Mark Zuckerberg, In It To Change the World? 268
schmidt349 submitted a story about Zuckerberg that might fly in the face of what you've heard of the guy in the past. "Award-winning New York Times journalist David Kirkpatrick's new book The Facebook Effect presents readers with a complex view of Facebook's founder and CEO. Primed by hours of conversation and research deep into the history of the social network, Kirkpatrick reaches the conclusion that money isn't a primary motivation for Zuckerberg, 'a coder more than a CEO, a philosopher more than a businessman, a 26-year-old who has consistently avoided selling out because he sees Facebook as his way to change the world.' Kirkpatrick deftly handles the controversy surrounding Facebook's sometimes cavalier attitude toward user privacy, and the result is a much more balanced and less sensationalist account of Facebook's past, present, and future."
Re:Well Obviously. (Score:1, Interesting)
the actual application is trivial save for the scaling to millions of users... i just built a custom framework on my own web server... one for each circle of friends or family. it works just as good and won't reject your video if it detects copyrighted music playing in the background as forced by the RIAA.
independent is the only way to go.
So what does he want? (Score:3, Interesting)
If that's really true (which i'm certainly willing entertain doubts about) does he want to reduce privacy because he really believes that's what best for everyone? Or if he's not in it for money is he in it for power? Does he just like knowing everything about everyone, and making a profit off of that knowledge is a side game to him? I'm really not sure which of those would be worse. The first case is a lot less despicable, but it's also a lot more threatening if you think that a certain amount of privacy is a good thing.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:1, Interesting)
The next new set of 13 year olds will be looking for something different to their parents/older siblings
geocites-> myspace -> bebo -> facebook -> same again with a different logo and start up capital.
How these companies get valued is just flawed......
This book looks like just the latest PR spun masterbateography
Is there such a thing as a Philosopher-thief? (Score:5, Interesting)
It was my understanding that Zuckerberg was a thief at his very core. Always an opportunist looking to earn off of things he doesn't have any right to possess. This included the photos that started Harvard's Facebook, much of the original code and concept, and continues to this day with examples like the email accounts used to connect to Facebook and their password information. I think this understanding of him is probably accurate.
That being said, wouldn't being a thief preclude the label of 'philosopher'? Isn't the harm caused by theft and the social implications of a world where theft is permissible one of the earliest, simplest hurdles that a 'thinker' must cross to become noteworthy? I'm not up on the stuff, but I'm not aware of any ethos that includes 'rutheless slimeball' as a virtuous-knower of wise things.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
When are we going to stop this sycophantic worship of sociopaths who happen to get rich by screwing over others?
They aren't sociopaths. That would be a medical condition beyond their control; They have a diminished sense of right and wrong. No, what they are is far worse: They deliberately ignore social values and mores for their own profit. And this shouldn't come as a surprise. Amongst the wealthy I have learned they have a common social trait that is decidedly uncommong amongst the working class: The ability to turn charm on and off at a whim. These are people who are nice to you, and mean to the waiter. They are not nice people, and it's something they're socialized to do.
See, the problem goes deeper than you think: A minority of this society trains its children to prey on one another. And those who work their way up from working class to the upper class are shunned for this -- because they are "new money", as in new to the game, not new to wealth.
And you wonder why we worship these kinds of people? Easy: Because we only see what they have, not what they are. They're predators in the purest sense -- exemplifying the exact traits that allowed humans to become the dominant form of life on this planet.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
Really? I'd say perhaps in the preceding five thousand years, but before that we had no walled cities, no mass graves, no weapons meant only for killing humans, no organized warfare, and very little heirarchy. Our current violent, hierarchical culture is an aberration brought about by our invention of agriculture and animal husbandry, our settling down, and subsequent inability to move on when drought and famine hit.
Re:The 'authorized' biography (Score:5, Interesting)
I propose that like Tony "I want my life back" Hayward, we give Mark a catchy phrase in his name.
Mark "Dumb fucks trust me" Zuckerberg sounds kinda nice.
Re:Pffft. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:5, Interesting)
.. and poor people reproduce more than wealthy. So what?
Also, I see that many of us underestimate cooperation. If pure selfishness would be the true way, then there would be no multicellular species -- like us. The fact that we have an imprinted idea of "justice" and we are disturbed by acts of sociopathy shows how deeply imprinted is social behavior.
Re:Well Obviously. (Score:2, Interesting)
So don't use it? (Score:1, Interesting)
It's a private service, not government supplied. If you do not agree with it's terms of service, then by all means DON'T USE IT! If you didn't bother to read the terms and signed up anyway because everyone else is, then you live with the consequences.
You really don't have to be on facebook... If enough of a consumer base disagree with the practices, a competitor will emerge and users can be divided amongst the various social network websites.
That being said, I do believe that Facebook has to have a reasonable method of informing it's membership to changes of terms of service... but I believe in most cases this has been done. It's just this particular user base (wahhh privacy wahhh) ignored the change and kept using it while whining about it, or didn't bother to keep themselves informed.
That's right, read this: (Score:2, Interesting)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/jan/14/facebook [guardian.co.uk]
Stay clear of failbook.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
The fact that we have an imprinted idea of "justice" and we are disturbed by acts of sociopathy shows how deeply imprinted is social behavior.
And a small minority has always existed that manipulates that sense of justice and cooperation for its own ends. A lot of us labor under the illusion that we're equal, but we aren't, we can't be. Humans organize into hierarchial models, with most working and some directing (and profiting?) off of that work. We are cooperative in that most of us are followers, but for that to work some of us must be leaders. This playing of roles is something any individual human being can do, but few actualize that potential. And there are some groups of people that have learned to not only actualize that potential, but train others in how to occupy the leadership positions. And they don't make many babies -- because there isn't much room for competition amongst that class.
I'm sorry to reduce human behavior to such a depressing and simple model, but you can't deny thousands of years of human evolution, which show that in almost every society wealth is concentrated amongst a small number of people.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
For most of our time on this planet, we have not had hierarchical societies. They are a recent invention, only appearing in the last five thousand years or so.
We have natural leaders, and natural followers, and there are more natural followers than leaders, of course. You say, there must be leaders for society to work, but you do realize that followers are even more crucial, right? Lacking leaders, followers will just do what their parents did, and most of the time this works. Lacking followers, leaders are less than useless, as their focus is not on day to day survival. The leader without followers gets eaten by a lion as he contemplates some far off goal.
And genetically speaking, we are not speaking of classes or castes but genetic variations. Get too many leadership genes and you end up screwed up with OCD or other mental illnesses. Leaders don't breed true, and followers can birth leaders. There is no 'top spot' that leaders are in competition for, leaders are not 'better' than their followers, just different.
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
It just happens that, in a world where most individuals cooperate, the sociopaths win, while in a world where most people are sociopaths, those that cooperate lose a little bit less that those that don't.
Game theory FTW
Re:What a conveniently timed puff piece (Score:3, Interesting)
Read up on the dictator game and the public goods game. When cooperators are allowed to punish non-cooperation, sociopaths lose. Punishing free riders is part of being cooperative. Game theory FTW, again!
Re:Well Obviously. (Score:3, Interesting)