Facebook...er, Meta Hatred

[Argent Stonecutter]

Sluggard is the British unit of laziness.

 

[Free]

Considering the billions Zuckerberg has flushed down the toilet on his A.I. and metaverse efforts, I'm sure the company can bear it. Still, ouch.

Meta loses trial after arguing child exploitation was “inevitable” on its apps

Meta plans to appeal as it faces down two other child safety trials.

arstechnica.com

Meta has lost the first of three child safety trials it’s facing this year after a jury in a New Mexico state court found that the social media giant’s platforms do not effectively protect kids from child exploitation.

On Tuesday, the jury deliberated for only one day before agreeing that Meta should pay $375 million in civil damages for violating state consumer protections and misleading parents about the safety of its apps.

The trial followed a 2023 lawsuit filed by New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez after The Guardian published a two-year investigation exposing child sex trafficking markets on Facebook and Instagram. Torrez’s office then conducted an undercover investigation codenamed “Operation MetaPhile,” in which officers posed as children on Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. The jury heard that these fake profiles were “simply inundated with images and targeted solicitations” from child abusers, Torrez told CNBC in 2024. Ultimately, three men were arrested amid the sting for attempting to use Meta’s social networks to prey on children.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Considering the billions Zuckerberg has flushed down the toilet on his A.I. and metaverse efforts, I'm sure the company can bear it. Still, ouch.

Meta loses trial after arguing child exploitation was “inevitable” on its apps

Meta plans to appeal as it faces down two other child safety trials.

arstechnica.com

Glad they lost! I know it's hard to tightly moderate such a big set of platforms, but serves them right for being too cheap to have any human moderators or support.

 

[Free]

Meta Lays Off 700 in Pivot From Metaverse to AI

"Where possible, we are finding other opportunities for employees whose positions may be impacted.”

gizmodo.com

The end of the Metaverse is coming soon. The beginning of the A.I.verse is...didn't it already arrive? I'm going to start calling him Day Late Zuckerberg.

 

[Dakota Tebaldi]

But wait....there's more!

Today both Meta and YouTube (in the form of Google) were found liable by a California jury for knowingly harmfully addicting a teenage user to their apps. The payout was far less as it was a single person suing, but the precedent set by the verdict might be super impactful in the near future.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

‘It started with a tipoff’: how a Guardian investigation exposed child sex trafficking on Facebook and Instagram

Meta has just lost a multimillion-dollar legal battle over its failure to prevent children being sold on its platforms. Here’s how we uncovered evidence that became part of the case against it

 

[Free]

Meta spins up AI version of Mark Zuckerberg to engage with employees

The Meta chief is personally involved in training and testing his animated AI.

arstechnica.com

Meta employees are saying they're not fooled by the A.I. version because unlike Zuckerberg, the A.I. is way too lifelike.

 

[Noodles]

One of the most pointlessly stupid Facebook things.

In case you don't use Messenger, they have these little animated cartoon people that look like you. Like you can send a sticker of your cartoon self blowing a kiss or whatever.

Latrly they started offering some more exotic and goofy ones. They even preview them. They exist, they are already made.

Except you have to "unlock" them by doing some Horizon Worlds nonsense.

Like WTF I just want to send a sticker.

 

[Free]

Zuckerberg continues to pine for China. In reckless, almost treasonous ways. But China continues to fail reciprocating those feelings.

China blocks Meta's $2 billion takeover of AI startup Manus

China said Monday it has decided to block Meta's $2 billion acquisition of Manus, a Singaporean AI startup with Chinese roots.

www.cnbc.com

China’s state planner on Monday called for Meta to unwind its $2 billion acquisition of Manus, a Singaporean artificial intelligence startup with Chinese roots.

The decision to prohibit foreign investment in Manus was made in accordance with laws and regulations, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a brief statement. It added that it has asked the parties involved to withdraw the acquisition transaction.

The deal had attracted scrutiny from both China and Washington, as lawmakers in the U.S. have prohibited American investors from backing Chinese AI companies directly. Meanwhile, Beijing has increased efforts to discourage Chinese AI founders from moving business offshore.

The man is obsessed.

 

[Free]

It's a "guest essay" in the New York Times, not a medical health chart, or an obituary written by a psychic with a good track record. But it satisfies nonetheless.

Meta Is Dying [NYT by way of archive.today]

There is a moment when internet companies get the stink of death on them. For AOL, it was 2003, when it became clear that its users were abandoning its clunky dial-up internet service for far-faster broadband. For Yahoo, it was 2015, when their last-ditch acquisition spree failed, and they sold themselves to Verizon.

For Meta, that time is now. I believe the company — one of the most powerful media organizations in the world and one of the most valuable members of the S&P 500 — is at the start of a long, slow decline that will trigger aftershocks to our economy and our society.

It may be named Meta, but the company’s biggest asset is still Facebook. Started from a Harvard dorm, the original online social network has dominated our world for two decades. Its three billion users are still bigger than any single country. Its platforms can help sway an election, fuel an insurrection or spark a genocide.

But if you look carefully, you can see chinks in the armor. Meta’s earnings are starting to show the strain from years of growing consumer disaffection and reckless spending. The latest earnings, released on April 29, revealed a dip in user numbers for the first time since it started reporting these figures. And the slumping stock confirms what we have all known in our guts for a while: This is a company entering its zombie era.

 

[Noodles]

I basically have not posted or even browsed anything except local events on Facebook for years. I stopped using Insta, Threads, and Facebook because their feed never shows me things I follow but constantly stuff it thinks I want to follow (but then never ever see again ever).

 

[Argent Stonecutter]

The original social network didn't even have Harvard on it.

Usenet, April 5, 1981

                       reed     phs
                           \   /   \
                  decvax---duke----unc
                     |      /  \
                     |  mhtsa--research      mh135a
         ucbopt---+  |    | \                  |
                  |  |    | eagle   ihnss   vax135
         ucbcory--\  |    |  |       /       /
                   >-+--ucbvax------+-------+-------------\
         ucbarpa--/      |   |              |              \
                  |  sdcarl sdcsvax       menlo70--hao    ucsfcgl
         ucbonyx--+     \     /              |
                        phonlab           sytek

I was on a system hanging off the ucbcory node.