General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWOW!Facebook investor, former advisor venture capitalist Roger McNamee
told a committee hearing in Ottawa today that social media platforms should be shut down until they can be reformed.
"If your goals are to protect democracy and personal liberty, you have to be bold. You have to force a radical transformation of the business model of internet platforms," venture capitalist Roger McNamee told the House of Commons privacy and ethics committee Tuesday morning.
WOW WOW AND MORE WOW!
"At the end of the day, though, the most effective path to reform would be to shut down the platforms at least temporarily.
. Any country can go first. The platforms have left you no choice. The time has come to call their bluff."
more at
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/facebook-grand-committee-tuesday-1.5152436
bahrbearian
(13,466 posts)Mr.Bill
(24,103 posts)Be careful what you wish for.
Hekate
(90,189 posts)Will any Western democracy have the guts? The howling from FB devotees will shake the Earth -- so it's going to take a lot of spine.
zooks
(308 posts)Canada's Parliament as they didn't show up to a hearing. That attitude makes clear that they have no plans to regulate Facebook themselves in any meaningful way. Very shocking to hear a Venture Capitalist call for such drastic governmental intervention.
Ford_Prefect
(7,817 posts)2naSalit
(86,048 posts)UpInArms
(51,252 posts)Content
Edit
The book heavily criticizes U.S. foreign policy and the widely accepted idea that "all economic growth benefits humankind, and that the greater the growth, the more widespread the benefits.",[3] suggesting that in many cases only a small portion of the population benefits at the expense of the rest, with the example including increasing income inequality where large U.S. companies exploit cheap labor and oil companies destroy local environment.[3] Perkins describes what he calls a system of corporatocracy and greed as the driving force behind establishing the United States as a global empire, in which he took a role as an "economic hit man" to expand its influence.
According to his book, Perkins' function was to convince the political and financial leadership of underdeveloped countries to accept enormous development loans from institutions like the World Bank and USAID. Saddled with debts they could not hope to pay, those countries were forced to acquiesce to political pressure from the United States on a variety of issues. Perkins argues in his book that developing nations were effectively neutralized politically, had their wealth gaps driven wider and economies crippled in the long run. In this capacity, Perkins recounts his meetings with some prominent individuals, including Graham Greene and Omar Torrijos. Perkins describes the role of an economic hit man as follows:
Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and other foreign "aid" organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet's natural resources. Their tools included fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. They play a game as old as empire, but one that has taken on new and terrifying dimensions during this time of globalization.
zooks
(308 posts)tnx for the recommendation - looks like a fascinating read
yonder
(9,631 posts)pecosbob
(7,502 posts)for decades.
UpInArms
(51,252 posts)Long read, but ... omg ... the corruption, it burns ...
zooks
(308 posts)thx for posting