
Mark Zuckerberg 2017 Challenge - ecesena
https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10103385178272401?pnref=story
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alexmingoia
> Going into this challenge, it seems we are at a turning point in history.
> For decades, technology and globalization have made us more productive and
> connected. This has created many benefits, but for a lot of people it has
> also made life more challenging. This has contributed to a greater sense of
> division than I have felt in my lifetime.

I don't follow. What exactly has technology made more challenging for people?
Certainly not communication.

What sense of division is he talking about? Are those weasel words for the US
election?

~~~
Gargoyle
I suspect that passage is more about wealth inequality.

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untilHellbanned
That he contributed to.

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codingmyway
Marginally, yes he's loaded but Facebook didn't destroy thousands of smaller
mom and pop businesses and concentrate whole sectors of the economy like
Amazon, or hundreds of newspapers and advertising agencies like Google.

Facebook is totally too powerful and far too greedy but I wouldn't blame it
for inequality.

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afinlayson
Between this and [https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-
faith/wp/2016/12...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-
faith/wp/2016/12/30/mark-zuckerberg-says-hes-no-longer-an-atheist-believes-
religion-is-very-important/?utm_term=.d30eccfd4c8b)

Is this Mark trying to better understand why 2016 election happened (going
against the data), or maybe he's opening himself up for a potential political
future.

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I-M-S
With him recently having eschewed atheism [1], I'd definitely say the later.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13287304](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13287304)

~~~
heartbreak
Do you think he's going to try to compete against Trump in 2020 or just local
politics in California?

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netsharc
I was thinking he has a lot of years before he'd be eligible to be president
(has to be at least 35), but he'll be 36 in May 2020.

Not that Trump will still be president at that time... (Just like everyone
said he won't win the primary, etc, etc)

~~~
afinlayson
I disagree with that. Like the ethics thing showed. The republicans without
trump are more lost than the democrats.

If Trump survives the stress of being president, and still runs he'll win the
primary. Or he'll pick his successor, maybe his Daughter or her husband.

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vdnkh
Will his celebrity status prevent him from getting a "real" sense of the
places/people he visits?

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Altaer
I think this largely depends on who he goes to visit. It's very probable his
status will prevent him from meeting people, but I think he can get around
this. I'd love for him to meet my father. He's a recently retired immigrant
chef, doesn't own a Facebook account, doesn't care who Zuckerberg is, but
would provide him with great conversation on his struggles and challenges with
technology as well as the best meal of his life. If I know someone good to
talk to that is this close to me while being in the field of tech, I'm sure he
can find good people to meet as well.

~~~
TheSpiceIsLife
Sorry about this, but I feel it is important:

 _doesn 't own a Facebook account_

Nobody _owns_ their Facebook account.

I feel this is important because we need to be careful and aware of the
language we use when talking about these services.

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wwkeyboard
My personal challenge is to contact someone in every state with ham radio.
It's far more energy efficient, and within my budget.

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smoyer
I've been in every state except Arkansas ... perhaps some day I'll have a
reason to go there (or at least reroute a road trip to pass through).

~~~
euyyn
Being able to claim that you've been to every single state is a great reason
to go there!

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rabbyte
so a mission to make the world more open and connected is being joined with a
mission to figure out how the first mission made the world more closed and
disconnected. snark aside, it's good to see, but if he's interested there's
some very good analysis on root causes already.

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dmode
A bit underwhelming

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dsabanin
I think this whole PR circus for him has one important goal - he seems to be
shooting to be a US president one day and this is him laying extensive ground
work. We are going to see more of that in the future.

He can't get much higher in the business world and it's pretty clear he's an
egomaniac who wants more power. That's my theory anyway.

~~~
gooseus
My cynical side is agreeing and also putting a different context around the
charitable LLC he announced a year ago in his daughters name.

I think it's a pretty scary scenario to have a person with such a high
percentage of the world's personal information at his fingertips seeking the
highest office in the land.

This is also the guy who decides the algorithms that control what news those
people see (or don't see) on his platform and is also the guy who also carried
out a study to see how his platform can manipulate his users emotions.

~~~
confounded
_Published_ a study on how his platform can manipulate its users' emotions.
There are hundreds/thousands of studies on millions of people being carried
out each day. And we probably won't hear about any more of them (unless
they're really really cute).

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ecesena
tl;dr: My personal challenge for 2017 is to have visited and met people in
every state in the US by the end of the year. I've spent significant time in
many states already, so I'll need to travel to about 30 states this year to
complete this challenge.

Also remarkable, imo:

This has contributed to a greater sense of division than I have felt in my
lifetime. We need to find a way to change the game so it works for everyone.

~~~
fullshark
It would be a bit more remarkable if he explicitly took some responsibility
for it instead of just speaking vaguely of the role of technology in that
sense of division.

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linkregister
Why would Zuckerberg be responsible for it?

Do you think that the Balkanization of social groups didn't occur before
Facebook? Facebook is a reflection of one's social group.

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fullshark
The filter bubbles are getting more severe imo because FB wants to be a news
source.

Simple illustration: [http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-
feed/](http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-feed/)

~~~
linkregister
How do you get that feed on Facebook? I never see that stuff on mobile or
desktop, just the terrible articles posted by my Facebook friends.

Thanks for posting that WSJ link. The example articles were horrifying.

~~~
fullshark
I don't have much insight beyond their posted methodology which I have only a
superficial understanding of.

[http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-
feed/#methodology](http://graphics.wsj.com/blue-feed-red-feed/#methodology)

