People are upset to the point where they are deleting their Facebook accounts. Yesterday morning, NPR commented that folks were waiting to hear from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and were surprised he had not as yet addressed this issue. I guess his team was still crafting his statement as he did not say anything until this afternoon. Even when he spoke and apologized, it sounded like blah-blah written by a PR firm. I am sure that if Eduardo Saverin and the Winklevoss twins were involved in the company, Facebook would have never come to this.
I believe that the only way to fight something like this is to bury companies like Cambridge Analytica in a tsunami of disinformation. How would they process it? What would they do with it? They would be stymied and neutered and we could all go back to enjoyed what Facebook is really meant for: cheering us up with cute kitten and baby goat videos.
Whatever am I talking about? Disinformation? Here is a long rambling sample of posts in the spirit of what I am talking about.
- I am gay, I am not gay, but gay is OK, when I am not anti-gay.
- Trump? I love the guy. Don’t like his hair. Where does he get those long ties? Pretty wife, Marla, right? I don’t like it when he tweets. Actually, I am not a huge fan.
- Alexander Nix is the president of Cambridge Analytica. Nix? Nixon? Coindcidence? (cue the Twilight Zone theme.)
- We should invite Kim Jong-un for Trump’s army parade thing. At that time, we can either negotiate a reconciliation with his country or brainwash him. I am OK with either.
- Hilary? Poor dear. Bless her heart, what made her think she could beat a man. Actually, she is as good as any man, maybe better. I love her policy on taxes but most definitely against raising them.
- Speaking of Hilary and Kim Jong-un, do they buy their pantsuits at the same place?
- Putin? I know the boy. Good man. Loves his country. Loves to be in charge. I kinda have a man crush on him. Hate what he has done in the Ukraine. When I next see him, I will most def ask him to consider term limits.
- I sure hope President Nixon puts J. Edgar Hoover on the job to investigate Russian influence pedaling in our last election.
- And then, of course, there is global warming. What a crock of science. Where do these guys get off analyzing data? Where do they even find this so-called data? It was probably hacked from Instabook or Facegram. It was probably Snipchatted or Twhatted. It has to be bogus except for on those days in February when it is 70-degree days. Then it kinda makes sense.
- The New York Yankees? Love it when they lose. Hate em when they win. But, I still want them to win the world series.
- Native Americans? Never cared for the Cleveland Indians, but love the Redksins, and the Stanford… what are they again? Ah yes, Indians that live in pine trees and get magically transformed into cardinals. I sure wish Fidel Castro would explain that in his next four-hour long speech.
- As for marriages? They should all be arranged. Let’s rev up the heat on the melting pot, let's enact a law that requires everyone to marry someone from a different race and religion.
- Gun control? All against it, except that teachers should be armed to the teeth with both guns and grenades. As Mike Royko once wrote, the teachers should not put themselves or their students in harm’s way. They should use the grenades to clear out the hallways before venturing out of their classrooms
Good points and funny confusion. I'm sure, though, their analysts would write some code to exclude outliers or questionable entries. I think the problem is systematic: why there' unsolicited anything (junk mail, spam, robocalls)? Because lawmakers create loopholes. It's as simple as that. Thankfully we don't get nighttime robocalls, because... Most likely if we did the outrage would have been tremendous. But during the day? Sure, the phone rings every hour. The system allowes it. There lies the issue to be solved.
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