Translated material
The end of the Facebook era?
The end of the Facebook era?
Why the company is losing the trust of users, governments and market value
Author: Maria Menshikova Publication: February 11, 2022
“Life without Facebook is wonderful,” Robert Habeck, Germany's economics minister, shared this week. “Yes, life without Facebook is very good,” echoes French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire. It seems that European politicians are not going to succumb to blackmail from Mark Zuckerberg’s company: recently “Meta” ◻️ threatened to disable Facebook and Instagram in the European Union. Habeck and Le Mer made it clear that if Facebook and Instagram want to continue operating in the EU, they will have to accept its rules of the game.
New EU laws force Meta to process European user data on local servers, while it is currently processed on servers in the United States. “Digital giants must understand that the European continent will resist and defend its sovereignty,” Le Maire commented.
“I have always called for an alternative to the EU-US Privacy Shield to find a balanced agreement on data sharing + have always called for flexibility in the General Data Protection Regulation ◻️ . However, Meta cannot simply blackmail the EU into abandoning its data protection standards; leaving the EU would be a loss for it.” Axel Voss, Member of the European Parliament (Christian Democratic Union, Germany)I have always called for an alternative to the EU US #privacyshield to find a balanced agreement on data exchange + always called for #GDPR flexibility. However, #META cannot just blackmail the EU into giving up its data protection standards, leaving the EU would be their loss.
— Axel Voss MdEP (@AxelVossMdEP) February 7, 2022
Meta has been struggling since last week, when its shares plunged a record 26% on February 3 and saw Meta's market value fall by more than $230 billion. The reason is Mark Zuckerberg's quarterly earnings report, which disappointed investors. For the first time in history, the number of daily active Facebook users has decreased, rather than increased.
This is very bad news for a company focused on expansion on a global scale and taking over even those territories where Internet access is still a luxury. In 2013, Zuckerberg announced the internet.org project (later Free Basics), the goal of which was to give the poor access to the Internet, or rather a limited version of it: what exactly would be available was decided by the company. Zuckerberg even gave a speech at the UN about how Internet access is a human right. However, it was difficult to believe in the altruism of a businessman who makes money from user data. The affordable Internet project eventually fizzled out : due to the ambitions and confidence of managers that they knew best how things should work, due to resistance from telecom operators in some countries in Africa - and due to resistance from activists in India. In 2016, they succeeded in blocking a service that, in their opinion, violated the principle of neutrality of network providers.
It seems that there are no new markets to conquer, young people prefer to stick to TikTok, and obstacles are created not only by governments, but also by competing companies: for example, Apple made it possible for iPhone owners to find out how the Facebook application is tracking them. Concerns about privacy are a threat to Meta's profits, because this way the company receives less user data that can be sold to advertisers.
Facebook as a problem is no longer talked about only in economic categories (a threat to monopoly), but also in political ones - as a threat to democracy. Facebook helped the QAnon conspiracy theorists who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, unite through its group recommendations feature. Facebook also made money from advertisements posted by QAnon supporters. A more serious accusation comes in connection with Zuckerberg's Internet operations in Myanmar, where the platform has been linked to inciting hatred against the Rohingya people. “I fear that Facebook has become a beast and not what it was originally intended to be,” said UN Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee, commenting on the genocide of the Rohingya people in Myanmar.
Sophie Zhang, who was fired from the company, told the press that Facebook management was too slow to respond to dangerous fake accounts or ignored them altogether. The priority was campaigns related to elections in the United States and Brazil, but no resources were allocated to work on “strange activity” outside rich countries - now Zhang believes that she, as a moderator, is responsible for the unrest in Bolivia and Ecuador: “I know that now I have blood on my hands."
However, the Facebook founder is optimistic about the future. Zuckerberg is still willing to spend billions of dollars on the augmented reality metaverse. Will this bet work? So far, the metaverse has become a source of ridicule rather than active investment.
“I find it hard to understand why one would invest an incomprehensible fortune into creating something so sterile and boring that the mere thought of visiting the site makes people want to log out.” Edward SnowdenFacebook's vision of VR is a derivative, lifeless world full of derivative, lifeless people.
— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) February 8, 2022
On-brand, really. pic.twitter.com/duiiJ6K69p
Besides, the metaverse was not such a safe place. Last December, one of the testers said that she was harassed in Horizon Worlds: a stranger touched her avatar's breasts and crotch. The developers then replied that they would improve the interface so that users would resort in such cases to the already available Safe Zone function. The responsibility for protecting themselves from harassment has fallen on those being harassed. Later it became known about the first gang rape in the metaverse. “I tried to get away and they were screaming, ‘Don’t pretend you didn’t like it,’” said user Nina Jane Patel.
Facebook has failed to unite the whole world through the Internet. The development team itself tried to convey to management the fact that Facebook is actually dividing people: the opinions of social network users are becoming more polarized and radical. In 2022, there is no longer any reason to claim that Facebook is making the world a better place - rather, on the contrary. Perhaps we are now witnessing the decline of Facebook.
Facebook's new name
EU regulation that harmonizes the protection of personal data. — approx. ed.