I'd suspected for years about such quizzes. Initially, I assumed the posts to calculate your (porn/movie/etc) name was a low grade phishing exercise as it asked you to mix personal data that are often used in security questions (eg first pet name plus mothers maiden name). This is a whole new level, but entirely unsurprising. Facebook is a data mining platform. Remembering that is nothing but a good thing.
When #first7jobs started trending on Twitter last year, I assumed it was a phishing attack - I've been covering such for years - and it turns out that two major banks were using jobs.. one was first job, the other was second job.
I remember in 2000's there was a sex quiz that spread like a worm where you answered personal questions. My friend sent me a link and of course I answered all the details for him to read. Then I sent my link wanting for revenge etc. I can't remember what was my motivation to answer, maybe I was young and just thought it's cool. I do know what was the motivation to spread it further...
I'm not impressed. Did anyone notice that Cambridge Analytics did not work for Ted Cruz? I mean he did win Texas and the great plains states, but those were his most-winnable locations from the beginning due to his consistent conservatism and other nominees dropping out. He even lost the south, which should have been his other target, presumably due to being off-wavelength with southern voters, something the analytics data should have helped him with. Cambridge Analytics and their Facebook questionnaires don't seem to be very effective.
Ted Cruz is probably more to blame in this case than Cambridge; he came across to many as supremely unlikeable/comically phony and clearly lost the mud slinging fights with Trump that dominated the Republican primaries. Whatever benefit Cambridge bestowed probably wasn't enough to turn Ted Cruz into a serious Presidential candidate. In more colloquial terms, perhaps even the most effective data targeting can't polish a turd.
I imagine we'd be equally unimpressed with other early tech.
imho, our concern should be of an extrapolative nature. we can guess where this will be in 5 or 10 years, nevermind Ted Cruz' future electoral successes. and we know how easy people are to psychologically "nudge". (sorry for assuming our agreement there)
> Cambridge Analytics and their Facebook questionnaires don't seem to be very effective.
So, nothing speaks against nipping that in the bud, right?
It's like a tiny person with no tools sneaking around your house to murder your whole family; sure you could ignore them, at least at the moment, but why would you?
Actually, the following states were lost by Cruz and have open primaries:
Alabama,
Arkansas,
Georgia,
Illinois,
Indiana,
Mississippi,
Missouri,
North Carolina (All races' primaries open for unaffiliated voters only),
South Carolina
I've been warning friends and family about this for years. It's incredible how much information people will give about themselves to get totally inane information. This "psy-ops" stuff is shady and scary, and I guarantee you that most voters have no idea it's happening.
> I've been warning friends and family about this for years.
How did it work out? I tried the same too, but it was falling into deaf years. Most common response. "Sean beta (means son in hindi). You are being excessively paranoid. Facebook is a closed community, and I only share info with friends and family, so don't worry."
And yet for all their magic, they were just as wrong about the outcome of the election:
You might think from a casual reading of the Cambridge Analytica press release that they predicted the outcome of the election. They did not. A company spokesman called reporters before election day to say that Trump had only a 20 per cent chance of winning.
I'm not sure I get this logic. If I told someone they had a 16.6% chance of rolling a die and getting a 6, and then they proceed to roll the die and get a 6, would you laugh and tell me that I was wrong?
Seriously. Why do we allow this kind of data collection. This is ridiculous.
Edit: the commenter who responded has pointed out that this is phrased fairly accusatory. Should the fact that there is probably a data cloud out there about me being used to manipulate me through subliminal type messaging not be upsetting? I don't think I have ever signed up for a service with the expectation that whatever information is collected will be collated in some over-arching cloud used for more things than just the service provided to me by the site. Maybe somewhere in a 30 page terms of service document, it said that, and I clicked "agree" upon skimming it. But should that really be enough?
Edit 2: Here's an idea: charge me $3/month to use your service without ads, and with full expectation that my data will not be sold or used inappropriately (you can give it to the govt. if they need it for security reasons, I don't care). I currently pay for e-mail without ads from both outlook and mail.com and would gladly do the same for a pure facebook / gmail / google search / etc service.
Has anyone been able to validate or correlate the claims in this article? It's an opinion piece without a lot of verifiable references or data. Seems like it is, to some degree, describing itself.
Meh, big deal. Like the Obama campaigns were't good at "weaponizing" all web tools they could find.
Note how the examples proposed are all GOTV efforts targeted to the R base rather than anything appealing larger slices of the electorate. Despite all this black magic, R turnout wasn't that impressive and Trump lost the popular vote. Where it might have helped a little bit is in exploiting weaknesses that Dems shouldn't have had in the first place, i.e. Clinton's baggage, to reduce D turnout in key states, but again, that's more the Democrats' fault for fielding such a candidate knowing very well that she had such baggage.
> In this election, dark posts were used to try to suppress the African-American vote. According to Bloomberg, the Trump campaign sent ads...
Really? Sending ads is suppressing the vote of certain people? Like the soviet union suppressed dissenters by sending them to the gulag?
I don't think so. But I think the New York Times has a secret agenda of its own, I just don't know what it is. Portraying the election as somehow "unfair" could result in civil unrest, who could possibly want that?
> In this election, dark posts were used to try to suppress the African-American vote. According to Bloomberg, the Trump campaign sent ads reminding certain selected black voters of Hillary Clinton’s infamous “super predator” line. It targeted Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood with messages about the Clinton Foundation’s troubles in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake.
How is this suppressing the vote? It's giving potential voters accurate information about your opponent. Frankly, how is it any different from Mr. Biden shouting, 'they're gonna put y'all back in chains!' — other than the former being true and probably in good taste?
An answer to how this is different is provided in literally the next sentence of the article.
>Federal Election Commission rules are unclear when it comes to Facebook posts, but even if they do apply and the facts are skewed and the dog whistles loud, the already weakening power of social opprobrium is gone when no one else sees the ad you see — and no one else sees “I’m Donald Trump, and I approved this message.”
"Mr. Zuckerberg is young, still skeptical that his radiant transparency machine could be anything but a force for good" This is naive bordering on delusional. I think Zuckerberg knows the real deal. Considering quotes like these:
Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard
Zuck: Just ask.
Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS
[Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one?
Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don't know why.
Zuck: They "trust me"
Zuck: Dumb fucks"
> In the immediate wake of Mr. Trump’s surprise election
How was it a surprise? With huge crowd sizes at his rallies (that NYT didn't show, but RSBN for example did), strong populist message that worked, and the awful candidate the other side put up (while sadly destroying Bernie), I was not surprised.
Is it just me starting to really have enough of "secret agendas" of Facebook and other internet giants? What the hell are the legislators doing? Even if you say that the advertising-based business model is OK where do you draw the line? Do they really need to know what kind of a psychologic personality I am and what kind of porn I watch ?! (exaggerating... but who knows nowadays)
Anyway, I eventually set up a placholder Facebook account. Once I typed my name into the setup form, they provided a frighteningly detailed list of friends and acquaintances. Since then, due to "do you know" emails, I get the impression they slurp other people's call and sms logs (or maybe just contacts, if FB types are more OCD about address books than me) into their social network graph.
Anyway, it is not much of an exaggeration to say that facebook gets more metadata to sell every time you make a phone call, regardless of whether you have an account.
(Of course, I don't have their software installed on any of my devices. However, I did give them my phone number for 2FA purposes. How naive I was. Assuming the phone app grabs people's address books and/or call logs, they probably had it before I gave it to them)
> If Mr. Zuckerberg takes seriously his oft-stated commitments to diversity and openness, he must grapple honestly with the fact that Facebook is no longer just a social network. It’s an advertising medium that’s now dangerously easy to weaponize.
The story is chilling. It more or less proves that Trump campaign and the Billionaire Republican donor who owns the Data Analytics site used Facebook to profile people and send targeted "fear" stories to them and swing the vote away from Clinton.
I'm not sure how the Dem's will compete with this going forward. Maybe it will become taboo and they won't have to. Maybe they already are.. I hope they don't go too deep into the mud on this.
It's almost impressive though how well the Republicans, and Trump specifically, are employing these, IMHO shady, tactics.
Is it scandalous how little scandal is made of all this(the FUD, populist rhetoric, phycological manipulation, etc)? I can imagine how this would be spun if "evil Hillary" was found to be targeting people with "dark posts".
Chilling. In fact, you could say it was a "fear" story.
All it's missing is the billionaire pulling the strings - except if you look at the tag line at the end you see it was written by someone who is an Open Society Fellow.
You know, those fellowships from the Open Society Foundation that are funded by Billionaire Democrat donor George Soros.
Did this article make you feel any negativity towards Trump and the Republicans?
If so, then for Soros, this was money on dark articles well spent.
Swaying votes away from one's opponents is the definition of running for office.
Back in 2008 the Obama campaign ran a very successful information shop and was widely lauded for it; why is it now chilling when a different candidate does the same thing?
[+] [-] ENTP|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ChuckMcM|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] caseysoftware|9 years ago|reply
Two for one is a good deal.
[+] [-] angry-hacker|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dpweb|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mjfl|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SnakePlissken|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] patcon|9 years ago|reply
imho, our concern should be of an extrapolative nature. we can guess where this will be in 5 or 10 years, nevermind Ted Cruz' future electoral successes. and we know how easy people are to psychologically "nudge". (sorry for assuming our agreement there)
[+] [-] drinkjuice|9 years ago|reply
So, nothing speaks against nipping that in the bud, right?
It's like a tiny person with no tools sneaking around your house to murder your whole family; sure you could ignore them, at least at the moment, but why would you?
[+] [-] forgetsusername|9 years ago|reply
2. Cruz was an establishment candidate. This electorate wanted an outsider.
[+] [-] narrowrail|9 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_primaries_in_the_United_S...
Actually, the following states were lost by Cruz and have open primaries:
Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina (All races' primaries open for unaffiliated voters only), South Carolina
[+] [-] techwizrd|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sean_patel|9 years ago|reply
How did it work out? I tried the same too, but it was falling into deaf years. Most common response. "Sean beta (means son in hindi). You are being excessively paranoid. Facebook is a closed community, and I only share info with friends and family, so don't worry."
[+] [-] fovc|9 years ago|reply
You might think from a casual reading of the Cambridge Analytica press release that they predicted the outcome of the election. They did not. A company spokesman called reporters before election day to say that Trump had only a 20 per cent chance of winning.
Source: http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/12/the-british-data-cruncher...
[+] [-] gareim|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] endless1234|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] forgetsusername|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] divbit|9 years ago|reply
Edit: the commenter who responded has pointed out that this is phrased fairly accusatory. Should the fact that there is probably a data cloud out there about me being used to manipulate me through subliminal type messaging not be upsetting? I don't think I have ever signed up for a service with the expectation that whatever information is collected will be collated in some over-arching cloud used for more things than just the service provided to me by the site. Maybe somewhere in a 30 page terms of service document, it said that, and I clicked "agree" upon skimming it. But should that really be enough?
Edit 2: Here's an idea: charge me $3/month to use your service without ads, and with full expectation that my data will not be sold or used inappropriately (you can give it to the govt. if they need it for security reasons, I don't care). I currently pay for e-mail without ads from both outlook and mail.com and would gladly do the same for a pure facebook / gmail / google search / etc service.
[+] [-] notyourwork|9 years ago|reply
"Why do we allow people to voluntarily hand over their own information at their own will?"
Sounds much different when its phrase properly and not accusatory.
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] lstroud|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toyg|9 years ago|reply
Note how the examples proposed are all GOTV efforts targeted to the R base rather than anything appealing larger slices of the electorate. Despite all this black magic, R turnout wasn't that impressive and Trump lost the popular vote. Where it might have helped a little bit is in exploiting weaknesses that Dems shouldn't have had in the first place, i.e. Clinton's baggage, to reduce D turnout in key states, but again, that's more the Democrats' fault for fielding such a candidate knowing very well that she had such baggage.
[+] [-] 08-15|9 years ago|reply
Really? Sending ads is suppressing the vote of certain people? Like the soviet union suppressed dissenters by sending them to the gulag?
I don't think so. But I think the New York Times has a secret agenda of its own, I just don't know what it is. Portraying the election as somehow "unfair" could result in civil unrest, who could possibly want that?
[+] [-] wtbob|9 years ago|reply
How is this suppressing the vote? It's giving potential voters accurate information about your opponent. Frankly, how is it any different from Mr. Biden shouting, 'they're gonna put y'all back in chains!' — other than the former being true and probably in good taste?
N.b.: I did not vote for President Trump.
[+] [-] mattnewton|9 years ago|reply
>Federal Election Commission rules are unclear when it comes to Facebook posts, but even if they do apply and the facts are skewed and the dog whistles loud, the already weakening power of social opprobrium is gone when no one else sees the ad you see — and no one else sees “I’m Donald Trump, and I approved this message.”
[+] [-] RichardHeart|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aw3c2|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] imron|9 years ago|reply
So basically, it's counter propaganda.
[+] [-] potatosoup|9 years ago|reply
How was it a surprise? With huge crowd sizes at his rallies (that NYT didn't show, but RSBN for example did), strong populist message that worked, and the awful candidate the other side put up (while sadly destroying Bernie), I was not surprised.
[+] [-] IshKebab|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Propen|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kome|9 years ago|reply
It helps to keep some mental ecology.
[+] [-] hedora|9 years ago|reply
Anyway, I eventually set up a placholder Facebook account. Once I typed my name into the setup form, they provided a frighteningly detailed list of friends and acquaintances. Since then, due to "do you know" emails, I get the impression they slurp other people's call and sms logs (or maybe just contacts, if FB types are more OCD about address books than me) into their social network graph.
Anyway, it is not much of an exaggeration to say that facebook gets more metadata to sell every time you make a phone call, regardless of whether you have an account.
(Of course, I don't have their software installed on any of my devices. However, I did give them my phone number for 2FA purposes. How naive I was. Assuming the phone app grabs people's address books and/or call logs, they probably had it before I gave it to them)
[+] [-] dominotw|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] sctb|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mulla111|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] sean_patel|9 years ago|reply
The story is chilling. It more or less proves that Trump campaign and the Billionaire Republican donor who owns the Data Analytics site used Facebook to profile people and send targeted "fear" stories to them and swing the vote away from Clinton.
Fear is a great motivator.
[+] [-] Rapzid|9 years ago|reply
It's almost impressive though how well the Republicans, and Trump specifically, are employing these, IMHO shady, tactics.
Is it scandalous how little scandal is made of all this(the FUD, populist rhetoric, phycological manipulation, etc)? I can imagine how this would be spun if "evil Hillary" was found to be targeting people with "dark posts".
[+] [-] jlarocco|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] imron|9 years ago|reply
Chilling. In fact, you could say it was a "fear" story.
All it's missing is the billionaire pulling the strings - except if you look at the tag line at the end you see it was written by someone who is an Open Society Fellow.
You know, those fellowships from the Open Society Foundation that are funded by Billionaire Democrat donor George Soros.
Did this article make you feel any negativity towards Trump and the Republicans?
If so, then for Soros, this was money on dark articles well spent.
[+] [-] wtbob|9 years ago|reply
Swaying votes away from one's opponents is the definition of running for office.
Back in 2008 the Obama campaign ran a very successful information shop and was widely lauded for it; why is it now chilling when a different candidate does the same thing?
N.b.: I did not vote for President Trump.
[+] [-] YYZoroaster|9 years ago|reply