
Mark Zuckerberg is either lying, incompetent,or an inept CEO. What do you think? - kiyanwang
https://hackernoon.com/mark-zuckerberg-is-either-lying-incompetent-or-an-inept-ceo-what-do-you-think-abb790c2c110
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Dowwie
There's a strong bias against Zuckerberg and Facebook around here so I expect
that my comment will down-vote into negative territory, yet this won't stop me
from expressing my opinion.

Mark has transcended from hacker-programmer to entrepreneur and ultimately CEO
of one of the world's largest, most successful tech-media companies. He's done
so before turning 40 years old. The world is watching him testify for days on
end with the most highly elected lawyer-politicians who don't understand his
business, technology, nor policies. He's responding to aggressive lines of
questioning to the best of his ability, with integrity, and yet in a way to
protect his best interests. That is no simple feat.

Mark is showing the world that he's earned his position and is a real leader.
His actions while testifying are commendable.

Those who continue to grind their axes will be left with nothing but a worn
handle soon while Facebook and its social media empire will continue on, but
hopefully changed for the better for society.

~~~
dannyw
This is one way to put it, but another way would be clarifying that Facebook
is a dark-pattern filled, dopamine-tuned, unethical, illegal, and sometimes
wilfully criminal social network.

While this was back ages ago, Zuckerberg used failed logins from Facebook to
hack into a reporter’s email. Yes, Facebook captured plaintext passwords of
failed logins, and Zuckerberg personally used them to hack a reporter’s email
account who was digging into FB.

[https://www.businessinsider.com.au/how-mark-zuckerberg-
hacke...](https://www.businessinsider.com.au/how-mark-zuckerberg-hacked-into-
the-harvard-crimson-2010-3)

The problem isn’t scaling pains as you try to wrap. The problem IS Facebook,
and almost everything about it.

Examples: Pledge 99% (for-profit, tax structuring), Internet.org (locking in
of Facebook; closed intranet as ‘internet’); anticompetitive actions against
Snapchat through copying of stories; and the 999+ privacy scandals that have
continuously plagued Facebook because it is the core business model.

For you to call Zuckerberg commendable, is almost an insult for every founder
with a moral compass.

He is certainly competent, but “commendable” is the exact antonym of what I’d
use to describe him.

~~~
Dowwie
Thanks for commenting. After reading your response, I added "his actions
_while testifying_ " to be more clear, although I was speaking to them in the
rest of my piece.

~~~
dannyw
Ah, that is fair and I agree with you. His actions while testifying is what
I'd call respectable, especially since the session is really just for show -
partly for both sides.

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sametmax
It's not even a serious question.

He is lying because he is a competent ceo. He has objectives in an hostile
environnement for his business but knows it will pass and that as long as he
holds, people will move and forget.

Lying is necessary if you want to keep doing something for your benefit that
people would think you should not.

~~~
be_jenk
This is a good point. Bore them to death and watch it fizzle out

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mankash666
None of the above.

He wasn't likely lying as he was under oath, and his very competent lawyers
would've advised him strongly against perjury.

He's obviously neither incompetent nor inept. He successfully navigated a
Congressional sideshow and delivered the expectation that shareholders had,
much to the chagrin of end users.

The only ones lying, incompetent and inept are us - those who continue to use
Facebook fully knowing next to nothing has changed from the hearing. If you
haven't already deleted Facebook, think hard

~~~
gautamdivgi
Have they finally implemented a delete account feature? I deactivated my
account and deleted the app from my devices many years ago. But there was no
delete account or “forget me” feature. Even if you get rid of fb you aren’t
really forgotten by fb

~~~
btcindivist
There is deactivate and delete option for years now.

Zuckerberg stated that they delete all of the data after user deletes their
account (not deactivate).

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corobo
You're surprised Zuckerberg didn't quite tell the full truth outside of oath
or deferred the more controversial answers to a time his answers weren't
livestreamed to millions around the world?

"My team will get back to you on that" can be replaced with "I'll tell you,
but not live" because he knows social media will be burning like magnesium
before he's even done with the next question

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lostsock
1\. Facebook have just come out with an entire release about what data is and
is not tracked when you're not on their site[1].

2\. Armchair developers always throw out things like this: "A few if-else
statements would remove most of them and would provide at least a temporary
solution.". Sure, you could do a keyword search for "pills" and delete all of
those ads. How many legitimate ads will you take down in the process? How many
extra support requests will they have to deal with because of the change? How
long until the spammers change the wording ever so slightly to defeat Facebook
s naive workaround?

3\. Facebook doesn't directly give data to advertisers, that's what Zuckerberg
was saying, and OP acknowledges as much. The fact that advertisers can infer
data about users by using the system is a feature, not a bug. The very fact
that you can do targeted advertising is of course going to leak some data
about users to advertisers, it's not Zuckerberg's job to explicitly state
that.

[1] [https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/04/data-off-
facebook/](https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/04/data-off-facebook/)

~~~
tpxl
2\. Bollocks. A few if-else statements to flag the ads, then have humans
approve/reject them. This could, and in fact is, done today (but not by
facebook obviously).

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apahwa
this writer who founded a social network is in no way biased in his article.

/s

~~~
lithos
Puts them in a good spot to call a lie, grey truth, or incompetence.

Still biased of them of course.

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mhkl
All of the above: lying, incompetent and inept.

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sunstone
To my mind I think he's following in Bill Gates' foot steps.

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drharby
I think you are not looking for an open discussion

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Grustaf
"Either"...

