Lessons in How to Lie

Just Make Stuff Up

Lies, White Lies, and Abusing Numbers

It’s all in how you look at it (e.g., it is easier to beg forgiveness than to ask permission)? How can there be bad in helping people connect with friends and family, find communities, and grow businesses in the “metaverse?” In politics (e.g., I did not have sexual relations with that woman.) and on the Internet, it is easier to pass a lie than to take responsibility for carelessness, wrongdoing, rushing to market, and other actions where truth, honesty, and caution should prevail. Making billions over more than 15 years of lying and then sharing “acts” of contrition is disgraceful, sinful, and woeful lying. Engaging in predatory lending and other practices for years and rebranding with “Hope USA” is just more shameless lying.

When Facebook was “outed,” claims were everywhere that safety teams protect billions of people each month. For years, Facebook profited from a business model founded on unsavory practices. When called out on it, a rash of bits that looked like public service announcements tried to set the record straight and promised renewed and continuing oversight by purveyors of previous practices. Some at the Starbucks where I earn most of my socializing points heralded this a great moment in history and time; others thought, “what a dick,” they should be ashamed of trying to fix something they created and vehemently claimed for years wasn’t broken. Much like at Bank of America, Theranos, Uber, WeWork, Wells Fargo, and other monstrosities birthed from words and actions of some social media “genius,” the bad happened because controlling decisions were made by self-serving people who should not have made them and regulating decisions were not made by other-serving people who should have made them.

Consider a few public service alternate reality announcements (PSARAs) that recently ran almost continuously for about month:

Facebook has invested billions in stopping bad actors online. That’s because they have invested $13 billion in teams and technology to enhance safety over the last 5 years (15 seconds)…

Another way to look at it:

Facebook has wasted billions trying to stop bad actors online. That’s because they invested just over 2 billion a year over the last 5 years and things have gotten worse…

And, more of the same:

Facebook leads the industry in stopping bad actors online. That’s because they invested $13 billion in teams and technology to enhance safety over the last 5 years. It’s working in just the past few months they’ve taken down 1.7 billion fake accounts to stop bad actors from doing harm but working to reduce harmful and illicit content on their platforms is never done. Learn more about how they are helping people connect and share safely at about.fb.com/safety. Sponsored by Facebook. (30 seconds)

Another way to look at it:

Facebook leads the industry in allowing bad actors online. That’s because they never invested a cent in teams and technology to enhance safety over the last 20 years. It’s working; in just the past few months they’ve put up billions of fake accounts that allow actors to continue doing harm but working to allow harmful and illicit content on their platform is never done…

He doth proclaim too much:

Facebook safety teams protect billions of people online each month. They lead the industry in stopping bad actors online that’s because they invested more than $13 billion in the last 5 years quadrupling their safety and security teams to 40,000 people and investing in industry-leading AI technology to enhance safety on their platforms. It’s working in just the last few months they’ve taken action on 1.7 billion fake accounts, 30 million violent and graphic posts, 32.8 million explicit adult posts, 7.1 million terrorism related posts, 3.8 million drugs and firearms sales posts but working to reduce harmful and illicit content on their platforms is never done. Keeping your feed safe will continue to be everyone’s priority at Facebook. Learn more about how they are helping people connect and share safely at about.fb.com/safety. Sponsored by Facebook. (60 seconds)

A look from another metaverse:

Facebook endangers billions of people online every day. They lead the industry in allowing bad actors online that’s because the more than $13 billion they invested in the last 5 years quadrupling their safety and security teams to 40,000 people and investing in industry-leading AI technology has done nothing to enhance safety on their platforms. It’s not working in just the last few months they’ve taken action on 1.7 billion fake accounts, 30 million violent and graphic posts, 32.8 million explicit adult posts, 7.1 million terrorism related posts, 3.8 million drugs and firearms sales posts but working to reduce harmful and illicit content on their platforms is clearly not working when there is that much bad stuff out there. Keeping your feed safe will never be everyone’s priority at Facebook…

The weak acts of contrition reveal how Facebook and other social media cesspools have promoted opinion as if it was fact and profited from the “opinionation” they created. Cleaned up 1.7 billion fake accounts means absolutely nothing. How many were there before, how many were there during, and how many remained after the “cleanup?” Hardly contrite. For 2 decades, you profited from bad actors’ fake accounts, violent and graphic posts, explicit adult posts, terrorism related posts, drugs and firearms sales posts, and who knows what other unsavory, illegal, and false feeds and the world’s stupidity is supporting them.

This is many types of lies served up to cover a very big lie: Facebook is helping people in positive ways. Lies of commission involve the intentional generation of false information. Lies of revision involve creating alternative narratives that cannot be easily verified and that take focus from the truth and lies of remission involve diminishing the context and value of the truth. Lies of omission involve the intentional exclusion of important information (e.g., not reporting the extraordinary harm (moral disengagement, isolation, racism, addiction. depression, cyber bullying, suicide) that can be done by bad people using what you sell or the service you provide).

According to information sponsored by Facebook ^[1]r.k.a, ∞Meta∞, the company promoting itself as building technologies that help people connect with friends and family, find communities, and grow businesses is serious about enhancing safety online and stopping bad actors from doing harm. With increasing people on safety teams and billions available for supposedly clearing fake accounts, violent and harmful posts, and drugs, firearms, and terrorism posts, how is a company in the greatest nation on earth allowed to create and continue such a calamity? Of course, none of this is verified in or verifiable by accessible sources and, sadly it comes following widespread media attacks, blame, and shame on the name, image, and likeness of corporate blustering. In the end it is just numbers promoted by a tech-made billionaire who is said to have stepped in the way of monitoring and change in the past. It’s too late. The damage has been done. Beyond generational fortunes have been made. Documenting the extent to which hate, outrage, and misinformation versus love, tolerance, and honesty are promoted will not help but it is a study that could be completed by a fifth grader for her Giggle Science Fair project.

Why do we see more trust and safety coordinators making TV appearances selling trust and safety? Why should we believe them? Hope is not a strategy…Promise is not a strategy…Self-promotion is not a strategy. Fear not. The world is bleak. The day is dark. The outcomes remain dangerous, but at Facebook, safety work is never done ^[2]think about it.

And the beat goes on:

The team said that they wanted to “go a step further and design [their] new symbol to dynamically live in the metaverse our company is helping to build,” embracing the heavily virtual nature of the metaverse (a.k.a. move along, there’s nothing to see here) into the creation process. Remarkable how these cretin geniuses came up with a logo than looks suspiciously like the highly recognized plot of Lorenz’s strange attractor (maybe nobody will notice if with turn it over and make it blue) and more remarkable that the genius at the top didn’t see it…or maybe he did and just went ahead as he has done before using the good thinking and work of others to create position and profit. Next for Meta? “We have entered a new level of fantasy,” the genius at the top told investors on a conference call, “we’re not really losing money, we seem to have entered an economic downturn that will have a broad impact on the digital advertising business” and “I’d say that the situation seems worse than it did a quarter ago.” He added that “Meta” would slim down spending and slow its pace of hiring to weather the storm: “This is a period that demands more intensity, and I expect us to get more done with fewer resources, but, of course, I will not take a cut.” Fortunes made, damage done, lessons learned? Say anything, no controls, wealth trumps reason. Ideas stolen, fortunes made, forgiveness forsaken and forgotten. I am the me in team. We are not MetaMuSell! Once the claimant to helping people connect with friends and family, find communities, now just another meta digital advertising liar.

And on:

Better to fake knowledge and insight to appear accountable and achieve approval: “We have a responsibility to make sure teens are safe and healthy on Snapchat,” the director of platform policy and social impact, told a proud-as-peacock NBC News senior national correspondent. And, better to blather on than to tell the truth as social media platforms face increasing scrutiny for exposing users to potential harm: “As soon as a parent and teen opt into Family Center, the parent immediately gets access to the teen’s friends list, the people the teen has communicated with over the last seven days, and new friends, that the teen has made as well” (emphasis added). The absurdity in spewing this as if it will make a difference is unconscionable.

And on:

Another pissing contest for liars and the obscenely rich: Amazon is suing more than 10,000 Facebook group administrators for allegedly orchestrating review fraud (i.e., passing lies) on Amazon Marketplace as the “war” on fake reviews continues to heat up.