Antitrust Investigation for Facebook and Google

-

    Facebook, do we really trust it? Do they really care about their users? Seven states and Washington DC have issued an anti-trust investigation into Facebook. Facebook certainly does not have the best record when it comes to keeping their user's privacy private. The states feel an overwhelming amount of responsibility in order to determine if Facebook's actions put users at risk by "endangering consumer data, reducing the quality of consumer choices or increasing the price of advertising." The investigation will look into data surrounding these three concerns with a large focus on breaking privacy and trust policies with users. 
     With that being said, this investigation also hopes to draw answers to the question if other social media platforms and competing networks are also being affected. The increased risk of harm stemming from Silicon Valley companies is raising a lot of red flags for the population and Facebook is not the sole company getting hit with accusations. Google will also be highly looked at under the microscope. 
     In the near future, I believe we will be seeing a lot more regulatory measures surrounding large technology companies and social media companies. However, in the defense of large tech companies, consumers also need to do their homework and read into terms and conditions pages. It is hard to defend against a technology company who, for the most part, allowed you to read what you were getting yourself into. I think policymakers and tech company owners have a lot of work to do in order to gain the trust of the people while also making sure that the policies do not infringe upon the rights of the companies. 
     All in all I do not think Facebook and Google have consumer's best interest in mind, a consumer is a mere set of dollar signs to them. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Creation of the Internet

-
Image
The creation of the Internet has been one of the most groundbreaking technologies our world has seen today. Without the internet you could not even be reading this blog right now! Here is a quick timeline of how the internet came to be leading up to before the World Wide Web was created.            1962 JCR Licklider proposes idea of having a networks of computers communicate 1969 The first message from one computer was sent to another using ARPANET(Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) which was the government’s internet network. One computer at UCLA sent a message to another computer at Stanford saying "Login". Only the first two letters were sent but this was the first time any type of messaging between two computers had been successful.  1969-1970: Other computer networks added all across the world in Hawaii an London to name a few major ones. But there needed to be a way for all computers to communicate even if they were not on the same n
Read more

Columbus Day or Indigenous People Day?

-
     The ever affluent notion of today's society to challenge national traditions and holidays continues with the rise of Indigenous People Day. Indigenous People Day is the new proposed name for Columbus Day. Columbus Day was originally found as a national holiday by President Roosevelt in 1937 to celebrate European expansion into America. In other words, the "fusion" of two cultures coming together.        Activists in support of a more diverse American history are in favor of erasing the Columbus from Columbus Day. The idea stems from the fact that the indigenous people were here first so really they should be the ones receiving the credit.   The governor of Maine as well as Senator Elizabeth Warren are both highly in favor of the name change and claim that there is a high amount of power in the name in which we choose to honor.       The author of the article linked below discusses the fact that changing the name is a small way of changing American his
Read more

Snapchat: Diffusion of Innovations

-
Image
             Picture from Forbes website             Snapchat is one of the most popular social media platforms used today. Users primarily fall in the range of 13 to 24 years old, so clearly a younger demographic. Forbes magazine featured an article  on Snapchat’s success in 2018. Using the Diffusion of Innovations Theory as a lens to look into the history of the app, it’s success is clearly evident.             The pioneer and innovator stage of Snapchat is an interesting beginning. The idea actually occurred through a conversation between two students Bobby Murphy and Evan Spiegel, who attended Stanford University, about the concept of disappearing pictures. Therefore, Snapchat was born. However, what a lot of people do not know is that the app actually started as a mobile website under the name Picaboo. It was not until July 2011 that the app we all know and love was created as Snapchat the mobile app.             The app was off to a slow start with
Read more