Meta is straight evil. It undermines the institutions of democracy and it negatively impacts its users mental health, all in service of selling your data to advertisers so they can better goad unnecessary consumption.
If I learn you work at Meta, I will judge you as at best lacking a moral compass and treat you appropriately.
Apple has problems, but is a lot closer to morally neutral. Ditto for Netflix.
Amazon has hollowed out local retail/is also bad for society, though not on Meta’s scale. But you sell your soul more cheaply there.
not to defend zuck but its a common misconception that meta sells data
advertisers dont see the personal data they buy for ad placement
There is no misconception. Meta also sells data, next to selling advertising space.
no, it doesn't sell user data. or, where can I buy some?
Brokers. Acxiom and Experian for starters.
Heck, you can buy facebook datasets right now from brightdata.
https://brightdata.com/products/datasets/facebook
Don't you recall the Cambridge Analytica scandal?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambridge_Analytica
All corporates sell your data. You're a fool to think otherwise, data makes dosh, and you can sell any data for a price.
Data is a commodity.
There are current ten plus folk in the subway carriage I am sitting in right now. Toss me £10 and I'll give you a dataset of ten people of what colour tops they're wearing and what brand of shoe and colour.
And yes you can sell your internet data too.
https://www.moneymagpie.com/make-money/make-money-selling-yo...
They literally don't. Data is their moat; selling it would be counter to their financial success.
Well not in bulk to its advertisement competitors as you seem to suggest. But as a different revenue stream, data collectors sell the collected information. Don't be naive, of course they do, first customer are governments.
Why should anyone at all care about this distinction?
i care that my data isnt being sold
i dont really care that i get targeted ads, in fact i prefer targeted ads vs. ones that are of no use to me
Why wouldn't Meta also directly sell data if nobody cared about this distinction?
This is a pretty uncharitable perspective. Most folks I know working at Meta or Amazon aren’t morally bankrupt. They just have kids, debt, poor parents with health problems, etc. They work at Meta to support their loved ones. And it’s not like you can walk onto the street and just wave down a morally superior job with similar pay and benefits. Blame the tech oligarchs, not the workers.
"Supporting their loved ones" is doing a lot of moral heavy lifting here, though.
History's littered with people trotting out this line when they've valued luxury and status over morals.
The more you interact with something, the more you are part of it and help it prosper. "Blame the kings!" is a little bit too simple, imo.
When you are paid $500,000+ a year you lose the right to use the "I'm just supporting my family" excuse.
You sold your morals for a wheelbarrow of money, that is the end of the story.
There are many, many tech jobs at many companies (at least there used to be, until very recently).
“I work for one of the most evil institutions on the planet today because it is the only way I can support my sick parents” is an absurd excuse.
It's not actually that hard, most companies are morally superior to Meta. Even the other evil ones.
Reads like "The poor kapos had kids! They weren't evil, they were just upstanding people supporting their families!"
Absolute bullshit.
> And it’s not like you can walk onto the street and just wave down a morally superior job with similar pay
Oh no! They might only have to make mid-six figures! Welp, better give some teenage girls depression. They really don't have a choice, do they?
Zero good people work at Meta.
[dead]