#1369 The Business Model That Ate the World (Facebook)
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.5 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 22 September 2020
⏱️ 72 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Air Date 9/22/2020
Today we take a look at the rising concern over Facebook as more and more negative impacts of the site become evident to an ever-expanding group of concerned people and, more specifically, we show how it is the fundamental business model of Facebook that is at the heart of its problems.
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SHOW NOTES
Early Facebook investor Roger McNamee talks about big tech companies are amplifying hate speech and disinformation. He also talks more about his book, ·Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe.·
Ch. 2: The Covid Conspiracy Boom on Facebook - On the Media - Air Date 8-19-20
Bob speaks to Fadi Quran about the "superspreader" pages that are amassing these page views, the most popular health conspiracies on Facebook, and whether there's any hope that Facebook will address the proliferation of disinformation on its site.
Ch. 3: Beyond the Boycott - Your Undivided Attention - Air Date 7-10-20
#StopHateforProfit is an important first step, but we need to go much further.
Ch. 4: The Business Model - The Social Dilemma
Clip from the docudrama "The Social Dilemma" from the Center for Humane Technology (available on Netflix).
Take action! Click the title and/or scroll down for quick links and resources from this segment. For more, visit Bestoftheleft.com/2020Action.
Ch. 6: When Attention Went on Sale - Your Undivided Attention - Air Date 4-28-20
Information system that relies on advertising was not born w/ the Internet. But social media platforms have taken it to an entirely new level, becoming a major force in how we make sense of ourselves and the world around us. Columbia Law Professor Tim Wu.
Ramesh Srinivasan (@RameshMedia), Bernie Sanders surrogate and Professor at the UCLA Department of Information Studies, joins us to discuss the politics of technology. Why conversations about technology need to be conversations about power.
Ch. 8: Yaël Eisenstat: Dear Facebook, this is how you're breaking democracy - TEDTalks - Air Date 9-8-20
In this bold talk, Yaël Eisenstat explores how social media companies like Facebook incentivize inflammatory content, contributing to a culture of political polarization and mistrust -- and calls on governments to hold these platforms accountable.
VOICEMAILS:
Ch. 10: Mythology - Alan from Connecticut
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Ch. 11: Response to Zach the theologian - Nicole
Ch. 12: Your argument convinced me - Zach the theologian
Ch. 13: White Male Privilege - Heidi
FINAL COMMENTS
Ch. 14: Final comments on the two major changes happening to the show
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Here's *exactly* how Democrats win the Senate (CNN)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to this episode of the award winning best of a left podcast in which we shall learn |
| 0:07.0 | about the rising concern over Facebook as more and more negative impacts of the site |
| 0:11.9 | become evident to an ever-expanding group of concerned people. |
| 0:15.9 | And more specifically, we show how it is the fundamental business model of Facebook that |
| 0:20.4 | is at the heart of its problems. |
| 0:23.0 | Also today, two major changes to the show are taking place very coincidentally both on |
| 0:29.2 | today's episode, so stay tuned to learn all about that. |
| 0:32.8 | Quips today are from Democracy Now on the media, your undivided attention, the social dilemma |
| 0:39.4 | that Michael Brooks show and Ted Talks. |
| 0:42.2 | AOC tweeted, hypothetically, if you were, say, a member of Congress sitting on the Financial |
| 0:55.4 | Services Committee, given five minutes to question Mark Zuckerberg, what would you ask? |
| 1:03.2 | What would you advise these Congress members ask? |
| 1:06.5 | Mark Zuckerberg, the man you knew very well, you invested in early on. |
| 1:11.9 | So I think the issue for all members of Congress, irrespective of what committee they're on, |
| 1:17.2 | essentially distills to the same thing, which is Mr. Zuckerberg. |
| 1:21.0 | We've built one of the most successful businesses in American history, but it enormous cost. |
| 1:27.6 | To me, Facebook is like the oil companies of the 50s. |
| 1:32.4 | It's artificially profitable because it pours waste products wherever it feels like. |
| 1:38.1 | Think about it. |
| 1:39.1 | In the 50s, chemical companies would pour mercury into fresh water. |
| 1:43.3 | Mining companies would leave the residue wherever it fell. |
| 1:47.4 | Last stations would pour oil into the sewer. |
... |
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