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☆ Sure, Twitter and Facebook have deepened polarization — just not in the way you think
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Adam Rogers | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +11 min

The conventional wisdom blames social media for the widening divide because the timing lines up. Maybe the problem isn't that social media has driven us all into like-minded bubbles. Maybe it's that social media has obliterated the bubbles we've all lived in for centuries. On top of that, Törnberg adds, there's the way people react to all the new ideas that social media exposes them to. And as one leading social media and polarization researcher told me, the model is not empirical, which makes it hard to test.

☆ Why is Mark Zuckerberg so obsessed with building the metaverse? It has a lot to do with Apple.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-27 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

It proved a huge blow to ad-dependant social platforms, Facebook top among them, which said it lost $10 billion because of the change. Zuckerberg insisted that "fortifying" Facebook's business against the likes of Apple is not the only reason he's investing heavily in building the metaverse. Zuckerberg sees four platforms in Facebook's futureRight now, the metaverse stack as Zuckerberg envisions it is based on "four major platforms" being developed. The first is Horizon Worlds, with user avatars making it more akin to a "social metaverse platform," he said. Zuckerberg seems keen to give Apple a taste of its own medicineBeyond trying to give his company a path away from being hit by the decisions of Apple, Zuckerberg also seems keen to give Apple a taste of its own medicine.

Interpol's member countries have raised concerns about how to prepare for possible metaverse crime, Madan Oberoi, Interpol's executive director for technology and innovation, told Reuters. "Some of the crimes may be new to this medium, some of the existing crimes will be enabled by the medium and taken to a new level," he said. Phishing and scams could operate differently when augmented reality and virtual reality are involved, Oberoi said. Virtual reality could also facilitate crime in the physical world, Oberoi said. Users may also create virtual worlds with "extremist rules," the report said.

☆ Facebook’s rules ban promoting weapons. Some gun sellers are running ads anyway.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-26 | by ( David Ingram | David Ingram Covers Tech For Nbc News. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +6 min

Gun retailers are running ads promoting firearms for sale on Facebook and Instagram, a tech industry watchdog said Wednesday in a report that shows apparent holes in how the apps enforce their own rules against ads that promote the use or sale of weapons. The company declined to comment on specific ads until it had seen the full report, which the Tech Transparency Project provided to NBC News ahead of releasing it. Tech Transparency ProjectMeta relies largely on automated systems to review ads, and it has some human reviewers. Tech Transparency ProjectGun ads have tripped up Facebook and Instagram for years, according to outside investigations. Facebook lets buyers and sellers violate its rules 10 times before they’re kicked off, The Washington Post reported in June.

☆ Metaverse-obsessed Mark Zuckerberg refuses to cut costs. It's no wonder the stock tanked
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-26 | by ( Zev Fima | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +9 min

Club holding Meta Platforms (META) reported mixed third-quarter results and weak forward guidance after the closing bell Wednesday. While beating expectations, revenue for Q3 dropped 4% to $27.71 billion. As for profitability, Family of Apps operating income came in at $9.34 billion, short versus expectations of $9.65 billion. Facebook Global Average Revenue per User (ARPU): $9.41 versus expectations of $9.83. Capital expenditures (capex) guidance was tightened to a range of $32 billion to $33 billion versus $30 billion to $34 billion previously forecast and above the $30.41 billion consensus.

☆ For widows on Facebook, updating relationship status is complicated
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-25 | by ( Samantha Murphy Kelly | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

But on Facebook (FB), these changes come with additional complications due to the limited number of relationship status options available and the impact that changes to this status can have on whether a marriage is represented on the deceased’s Facebook (FB) memorial pages. “The relationship status is such a source of deep pain when a widow chooses to proceed with a new relationship,” she wrote in the letter. A separate Change.org petition started in September 2021 received nearly 20,000 signatures asking Facebook to retain the “widowed from” status permanently and allow users to create a new relationship status if they want. Facebook also allows users to change their relationship status to “widowed” and specify a partner’s name if a partner’s account has been memorialized. Sandberg lists Bernthal as her spouse on Facebook; Goldberg’s account is a memorial page, where it lists six former places of employment.

☆ Here's what to look for when the Club's 5 tech holdings report this week
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-24 | by ( Paulina Likos | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +12 min

The world's biggest tech companies will be put under the microscope this week when they report earnings for the quarter ended Sept. 30. Club holdings Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOGL), Meta Platforms (META), Apple (AAPL) and Amazon (AMZN) have all been bogged down by inflation, weaker consumer demand and a slowing global economy. Here's what to expect when all 5 tech holdings report. At the same time, Goldman analysts predicted Microsoft's enterprise cloud computing business, Azure, would remain competitive, with 38% year-over-year growth. Apple (AAPL) Apple is set to report fiscal fourth-quarter results on Thursday.

☆ Facebook and Google face skeptics on Wall Street this week amid digital ads collapse
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-24 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Wall Street is bracing for disaster in online advertising. Facebook parent Meta shares are down more than 60% this year, and the company is expected to report a second straight drop in revenue. UBS said it would "reduce estimates and price targets across the online advertising group" due to both the economic environment and a strong U.S. dollar. In Snap's report on Thursday, the company said results are being hit by a combination of platform changes, economic challenges and competition. For a second straight quarter, Snap said it wouldn't be providing guidance for the coming period because of difficulty in predicting the economic trajectory.

☆ Facebook Says It Is Prepared to Block News Content in Canada
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-22 | by ( Paul Vieira | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

OTTAWA— Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc. has warned Canada it is prepared to block the sharing of Canadian news content—like it did in Australia last year—unless the Liberal government amends legislation that would compel big digital companies to compensate domestic media outlets. The legislation is under review by a parliamentary committee, and lawmakers voted this week to stop hearing further testimony from witnesses. Facebook said it wasn’t given an opportunity to testify, so late Friday it issued a statement outlining the company’s concerns with Canada’s proposed rules—and a warning.

☆ Snapchat leaves San Francisco, giving up its office lease in the city as part of a major reorganization
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-21 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Snapchat no longer has an office presence in San Francisco. Snap's San Francisco lease wasn't due to end until November 2024, according to another person familiar with the situation. The move is another blow to San Francisco, formerly a mecca for tech workers and glitzy modern offices. The company opened the 33,000 square foot San Francisco office in 2017, shortly after it went public that year. The company is headquartered in Los Angeles, where it has more than 400,000 square feet of office space in Santa Monica.

Under the law, which took effect this week, companies must share with authorities users' information if they post content constituting crimes, including misleading information. Social media companies are required to appoint Turkish representatives. The law has mainly been criticised for imposing jailtime on social media users and journalists spreading "disinformation", but it also builds on legislation imposed on social media companies in 2020, with much tougher measures. "I think (the law) is like a wish list - they put whatever they can think of in there," Akdeniz said. "There is an attempt to regulate social media platforms that could be a model law for authoritarian regimes."

☆ Facebook and TikTok are approving ads with ‘blatant’ misinformation about voting in midterms, researchers say
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-21 | by ( Jennifer Korn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

In an experiment, the researchers submitted 20 ads with inaccurate claims to Facebook, TikTok and YouTube. TikTok approved 90% of ads that contained blatantly false or misleading information, the researchers found. The researchers withdrew the ads after going through the approval process, if they were approved, so the ads containing misinformation were not shown to users. Last month, TikTok took additional steps to safeguard the veracity of political content ahead of the midterms. Google also took steps in September to protect against election misinformation, elevating trustworthy information and displaying it more prominently across services including search and YouTube.

☆ Snap plunges more than 25% on third-quarter revenue miss
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-20 | by ( Jonathan Vanian | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Snap shares plummeted more than 25% in extended trading on Thursday after the social media company reported weaker-than-expected revenue for the third quarter. In August, Snap announced that it would lay off 20% of the company's roughly 6,000 employees as part of a major restructuring plan. Snap added that revenue growth is likely to keep decelerating in the fourth quarter, as that period "has historically been relatively more dependent on brand-oriented advertising revenue," which declined in the latest period. Snap also ended the production of its Snap Originals premium shows. Snap debuted the subscription service in June as a way for users to access exclusive and pre-release features for $3.99 a month.

You can try to contact Facebook via email, but responses can be slow and aren't assured, either. How to contact Facebook customer supportIf you want to contact Facebook, you'll first need to log into your account. How to ask the Facebook Help Community a questionFind the Facebook Help Center from the question mark dropdown menu. Facebook; Business InsiderIf you want to contact Facebook, you'll first need to log into your account. How to contact Facebook via other social media platformsAnother way to attempt to connect with Facebook is to reach out to them through or mention them on another social media platform.

☆ Why the 'Amazonification' of startups isn't always a good thing
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-19 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Plus, we've got news on actual robots, who are threatening to pit humans against machines. That's not always a good thing. Companies love to hire Amazon alumni who inject their firms with Jeff Bezos' metrics-focused style. Amazon-trained leaders (sometimes known as "Jeff Bots") have founded more than 650 startups, and swaths have joined the industry's top C-suites, contributing to the "Amazonification" of said firms. Now, humans need to determine how to synchronize our labor with the souls of new machines — before things get out of hand.

☆ Death threats, insomnia, and near-minimum wage: A Meta customer service contractor reveals what it's like to be on the frontline of Facebook customer complaints
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-18 | by ( Lara O'Reilly | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

A Meta customer service agent working for third-party firm Teleperformance revealed the job has become so stressful, she suffers from insomnia. Because sometimes she's powerless to help Meta users, it's tough to earn productivity bonuses, she said. She can investigate, troubleshoot, and as a last resort escalate the matter to the internal Meta team. Despite not being empowered to help, Meta customer support agents are also instructed not to use words such as "sorry" or "unfortunately," Charlotte said. *This article uses a pseudonym that was chosen by Insider, which is aware of the Meta customer service contractor's real identity.

☆ Facebook said an Indian publication, The Wire, used faked documents in an investigation. Now the publication is taking the stories down. Here's a timeline of the escalating conflict.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-18 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +16 min

Facebook claims a series of reports by an Indian news site, The Wire, were based on faked documents. On Tuesday, an expert The Wire used in a story denied publicly that he commented in any way to the publication. Stone responded on Twitter saying, "as it's been clear from the outset @thewire_in's stories are based on fabrications." Varadarajan wrote on Twitter that the email account The Wire uses, a protonmail.com address, had been "hacked via the hacking of a MacBook." Kumar of The Wire deactivated his Twitter account.

☆ The Hottest App Right Now? One Where Teens Have to Say Nice Things About Each Other
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-17 | by ( Ann-Marie Alcántara | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

TBH was hot. Five years ago, the app, which prompted teens to compliment one another, topped Apple ’s App Store charts and quickly amassed millions of users in the coveted high-school demographic. Facebook snapped it up less than three months after launch—and soon shut it down. Now one of TBH’s co-creators is back with Gas, a nearly identical iPhone app. Gas asks teens multiple-choice questions about people in their school, letting them choose yearbook-style superlatives such as “the most beautiful person you have ever met” or the classmate who is “never afraid of getting in trouble.”

☆ Following Google, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg takes aim at the green and blue bubbles of Apple's iMessage
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-17 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Zuckerberg is trying to put WhatsApp above Apple's iMessage on interoperability and privacy. He posted a photo of a billboard ad from Facebook that jokes about iMessage limitations that make Android messages show up in green bubbles, while iPhone texts appear in blue bubbles. Apple CEO Tim Cook has resisted making iMessage more interoperable with Android phones because the technical difficulties help sell more iPhones. In an update to its iOS, Apple prompted its more than 1.6 billion device users to opt-out of being tracked by apps. It's not the first time Zuckerberg has attempted to come for Apple's business since it enacted its privacy changes.

☆ Amazon, Meta, and other big tech firms have entered the 'Great Hesitation' — cutting hiring and other costs in fear of an economic downturn
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-16 | by ( Rob Price | Eugene Kim | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +10 min

Leaders at large-cap tech companies are in an anxious waiting game, battening down the hatches as they prepare for the storm to hit. Some tech firms will be hurt moreAmong the biggest players in the tech industry, the impacts of a crash will not be felt evenly. "I look at these large tech companies, and over the last couple of years, obviously money's been free, everything got bloated, and all these tech companies — excluding Apple — have effectively doubled their head count over a three-year period, right? Beyond head count, tech companies are cutting back on extras, imperiling their famously lavish meal options. The largest tech companies are also signaling their anxiety by trimming budgets for their more experimental businesses and research projects.

☆ How to Build a Metaverse
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-14 | by ( The Journal. | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Over the past year, the tech world has been abuzz about the metaverse. But there is a metaverse that has been up and running for decades. It is called Second Life and it was created by a small San Francisco company named Linden Lab. In a new four-part podcast series from The Journal, producer Annie Minoff heads back into that largely forgotten virtual world to tell the story of the metaverse we already have, and what it reveals about the one that is coming. We hear from the founder of Linden Lab and early employees, and people who have had lives in this world for years.

☆ It's time for Mark Zuckerberg to step down
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-13 | by ( Linette Lopez | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

Mark Zuckerberg should quit. He should step down from his position as CEO of Meta and let someone else manage Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram. Zuckerberg was so excited about legs that he jumped for joy as he talked about them. Zuckerberg already has two very profitable platforms — Facebook and Instagram — but their popularity is declining. Internally, employees told the Times, Meta workers refer to metaverse projects as MMH, or "Make Mark Happy,'' projects.

☆ How Amazon acquires companies, and what makes it want to buy a firm 'right now'
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

For starters, the company is hosting its second major sale event of the year, its two-day Prime Early Access Sale. Prime members can expect to get some holiday shopping knocked out with deals on everything from Amazon devices to kitchen tools. The e-commerce giant has been on a shopping spree this year, snapping up companies from One Medical to iRobot. As Amazon reaches hundreds of billions of dollars in sales, it needs to move beyond its traditional retail and cloud businesses. The Prime Early Access Sale starts today and will continue until tomorrow, offering early access to holiday deals.

☆ Meta employees proposed marketing its $399 virtual-reality headsets to people who will get student debt relief, a report says
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Grace Kay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Meta workers considered advertising VR headsets to federal student debt relief recipients. Three employees said the ad proposal could boost sales by 20%, The New York Times reported. The Times reported that it did not look like Meta had implemented the idea. What's more, even some Meta employees appear disillusioned with Zuckerberg's plans. Meanwhile, Insider's Kali Hays previously reported Meta was conducting "quiet layoffs" that could impact as much as 15% of the company's workforce.

☆ The era of the Big Tech moonshot is over
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-29 | by ( Jordan Parker Erb | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Each of these ideas is a "moonshot," or a radical, potentially world-changing project that Big Tech companies have worked on in recent years. Is the era of Big Tech moonshots over? For years, companies like Amazon, Google, and Facebook dumped money and energy into radical, potentially world-changing projects. But recently, Big Tech firms have been scaling back their ambitions — and have instead turned to a Wall Street-appeasing pragmatism. It comes after Amazon workers of all types have been pushing for higher pay for years.

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