Mark Zuckerberg, owner of Facebook and loser of every Jesse Eisenberg look alike contest ever, was questioned by Congress about his involvement in the Cambridge Analytica debacle. The House Energy & Commerce Department softballed some questions to the Tech mogul, mainly because Facebook gifted the department over $60k. They asked Zuckerberg what he thinks his punishment should be. That’s real progressive parenting from Congress. It’s about the only progressive thing they’ve done in 20 years.
“Hey Marky, seems like you sold out the psyche of the American people to the highest bidder, leaving everyone feeling betrayed, unsure of what’s real and whether they can trust you or not. Do you think you did something wrong or would you like to sit in front of us with an awkward smile and eat ice cream all day?”
“Senators, I’m going to go with the ice cream option and continue my course of action proving to the world that Democracy is under the control of tech giants who enjoy being worshipped by the people for their worship of Capitalism! But we can all start a Facebook argument about what ice cream flavor I should eat and whether or not it’s racist because cows are from India!”
Zuckerberg’s response was “we need to make it so American companies can innovate even if it’s with features that seem invasive!” Which is code for “Let us root around in your psyche so we can get you to buy shit while being afraid of everything! And then sell you more shit!” Using technology and apps we’re basically conditioned to quell our fear with consumerism. Which works great since the far left is literally terrified about everything in this administration. Fear is always good for business. I believe that was McDonald’s original ad campaign explaining why their mascot is a creepy Clown.
So the question really comes down to trust. Can we trust Facebook? No. Did we trust Facebook? Yes. If we didn’t we wouldn’t have collapsed our MySpaces and Livejournals like a dying star to move a new platform and build a universe of our thoughts, feelings, desires, relationship statues and meaningless food photos. At this point there is so much our digital DNA on Facebook they can make clones out of 2 billion of us and unleash it upon the planet to either destroy it or run fun What if scenarios!
Zuckerberg’s trail...or what it really was; an excuse to finally wear his Sunday best and pretend to look professional...it proved that these companies are all in it to turn a buck any way they can. First it was trying to sell us on buying ads for ourselves. Then it was just getting corporations to change the game on advertising. And now it’s selling our personal, private data to whoever has the biggest check and some fun fancy tricks.
It’s like the worst magician ever! Keep your eye on the puppy gifs, while I take your fears, passions and personal information and….now it’s an ad for gun control and Nissan preying on your psyche!
And this really is a betrayal of trust to most of us! We trusted these tech giants and it turns out they’re doing exactly what our paranoid cousin said they were doing. We really did pour a lot of our trust into them. Anytime you need an answer, we Google it. Bam, the answer is right at your fingertips! We were ready to burn down libraries in the name of Google. Bing couldn’t even incite a book burning.
We trusted Google with all the answers so much that we even changed the term “Let’s search for it” or “Let’s research it” to “Google it!” It’s a noun and a verb! When other search engines come about they’re described as “Googley”. It’s an adjective now too!
Facebook was supposed to connect the world and help the spread of ideas and discourse but now we can’t trust whose profile is infected with a data mining bug and who’s just troll. Amazon helps us acquire our things and Apple spreads this technology. And all these companies have betrayed our trust.
Amazon is trying to go for a monopoly of all things and treats its employees like crap. Apple is hiding money off shores, doesn’t treat its employees overseas very well and keeps updating itself constantly. We get it Apple, you want to better yourself, but do you need to tell us everyday that you’re better than you were before? Can we take it back to like a monthly update?
And this betrayal is going all the up the corporate ladder with the most recent YouTube Adpocalypse. Advertisers pulled away from Youtube, which is owned by Google, because their ads were showing up on channels that promoted Neo-Nazi philosophies, pedophilia, and...Comedian Jimmy Dore.
Ok, I know it sounds like I just equated Jimmy Dore to Neo Nazis and pedophiles, but that’s how CNN reported this story. They talk about how advertisers like Nissan Leaf and Disney are pulling away from Youtube because their ads are showing on videos that did not match their brand ideologies...and then they just drop Jimmy Dore’s name in there like he’s part of the same riff raff as these Neo Nazis.
“Oh those anti-war, pro-truth Comedians, you what they like? Bigotry, Eugenics and the Fury of the Dark Lord Satan himself...with a side of pedophilia. Buy a Nissan!”
When corporations can’t trust other corporations to get us sheep to buy their shit, you know it’s a real big mess! It’s the problem with the Polytheism of Consumerism, too many choices. And Facebook was collaborating with Cambridge Analytica to help us decrease the burden of choices.
Unfortunately the choice that was being taken away was about the leadership of this country. Leadership is being used as loose as Steve Bannon’s skin. These tech companies do play a part in the way the country and the world is run. And with their advancements they can control what we see, buy and vote for. But there are alternatives platforms popping up. From Steemit, to Minds.com to Mastadon, there are plenty of social media and information platforms we can join and try to put our trust into.