
Making Ads and Pages More Transparent - minimaxir
https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/04/transparent-ads-and-pages/
======
andreyk
The tone of discussion on HN around this issue seems to have become completely
cynical and atypically nasty. Come on, it's a good thing fb is improving and
regardless of your stance on the site you cant deny it does a lot of good for
a lot of people and seeing it improve on privacy and transparency is a good
thing.

~~~
drb91
> you cant deny it does a lot of good for a lot of people

I'm not really interested in having a value judgment discussion of Facebook
here, but it really annoys me when people assume this. At least have an open
mind enough where you can imagine someone thinking different from you. It
really doesn't take that much imagination or empathy to see why some people
view it as, yes, completely and totally a net-negative on the world,
regardless of whether you specifically believe it or not; I think the good
that facebook does do is both incidental and replaceable.

Besides, c'mon, how can you be "nasty" to a corporation? People publicly
complaining is probably the only way this change happened in the first place.

~~~
traek
> some people view it as, yes, completely and totally a net-negative on the
> world [...] I think the good that facebook does do is both incidental and
> replaceable.

OP wasn’t claiming that Facebook is a net positive for the world, just that it
indisputably provides a valuable service for at least some people[0] and
improving the privacy features is only a good thing. It’s unproductive and
misguided to attack Facebook for this.

[0] [https://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpetersen/ex-flds-new-
chapt...](https://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpetersen/ex-flds-new-chapter)

~~~
andreyk
Exactly. I am personally all for replacing it with open source decentralized
options, I am even working to further that cause, but do you actually think
that'll happen anytime soon? Network effects are not so easily replaceable...

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rawrmaan
This is amazing! I love that they're adding the ability to see:

1) which campaign or PAC bought the ad

2) all other ads by that buyer

3) how much that buyer spent on this ad and all other ads

Seriously, what other platform provides this level of transparency into
political ads? It's unprecedented.

Also, it doesn't matter if you use or like Facebook--literally tens of
millions do in the US, and they all have a vote. This is a win for democracy.

~~~
elliotec
Found the Facebook PR people

~~~
dang
This breaks the site guidelines. Please read and follow them:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html).

You don't have to agree with someone about Facebook but you do need to take
care of the commons when posting here.

~~~
elliotec
My apologies.

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paulie_a
Now instead of every third post that in reality is an ad, half of them will
be. But clearly marked as ads.

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KronenR
What? uBlock already make ads completely transparent

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IAmEveryone
What I'd love to see is the ads' targeting information.

~~~
throwaway080383
Click on the "..." above any ad and select "Why am I seeing this?"

------
discussedbefore
[https://www.fbpurity.com](https://www.fbpurity.com) adblocking extension

------
feelin_googley
There really is a feeling of "too little, too late".

Not in the sense FB cannot make improvements. Of course they can.

What is too little, too late is reversing the direction that the Zuckerberg
story has taken.

The media can build someone up and they can also destroy someone.

As the recent Rolling Stone article suggested in no uncertain terms, there has
been great damage done to media and journalism (and arguably to society) by
having FB as a "filter" between the reader and the news source.

They have not managed the relationships well enough it seems.

Have a look at this article:

[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/06/mark-
zuck...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/apr/06/mark-zuckerberg-
public-image-cambridge-analytica-facebook)

Anecdotally I have heard Zuckerberg discussed in the ways described in this
article. I have no doubt he was trying to carefully craft an image for the
American public.

But, today, who can trust this young man who has the personal lives of
billions of people on his servers... now that they have seen _how he reacts in
a crisis_? (Perhaps we should say "fails to react".)

There is a certain irony I see in the failure of Zuckerbergs PR team. Someone
who has been in PR for many years once explained to me the effect of FB on PR.
Needless to say, it wasnt positive. PR traditionally relied on the media and
its ability to reach the targeted audience. To a large extent, FB controls
this now.

Whether any of this will matter long-term, who knows? Ask Wall Street?

But if and when FB assures us that they have everything under control, I will
have doubts. This is an evolving story. We are seeing only the tip of the FB
iceberg.

------
feelin_googley
This author located in the UK believes FB should be broken up:

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/03/26/zuckerberg-m...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/03/26/zuckerberg-
must-ask-help-fix-facebook/amp/)

He believes that Facebook's board is susceptible to Silicon Valley groupthink
and with Thiel there is clear conflict in interest due to Palantir.

He argues the board is "feeble" because Zuckerberg cant be sacked.

The author thinks Zuckerberg has made some "stupid" and "arrogant" moves.

For example last year as an experiment, he cut professionally produced news
from the main newsfeed in Sri Lanka, Guatemala, Bolivia, Cambodia, Serbia and
Slovakia making those countries "beta-testers" for "a political debate free of
facts".

He recalls in 2007 he wrote two news stories about FB for a former employer.
One was about some software that "connected to Facebook's then-new "social
graph" and siphoned off personal information for resale." The other was about
an advertiser, Vodafone, who pulled its ads from Facebook because it had been
placed on a page promoting the British National Party.

He suggests that because stories like these could easily have been written as
recent as last week, it shows how FB's problems are _not new_ and how
Zuckerberg has refused to acknowledge them for the last _ten years_ let alone
try to "fix" them.

He thinks FB should not be "fixed"; rather, it should be "broken and remade".

------
feelin_googley
He has also announced that he now supports the Honest Ads Act.

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-
privacy/facebook...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-
privacy/facebook-backs-u-s-regulation-of-internet-political-ads-idUSKCN1HD2JH)

Perhaps he will announce next that he supports competition.

Isnt it true that before being acquired by FB, WhatsApp charged users a
subscription fee and did not show ads?

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feelin_googley
How about making ads _go away_?

FB _appears_ locked in to a business model that relies on continually pushing
the limits of invasiveness.

Does that model have a breaking point?

Does FB know where that point lies?

~~~
ben_jones
I think I would pay $1-2/mo for a custom algorithm that eliminated ads and
sorts content the way I want. But Facebook probably makes more money on
certain users then that anyways.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
I am surprised this doesn't get brought up more.

I also would pay $24 a year for a 'premium Facebook' ad free experience.

~~~
IAmEveryone
Google tried it. Nobody used it.

~~~
dragonwriter
Google tried to charge for ad-free Facebook?

That doesn't seem likely.

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akshayB
There are 2) big problems here:

1) This could have been done long time ago

2) People or bots can still share content as images and there is still lot of
fake news being spread in that way.

This will probably help but definitely not a sustainable fix.

------
mistermann
"We believe..."

Hahaha, no you don't you disgusting liars.

~~~
dang
As you know, you can't post like this here. You may not owe Facebook any
better, but you owe this community much better if you want to keep commenting
here.

If you continue to break the site guidelines, we're going to end up banning
you. Would you please reread them and use this site as intended from now on?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

