his whole time in government as | one big defacto bribe... | gw99 wrote: | This is probably the most unsurprising thing I've heard all year. | boomboomsubban wrote: | If Onlyfans claim his name was only released as a mistake, does | that mean this trial could have happened with nobody new learning | that Clegg allegedly accepted a bribe? How does that make sense? | Was he only supposed to face internal punishment for accepting a | bribe? As if that's the case, his promotion in February is pretty | sketchy. | jandrese wrote: | He was finding additional revenue streams for the company, a | promotion was of course in order. Legal liability is a concern | for the next guy. | rossdavidh wrote: | ...not if he pocketed the money himself, he wasn't. | callumw13 wrote: | The man who got his party to government off the back of promising | to abolish tuition fees, then immediately tripled tuition fees | landing an entire generation with massive debt has questionable | character. Who'd've thunk it? | rvieira wrote: | Not excusing his role on this, but for a better appreciation of | the coalition dynamics I recommend "The Thick of It" series 4. | jen20 wrote: | I really hope they do another season covering the last year | or two of British politics. One of the best shows ever made. | mjfisher wrote: | How could they? It would be indistinguishable from a | documentary at this point. | jen20 wrote: | It always was - that's the beauty of it. | Oarch wrote: | I briefly met Nick Clegg at a private event once. My first | impression was that he was surprisingly posh for a 'man of the | people'. Big Oxford energy. | reducesuffering wrote: | No "man of the people" moves to Atherton, CA. | | https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/inside-nick- | cleggs-7mi... | chrisseaton wrote: | > Big Oxford energy. | | He was Cambridge. | pessimizer wrote: | Big Oxbridge energy. | mijoharas wrote: | Shhh! Don't tell people that. Oxford can have him. | Oarch wrote: | I was more describing the energy. | chriswarbo wrote: | As a junior part of a coalition, they could only get through a | few policies. The media put a lot of focus on tuition fees, but | they weren't high up the Lib Dem agenda (e.g. the first mention | in their manifesto[0] was on page 33). | | In contrast, the Lib Dems _did_ manage to pass same-sex | marriage (frustratingly, many seem to credit the Tories or | Cameron for this despite a majority of Tories voting against it | at both readings[1]). | | The Lib Dems also managed to block the Digital Economy Bill, | AKA the "Snoopers Charter" (the Tories later passed it, once | they got a majority in parliament). | | The Lib Dem's top priority has always been voting reform, and | Clegg seemed to gamble away far too much in an attempt to get | it. All they managed was a referendum on a watered-down AV | system (AFAIK the Lib Dems want STV, as used by Northern | Ireland); which was heavily campaigned against by both Labour | and Tories, and failed spectacularly :( | | [0] https://general-election-2010.co.uk/2010-general-election- | ma... | | [1] | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marriage_(Same_Sex_Couples)_Ac... | gadders wrote: | I think the Lib Dems rapidly found the difference between | being in permanent opposition and being able to promise what | they like, and being in government where hard choices need to | be made. | rwmj wrote: | That's the story of Brexit too. | anonymous_sorry wrote: | I also used to argue that it was unfair to criticise the Lib | Dems too harshly over tuition fees, because they hadn't won | the election, and as the junior partner in a coalition | obviously had to compromise on parts of their manifesto. | Reasonable people could perhaps disagree on how hard they | should have negotiated with the Conservatives on that point. | | Then someone pointed out to me the tuition fee thing wasn't | just a manifesto policy. Every Lib Dem candidate in that | election had (at the direction of the campaigns department) | signed a personal pledge to vote against a rise in tuition | fees during the next parliament. Most of them broke that | pledge in pretty spectacular fashion (at the direction of | party leadership). | | I didn't really have an answer to that, and still don't. | | [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_for_Students_pledge | dangerface wrote: | > The media put a lot of focus on tuition fees, but they | weren't high up the Lib Dem agenda | | Lib Dems target students and young people who are generally | more liberal, their main selling point to them was tuition | fees. Young people got them to government and they | immediately turned on their voters. | pjc50 wrote: | I would accept not being able to abolish tuition fees, but | having a three-line whip imposed to vote to _increase them_ | after making a "personal pledge"? No, that was definitely | wrong. The Lib Dem party should have revolted at that point | and fees should have been left at their level. | | Agreeing to a referendum on the voting system _without_ | securing agreement that the Tories would not campaign against | it was also incredibly tactically stupid. | | The coalition negotiations were _far_ too quick and cheap. It | should have been over a few weeks rather than a couple of | days. Anyway, the public punished the Lib Dems by re- | relegating them to minor party status. | scott_w wrote: | > I would accept not being able to abolish tuition fees, | but having a three-line whip imposed to vote to increase | them after making a "personal pledge"? | | This was key for me that turned it from being the | unfortunate reality of politics into a serious breach of | trust. I remember saying at the time that I'd have accepted | keeping fees but tripling them was like slapping your | voters in the face. | | I understand they were stitched up by the Tories: the | budget gutted university funding, meaning the choice was | increase fees or watch higher education collapse. That | being said, they needed to find another way. | | From a strategic perspective, too, it was the biggest cause | of their 2015 annihilation. Their entire message of "we'll | moderate the Tories" had the ready response of "you mean | like tuition fees?" | ajb wrote: | I always assumed that the LDs planned to stay in coalition | for a few years, then exit over some point of principle, | restoring their reputation as an independent party. Failing | to do that seems like a clear mistake on their part, in | hindsight. A lot of things could have been different now if | they had made that move in 2014 or so. | pydry wrote: | >Failing to do that seems like a clear mistake | | It wasnt any more a mistake than the decision to take a | bribe was a mistake. | corney91 wrote: | Maybe with hindsight, but their main policy was/is | electoral reform which would end up with more coalitions. | They needed to prove coalitions can work. Funnily enough, | I'd argue they managed to do that after seeing the | governments FPTP has given us since the 2015 election. | LatteLazy wrote: | >In contrast, the Lib Dems did manage to pass same-sex | marriage | | It's my pet peeve when people claim this. | | The UK already had same sex marriage, it was just not called | marriage. Labour brought that in. The bill you refer to just | renamed it, plus it gave religious orgs a get out from | equalities legislation and tidied up non-same-sex marriage | rules. | | And the only reason it passed was because of Labour. The | majority of Tories voted against their own parties bill. And | 10% of Lib dems did too. | | Like so many of Clegg's achievements, it was a triumph of | (false and misleading) advertising over substance... | | In exchange for not supporting a bill that didn't really do | what was claimed, the tories got total support for all of | their economic and social policies. | chriswarbo wrote: | > The UK already had same sex marriage, it was just not | called marriage. | | Sure, but marriage isn't just about legals/financials. | Socially/culturally, civil partnerships are a "runner up | prize" compared to marriage; e.g. the recent extension of | civil partnership to opposite-sex couples didn't get much | fanfare. | | In any case, I was specifically referring to the 2013 act, | rather than the broader notion of | marriage/partnerships/etc. It's the inconsistency which | frustrates me, to see people thanking Cameron/Tories for | delivering same-sex marriage (i.e. the 2013 act) in one | breath, and blaming Clegg/LibDems for delivering tuition | rises in the next. | | > And the only reason it passed was because of Labour | | Absolutely. The LibDems couldn't do much to swing votes | themselves; hence the back-room negotiations, whips, etc. | | > And 10% of Lib dems did too. | | True, but that's still just 4 MPs; so I'm not sure it's too | statistically insightful. Still disappointing considering | the whole point of liberal philosophy is personal freedom | (unfortunately some like to interpret "personal" as "the | corporation I own/represent", and "freedom" to include | freedom to pollute, freedom to choose my own health & | safety levels, etc.) | | > In exchange for not supporting a bill that didn't really | do what was claimed, the tories got total support for all | of their economic and social policies. | | To be clear, the bill which did that would be the AV | referendum (which LibDems most cared about). Also, some | Tory policies were blocked by the LibDems, e.g. the Digital | Economy Bill. | nicoburns wrote: | It might not have been high up their agenda, but it was high | up their campaign material and was a major reason why they | won so many seats. It's also worth noting that they | positioned themselves to left of Labour in that election | campaign, and that as "kingmakers" they had the option of | forming a coalition with Labour which would have allowed them | to have gotten a lot more of their manifesto passed. | moomin wrote: | I am 100% not a fan of the LibTory years, but LabTory would | have been a minority government. At the very least this | would have been difficult to pull off. | hardlianotion wrote: | You mean LibLab, I'm guessing. | moomin wrote: | Yeah, too late to edit now... | chrisseaton wrote: | A collation of Labour and Tory would have been bizarre - | why would they have done that? | HPsquared wrote: | They'd be pretty much impossible to vote out, I suppose. | moomin wrote: | Whilst unthinkable at a national level right now, it has | happened before and is happening in Scottish councils | with nods and winks. | smcl wrote: | It might not have been high up in their agenda, but it _was_ | still there and every single Lib Dem MP signed the Vote for | Students pledge | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_for_Students_pledge) in | support of it. So no matter what the outcome was, | _generations_ of students have incurred fairly ridiculous | levels of debt as a result and many hold the Lib Dems | responsible and feel betrayed. They may have been powerless | to stop it, or they may have been ineffective - but the | damage is done either way | sideshowb wrote: | It was a coalition, though, and whatever he betrayed for that, | you could argue he might have prevented the Tories from running | an even worse government than they did during those years. | Given what's happened afterwards, the evidence would be on your | side. | | For all that, I think he made a serious mistake going into | coalition with the Tories when he could equally well (going on | election results) have done so with Labour (plus possibly SNP I | forget), whose policies I thought should have better aligned | with Lib Dem. | | But I'm assuming the best of intent here, and will continue to | do so until proven otherwise, so this case is an interesting | development. | rjsw wrote: | There were not the numbers of MPs to be able to form a | coalition with Labour, a better solution could have been to | just support the Tories with a confidence and supply [1] | agreement. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confidence_and_supply | cjrp wrote: | How well has that worked out for the DUP though? | lambertsimnel wrote: | I get the impression Clegg was concerned about any Prime | Minister (whether put in place by a coalition, by a | confidence and supply deal, or as head of a minority | government) calling an early election just as soon as polls | indicated it would be to their advantage. Partisan | elections being a zero-sum game, that would be to the | disadvantage of other parties, likely disproportionately | including the junior party of any deal. This was before the | Fixed-Term Parliament Act, and some of Clegg's energy, | attention and political capital went into that act, rather | than into electoral reform, tuition fees, etc. | thorin wrote: | From what I remember due to the figures if he'd gone with | Labour it would have been a massively rainbow coalition. I | think he got conned by the superior sliming skills of some of | the tories and saw a bit of power, then messed up. He went | all out to try for proportional representation giving up all | other policies and then the tories were able to market that | as looking so bad or just uninteresting that the majority | either didn't understand the vote or didn't care, so it lost. | kennyadam wrote: | There's an interesting article from the time here: https:// | www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/domestic_pol... | [deleted] | talldan wrote: | Clegg voted for raising tuition fees, in direct contradiction | to the pledges. It was a betrayal and one that's on public | record. | | Cameron was a disaster. Austerity was incredibly cruel on the | poorest of the population, and the UK wasn't exactly a | shining light in its recovery from the financial crisis. He | led a weak remain campaign and then stepped aside as soon as | Brexit became difficult, and the following governments have | had to deal with his mess, the covid outbreak and the effects | of the war in Ukraine. | | So I think you could equally say that the coalition is a root | cause of many of the issues of today. That and the lack of | any credible opposition for years. | lambertsimnel wrote: | > Cameron was a disaster. Austerity was incredibly cruel on | the poorest of the population, and the UK wasn't exactly a | shining light in its recovery from the financial crisis. | | Although austerity did indeed start under the coalition (so | it has the Lib Dems' fingerprints on it), didn't much of | what many dislike about Cameron's premiership stem from | after the end of the coalition? | | > He led a weak remain campaign and then stepped aside as | soon as Brexit became difficult, and the following | governments have had to deal with his mess | | He was rumoured to have campaigned in the 2015 general | election on the assumption he'd renew the coalition with | the Lib Dems, who would block the EU referendum he'd | promised his voters, and who he could continue using as a | human shield. But the backlash against the Lib Dems after | just one term of coalition with him was so severe that he | had to lead a single-party majority government and uphold | his negotiating position as if it were a plan for | government. | specialist wrote: | I don't have a dog in this fight. For other lurkers like | me, here's some background: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Clegg#Tuition_fees | LightG wrote: | As someone in the UK, this is mildly amusing. | amadeuspagel wrote: | Facebook has to hire well-connected former politicians and | operatives, basically to bribe them, and these then take bribes | from others as well. But what is facebook supposed to do here? | Hire these people and not give them any responsibility, thereby | making it a transparent bribe? | [deleted] | onionisafruit wrote: | That is the fun part. OnlyFans is doing to Facebook what | Facebook is doing to governments. The fact that the same person | is involved in both really puts the point on it. | | As for what they could have done instead, they could have gone | the more traditional route and hired him as a consultant who | attends a few offsite gatherings and maybe writes a policy memo | for them if he's feeling ambitious. | orhmeh09 wrote: | Not hire them in the first place. It doesn't have to hire them | and I'm not sure why anyone would think so. | hardlianotion wrote: | I don't have a candle for Nick Clegg, but I think he was hard | done by on the student fee issue and the accusation seems | implausible to me. | mijoharas wrote: | Why do you think he was hard done by on the student fee issue? | | * In his manifesto he said he'd scrap tuition fees. | | * He signed a _personal_ pledge against voting to raise | them.[0] | | * People voted for him with this information. | | * He was able to gain power through a coalition government. | | * He voted to _raise_ tuition fees. | | You can see how people could feel betrayed by him[1]. I | wouldn't say he was hard done by, and I think condemnation of | that behaviour is a rational response. | | [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_for_Students_pledge | | [1] ...the percentage of students supporting the Liberal | Democrats had fallen from 42% at the last general election to | 11% just after the vote on fees. 83% of students said they felt | let down by the Lib Dem leadership's decision | hardlianotion wrote: | They were in coalition, so I think most of the anger is just | misplaced. Could he have been more savvy? Probably. | mijoharas wrote: | That's fair enough, and if he'd said "we can't stop this, | I'm sorry" and _not_ voted for it himself, it would have | been fine. That's not what happened, he personally voted to | raise the fees, and he instituted a 3 line whip for his | party to do the same. | | I think it's fair to condemn him for that. | deworms wrote: | Neither Meta nor Onlyfans are government organizations, they are | privately owned and as such can make whatever deals they like. | Calling a deal a "bribe" is just silly. | HWR_14 wrote: | > they are privately owned and as such can make whatever deals | they like. | | Not really. | | 1) Meta is publicly traded, and has a duty to shareholders. | | 2) Antitrust laws limit what can Meta can do. | | 3) Paying individual executives to take action against Meta's | interest is a crime. | | 4) A deal that involves Meta breaching contractual obligations | with other parties or otherwise committing torts (e.g. libel) | is also actionable. | | There are more exceptions, but that should be enough. | deworms wrote: | Publicly traded does not mean the same thing as being a | public institution. | ganbatekudasai wrote: | Objection: Irrelevant. | scythe wrote: | Publicly traded means fiduciary duty. | cm2187 wrote: | I am a bit surprised. Surely Meta' senior executives must be paid | fairly well. And compared to Meta, OF is a lemonade stand. | umeshunni wrote: | Buried in the articles: | | Meta has scrutinized the email, too, noting supposed | inconsistencies in the plaintiffs' claims, including that Clegg | started at Meta after the OnlyFans bribery conspiracy allegedly | started. In the court filing, Fenix also pointed out that | plaintiffs have accused Perrella, but in their complaint, | plaintiffs say that wire transfers allegedly sent to Perrella | were sent to someone with a similar name at "Cristian Peralta | Trust." | sroussey wrote: | Similar names and slight name changes are all part of social | engineering | themitigating wrote: | How? | jjulius wrote: | Being well-paid isn't a signifier of whether or not one will | accept a bribe. Greed is greed. | lostlogin wrote: | I tried (briefly) to hunt for papers on this. Countries with | extreme wealth and poverty (ie high inequality) seem to have | more corruption. | | Interestingly, small government seems to correlate with more | corruption too. | | I am very much not an expert in this area. | | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311886.2021.1. | .. | | https://www.hks.harvard.edu/publications/inequality-and- | corr... | tgv wrote: | Small government means little control, so that's quite | logical. Criminals rarely argue for better law enforcement. | smcl wrote: | Ha, a generation of English students will thoroughly enjoy this. | For a bit of context, he was the head of the Liberal Democrat | party in the UK which gained a lot of popularity among younger | voters leading up to the 2010 UK General Election. This was in no | small part due to a pledge they all made to _not_ increase | University tuition fees. | | They were fancied to do very well in that election - Clegg was | young, spoke really well and outclassed everyone in pre-election | debates[0]. However they didn't do quite as well as hoped - while | they added about a million votes over the previous election, they | ended up losing a few seats in total. However they ended up in a | fairly powerful position, since neither of the two bigger parties | - Labour and the Conservatives - had enough MPs to form a | majority government. So whoever could form a coalition with Lib | Dems could basically win. | | They chose to enter a coalition with the Conservatives who then | proceeded to lifted the cap on tuition fees and basically every | university in England and Wales promptly hiked their fees to the | maximum allowed. In response they didn't do much other than wring | their hands and offer meek apologies. The party was quite | understandably crucified at the next election, losing 49 of their | 57 seats and they've been the fourth party - behind the | Conservatives, Labour, and the Scottish National Party[1] - ever | since. | | [0] - This was a pretty low bar, though. For example one of the | memorable parts of the first debate was that during his closing | statement he namechecked the audience members (name, location and | issue) who asked the candidates questions. The media liked this. | Needless to say, all the candidates did the same in the second | debate :D | | [1] - They do pull more votes overall than the SNP, but due to | how the UK system works they don't get as many parliamentary | seats. Understandably they pushed for a proportional | representation voting system which would help ... but that | failed. | DrBazza wrote: | > Ha, a generation of English students will thoroughly enjoy | this. | | They might well do, but it was their parents that didn't stop | them and say 'perhaps you ought to get a job, do an | apprenticeship, or basically anything other than a BA in | Madonna Studies and 70k in debt by the time you're 21'. | | This is another political legacy of Blair trying to get every | kid through university and has resulted in pointless degrees | and an increasing percentage of the population in debt. And | can't afford to get on the house ladder. | concordDance wrote: | That last bit is 90% due to the insane 10x increases in house | prices over the last few decades. | smcl wrote: | You're deliberately using frivolous, made-up degree to try to | dismiss the point. No matter, let's pretend someone doesn't | have a "BA in Madonna Studies" and they have a degree you | might respect more, like a BEng in Civil Engineering. Do you | think _they_ should have 70k in student loan debt that (with | the UK 's famously awful salaries) they'll be paying for over | a decade? Of course they shouldn't. Hell, even less well-off | European countries like Czech Republic manage to offer | tuition-free higher education under the age of 25 - I don't | see why non-Scots UK students shouldn't at least have _more | affordable_ tuition. | | I'd also add that in the UK student loan debt is orthogonal | to the problem of young people being unable to get onto the | housing ladder. Remember that Scottish students do not incur | the same level of student debt (on account of the government | paying tuition) and they have similar troubles buying | property. Salaries and house prices control this, student | loans barely figure into it. | DrBazza wrote: | What part of going to university aged 18 to get a junk | degree, just because that's what's expected, _and_ tens of | thousands of pounds of debt by the time you 're 21 is | absurd, is wrong? In the UK in 2022, if you're not inclined | to do a STEM or professional degree, you're probably better | off going into a trade or apprenticeship. | | > I'd also add that in the UK student loan debt is | orthogonal to the problem of young people being unable to | get onto the housing ladder. | | Perhaps you'd like to tell that to one of my kids that has | to factor all their outgoings (including university debt) | into their calculations which tells them exactly whether | they can afford to take on mortgage? | smcl wrote: | Civil Engineering is a junk degree!? I was going to say | Architecture but I thought CivEng was playing it _safe_. | Wow. Ok so can I take another punt - Mechanical | Engineering? Is that worthy? | | I'm really puzzled by your second part, so you have kids | who have sufficient deposit saved up, and a high-enough | salary to qualify for a suitably-sized mortgage ... but | the difference between their current rent and the would- | be mortgage repayments is high enough that _specifically_ | their student debt repayments are stopping them? | | That's an _incredibly_ unique problem. I mean, as someone | who is probably within a few years of your kids ' age, | the _overwhelming_ problems in our age groups are the | deposit and the price itself beyond beyond what a bank | would lend based on salary. Everyone I know who is | struggling to get onto the ladder is facing these two | problems. I was lucky with where I bought and more | importantly _when_ I bought (on the eve of a 3x price | boom) otherwise I might have hit the same issues. | mft_ wrote: | > This was a pretty low bar, though. For example one of the | memorable parts of the first debate was that during his closing | statement he namechecked the audience members (name, location | and issue) who asked the candidates questions. The media liked | this. Needless to say, all the candidates did the same in the | second debate :D | | It always shocked me that _this_ was what the media jumped on, | and seemed to matter most to people. Really shows how | appallingly low the standard of political debate and reporting | has become. | | (Personally, I'd be much happier with someone who didn't spend | time on such obvious PR guff, and was a good and incorruptible | _administrator_ of a country.) | smcl wrote: | Yeah it's weird. I don't actually remember TV debates being a | big thing before that election, did we just start it for | 2010? | housecarpenter wrote: | Yeah, televised election debates weren't a thing in the UK | until 2010. | mnd999 wrote: | I still don't know why we have them. It seems to make | elections even more about personalities and individuals | than politics. | | It's amazing how many people when presented with a list | of policies will vote one way, but when presented with a | list of names and parties will vote the other. | origin_path wrote: | There's a bit more to the story than that. | | British universities were pushing hard for the raised tuition | fees at the time, a legacy of Labour's drive to drastically | increase the numbers of people going. They claimed that they | were going broke and needed the possibility of charging more to | decrease class sizes and scale up their operations. They also | claimed that very few universities would actually raise prices | to the new cap, that in most cases the new prices would be | hardly different. | | The coalition, both Tories and Lib Dems, were completely | suckered by this claim. They came to see raising the price cap | as an unpleasant compromise, needed in order to ensure | education remained high quality at the very highest end | (russell group etc). What actually happened next showed that | the claims of universities were a lie: every university | immediately raised their prices to the max and faced with a | tidal wave of new money, the academics that had been claiming | they needed it to benefit students immediately went on | "strike", except it was the sort of strike where they continued | to turn up and do research (the fun bits), but refused to mark | students exams. In other words they held students hostage at | the start of their careers. I remember because I was there at | the time. | | Because the university sector has pathetically weak management | this tactic worked very well, and within months the "strike" | was ended by the simple expedient of allocating nearly all the | new money to wage increases for lecturers and other academic | staff. The new money was swallowed whole by the existing | system, the big promised expansion never happened. | | The ironic thing is that universities are heavily biased | towards Labour/Lib Dem voting, with university towns being much | more orange than typical, even though it was the Tories who | gave them all massive pay rises and Clegg who notionally | opposed it. | smcl wrote: | > They also claimed that very few universities would actually | raise prices to the new cap | | Yeah I remember this too - the commonly-held belief was that | only the top Universities (Oxbridge, Durham, LSE and UCL, | plus Edinburgh/St Andrews for English students) who would max | it out, and that the rest might just allow themselves a | little bit more to balance the books. Looking back it seems | pretty obvious that it wouldn't go down like this - who | wouldn't want to give themselves more money? | | I didn't recall all the details of the aftermath though (the | strike + the capitulation) though, that was a pretty | interesting turn. I guess it was after 2011 when I moved | abroad. | pjc50 wrote: | Student numbers definitely have expanded over time: https://w | ww.ft.com/content/8f3ab80a-ec2b-427d-80ae-38ad27ad4... | | .. although that's to a great extent international students, | because their fees aren't capped at all. Higher education is | one of the UK's successful export industries. | | The strike seems to have been, as always, changes to pensions | and preventing pay _cuts_ : https://www.theguardian.com/educa | tion/2011/oct/07/university... | jamessb wrote: | > faced with a tidal wave of new money, the academics that | had been claiming they needed it to benefit students | immediately went on "strike" | | > the "strike" was ended by the simple expedient of | allocating nearly all the new money to wage increases for | lecturers | | This makes it sound like the money from tuition fee rises | went to the academics as pay. It didn't: they've now had real | terms pay cuts for over a decade (here's one estimate [1]), | as well as their pensions becoming worse. | | The tripling of the price cap occurred in 2010; there was a | strike in 2013 because university staff had had a real-terms | pay cut of 13% in the 4 years from 2008-2013 [2]. | | It would also be more accurate to say that universities and | vice-chancellors (rather than "academics") pushed for a raise | in fees. | | [1]: | https://twitter.com/PWGTennant/status/1579061761013329921 | | [2]: https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/6846/Strikes-remain-on- | at-uni... | origin_path wrote: | _" The tripling of the price cap occurred in 2010; there | was a strike in 2013 because university staff had had a | real-terms pay cut of 13% in the 4 years from 2008-2013 | [2]."_ | | You're right, I'm mis-remembering the ordering of events. | The strike I'm talking about was in 2006 and pre-dated the | tripling of the fee cap. They got a ~15% increase for | everyone in the entire sector, including non-academic | staff. _Then_ they started to plead poverty and demanding a | rise in the price cap, even as the great recession was | ravaging the economy. | | https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/jun/06/lecturerspay.hig | h... | | I do seem to have recalled correctly that they claimed at | the time very few universities would actually raise prices. | | Your university source picks the time period for their "pay | cut in real terms" starting immediately after they got a | big pay rise phased in over two years. I learned at the | time that the way unions calculate things like cost of | living and "real terms" isn't always what you'd expect, | though this was coming up on 20 years ago so I forgot the | exact details of what they were doing. At least back then | it wasn't just inflation. I do remember being pretty | disgusted at their strike tactics and especially at the | fact that universities continued to pay them, even as they | refused to do their jobs. | jamessb wrote: | > Then they started to plead poverty and demanding a rise | in the price cap | | It would be fair to say that academics demanded increases | to their salaries (to limit how far they fell below | inflation), but not that they demanded tuition fees be | increased to achieve this. | | See this policy briefing from the UCU on "Tuition fees in | higher education" from May 2010 [1]: whilst bodies | representing the universities supported increases in | fees, the position of the UCU union (representing the | academics, rather than the universities) was that tuition | fees should be abolished and replaced by a Business | Education Tax: | | > University and College Union has consistently opposed | the payment of tuition fees. Rather than charge students | for their education, UCU would charge large employers who | benefit from the plentiful supply of graduates through a | new Business Education Tax (BET). | | It's really not the case that lecturers wanted to stuff | their pockets by price-gouging their students. | | [1]: https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/4626/Tuition-fees-in- | higher-e... | blitzar wrote: | Was it this sort of bribe? | | _OnlyFans star says she REPEATEDLY tracked down Meta employees | and had sex with them to get her Instagram account reactivated | when it was locked for explicit content - and reveals Insta 's | shadowy 'review' process_ | | https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10833813/OnlyFans-s... | | _Nick Clegg to decide on Trump 's 2023 return to Instagram and | Facebook_ | | https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/23/nick-clegg-t... | | I guess Trump now knows what he _needs_ to do. | princevegeta89 wrote: | Meta goes wherever the money is. Doesn't matter if it's shady | or transparent. | belfalas wrote: | The founder said it himself almost two decades ago: "you can | be unethical while still being legal. That's how I live my | life." He was telling the truth! | jslaD wrote: | consumer451 wrote: | How so? This Gamergate? | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_(harassment_campaign. | .. | jslaD wrote: | UncleMeat wrote: | A woman had sex with a reporter. That reporter also | blurbed a game she made. That is not the same as "she had | sex with a reporter to get publicity." | | Gamergate was trash from the beginning and only got more | distasteful over time. | LordDragonfang wrote: | And to be clear, said blurb on her game was a passing | mention, not a review, and was published before they | began their relationship. | nullish_signal wrote: | Yea basically, Yellow Journalists in bed with Terrible Game | Devs | RajT88 wrote: | If you believe GamerGate was about what it purported to be | about. | | (It wasn't, and you shouldn't) | | But anyways - you got at least the pretext correct. | 8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: | Meta employees are people too in the end. I can think of plenty | of men who would cut ethical corners for a chance to hook up | with a porn star. Just self-interested humans being self- | interested humans. | scohesc wrote: | Interesting how over time society is finding the decisions | these massive companies make are arbitrary, and usually follow | the scent of money - and not to "connect the world together". | | Some things never change. | alfalfasprout wrote: | Yep, yet they want any sign of conservative content purged | from all online platforms. This generation only wants echo | chambers. | scohesc wrote: | It really does seem that way. | | The shifting of personal responsibility from the individual | to the governments and corporations that exist to 'serve | you' in some sort of hybridized federal/corporate merger. | | When the majority learns from birth to completely trust the | institutions (ran by the government) that have existed for | decades/centuries before them, there's very little wiggle | room to try and convince people that maybe they don't have | your best interests in mind... | | We'll see what happens when first-world governments can't | reliably feed a majority of their citizens and when social | media companies start putting "misinformation" tags on | individual messages/status updates about people dying due | to starvation. | Huh1337 wrote: | More like "finding that people are corruptible", it's not | like Facebook wanted this or did it on purpose. | JumpCrisscross wrote: | > _it 's not like Facebook wanted this or did it on | purpose_ | | Facebook (and in this case, its employees) certainly aren't | hurrying to fix a power structure that gives them arbitrary | influence. | Huh1337 wrote: | They also certainly aren't hurrying to allow corruption. | That goes against company interests. One thing is keeping | arbitrary decision power for the company, entirely | another thing is allowing your managers to wield it in | your name and however they want. I bet you Facebook | doesn't want any of the latter. | toss1 wrote: | >>That goes against company interests. | | Nice ideal statement | | The problem is that there is no "company" that has a will | or ability to think or act on it's interests - the | "company" is literally a virtual creation. | | What DOES exist are a collection of people in executive | positions. Some of them may take a long view and see that | what is good for the company and stakeholders is good for | them, and act on those ideas. But, sadly, what usually | seems to happen is that the system actively filters into | executive positions sociopathic individuals who will | happily game the system for whatever advantage they can | gain, and they're usually smart enough to not do it in | the easier-to-catch direct bribery/kickback schemes. But, | if they think they won't get caught, many will do so. | | >>I bet you Facebook doesn't want any of the latter. | | Again, there is no "Facebook" who doesn't want the | latter. There is Zuckerberg, with primary controlling | interest, who wants what he wants, and the board and a | bunch of executives. And he can exert some level of | control, including the threat to summarily fire them upon | his displeasure. That will not prevent any of them | bending the organization to their own benefit if they | think they can get away with it, and nothing says in | advance that they won't try something corrupt if they | think they can get away with it (& nothing says they're | right or wrong about thinking they can get away with it | either). | Huh1337 wrote: | Not even a major/primary/only shareholder can just do | whatever they want. There definitely is a strong | separation between Zuckerberg and the company. Even if he | had 100% the company still would have to act fiscally | responsibly for itself. Read the law. | toss1 wrote: | >>Not even a major/primary/only shareholder can just do | whatever they want. | | Of course not. I did not say or imply that they could. I | was merely clarifying that there is no abstract "company" | with a will of its own, and that the major players, | WITHIN the constraints of the law and the other players, | can and often do exploit power for their own purposes | rather than an abstract ideal. | | >>There definitely is a strong separation between | Zuckerberg and the company. Even if he had 100% the | company still would have to act fiscally responsibly for | itself. | | Yes, people can have multiple hats, and there are laws | about fiduciary responsibility to shareholders. There are | often lawsuits over failures to uphold such | responsibilities. | | >>Read the law. | | Yes, I do read the law. I do not make the silly | assumption, as you apparently do, that just because there | is a law, it fully covers all possible wrongdoing and | people always follow it. | | There are nearly unlimited actions that can be | legitimately dual-purpose, benefiting the corporation | _and_ the individual executive /board member, whoever. | and that does not even begin to account for the actions | that are only _arguably_ beneficial to the corporation | but really extract value for the wrongdoer. I 've | literally heard an executive state "There's 1000 ways to | screw minority shareholders", and watched them do it. | There's a practice that screws creditors that is so | common there's a name for it - a "cram-down". I could go | on endlessly. | | If you really think that the fact that laws define | responsibility of corporate players, and therefore there | is no wrongdoing, I'd like to talk to you about an | opportunity for some great oceanfront property in Kansas. | Sheesh. | JumpCrisscross wrote: | > _bet you Facebook doesn 't want any of the latter_ | | It's not in Facebook's shareholders' interest. That's all | we can say. | | Concentrated, opaque and arbitrary power centres are | predictably corruptible. Creating and nurturing those at | multiple levels of an organisation, one whose senior | leadership has shown a pathological history of lying | moreover, speaks to an unsaid intent, or at the very | least, overt tolerance of the pattern of behaviour. It's | also self reinforcing, as the culture increasingly | forgets how to build and protect other power structures. | prvit wrote: | > They also certainly aren't hurrying to allow | corruption. That goes against company interests. | | I suspect that corruption might actually help facebook | avoid a bunch of negative attention from powerful | individuals who'd otherwise struggle to get their account | unbanned/verified/whatever. | Balero wrote: | What is Facebook if not the people leading it? These people | are high up in the organisation, and according to OP other | people at other levels are also doing this on purpose. | Perhaps personifying a huge company isn't the right way to | go. | Huh1337 wrote: | The codified standards and rules, definitely not an | arbitrary decision of a person who got fired over it. | yeasurebut wrote: | Everyone at Facebook intentionally signed up to get paid | from the data invasive ad money fire hose. They very much | did it on purpose. | Huh1337 wrote: | No, I really don't think there's any rule at Facebook | that says you should unban people if they have sex with | you. | jjk166 wrote: | Pretty big jump from "I have no moral qualms with | advertising" to "I am actively seeking to manipulate | people into providing sexual favors to my coworkers" | yeasurebut wrote: | These companies have been in the news for screwing users | and the public one way or another for decades now. It's | not 2002 anymore. | | Propping up the org props up all the unethical schemes. | Personal preference to label self as merely looking | passed one is gibberish. | londons_explore wrote: | For every case of something that is caught, there are many many | cases that go undiscovered. | | We should be thinking about how to stop such injustices. | themitigating wrote: | More police, government, and regulations? | cm42 wrote: | A database of people who have access to databases, cross- | referenced with a database of people who have abused database | access, only accessible by the most rigorous of procedures, | etc, etc. should solve this. | | Sure, $10 billion seems like a lot to stand up two postgres | containers, but can you really put a price tag on something | like this? | bityard wrote: | What did you have in mind? | kornhole wrote: | Participation or non participation is the choice we all have. | stale2002 wrote: | We actually have more choices. Choices such as using the | legal system to bring the offending parties to justice. | LordDragonfang wrote: | Relying on consumer boycotts to address anti-social behavior | from companies that literally rely on addiction behaviors to | get people to return to their product is clearly not the | answer. | | This is the exact purpose of the state, to punish bad actors | that can't be effectively effectively punished or | disincentivised with collective action. | kornhole wrote: | You may have much more faith in US regulatory agencies and | government than me. | | Does knowingly participating in a corrupt platform or | business make one complicit? This is why I opted out. If | more people would make decisions with conscience, it would | starve the beast. | nathanaldensr wrote: | So far, the evidence is that there is no way, because all those | ways would rely on fallible human systems. The best one can do | is live a good, ethical life, protect one's family, and try to | find peace as best as one can. | themitigating wrote: | Is it ethical to protect your family at the expense of | others? | [deleted] | kolbe wrote: | I hope Mark Zuckerberg has reflected on how much he has changed | over the decades. He originally wanted to build a social network, | borne out of a 4chan style sense of 'fuck the man' and do cool | things that improve the world. But instead, he's created a | vehicle to harm the world--to take from the poor, and to give to | the McKinsey alums who've infected and ruined his business for | their own personal gain. He could have done it the right way, but | he chose to let them do this to his company. What was even the | point of burning Eduardo or the Winklevosses if he just in turn | handed the keys over to even shittier people? | cwkoss wrote: | > borne out of a 4chan style sense of 'fuck the man' and do | cool things that improve the world | | Has zuckerberg ever been subversive? I thought he started | facebook out of horniness and desire for power, and that pretty | seamlessly morphed into greed and lust for more power. | | What 'fuck the man' things has zuck done? | kolbe wrote: | I think Facemash was quintessentially 4chan style fuck-the- | man. He hacked every Harvard house directory to make some | highly offensive web tool. What he did to the Winkelvoss | jocks certainly had an element of not wanting to play ball | with the aristocracy. | RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: | > borne out of a 4chan style sense of 'fuck the man' | | Yeah, nothing says 'fuck the man' like enrolling at Harvard. | Bakary wrote: | This is an oddly generous characterization of Zuckerberg, | probably borne out of the optimism of the era when the networks | were getting started. Keep in mind that this is the same person | who called people who handed over their data to him as dumb | fucks. A person who models their life around Augustus is most | definitely not a fuck the man type of person. Besides, being a | Harvard student is not exactly a rebellious choice to begin | with. There is no circumstancial evidence to paint him as a | subversive and plenty that paints him as the opposite, but I | suppose we'd have to know him a bit better to understand him | properly. | solveit wrote: | > Keep in mind that this is the same person who called people | who handed over their data to him as dumb fucks. | | In his defense, he was absolutely right. People shouldn't | hand over their data to random websites. | thenewwazoo wrote: | > He originally wanted to build a social network, borne out of | a 4chan style sense of 'fuck the man' and do cool things that | improve the world. | | he literally _originally_ wanted to build a directory of | pictures of attractive women so people could rank them | | https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/47709/did-mark-... | kolbe wrote: | He did build that. | yamtaddle wrote: | Basically HotOrNot--launched about four years earlier--but | with images pre-populated from student directories. | chatterhead wrote: | The Facebook hoodie should explain it all. | IndySun wrote: | Just need to point the obvious out that being 'accused of' | accepting a bride is not the same as the crime. Too many people | commenting are taking the bribe accusation to be true. | google234123 wrote: | I doubt Nick Clegg took a bribe. | thesaint wrote: ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-10-13 23:00 UTC)