Comment by horsawlarway

Comment by horsawlarway 2 days ago

6 replies

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I'm not sure how I feel about this.

I think "reputation" is absolutely critical to functional societies, and this feels a lot like putting a mask on and hiding critical information.

If Facebook got rejected because people hate Facebook, even when the economics are good... that's valuable to society as a feedback mechanism to force Facebook to be, well - not so hated.

Letting them put a legal mask on and continue business as usual just feels a bit like loading gunpowder into the keg - You make a conditions ripe for a much larger and forceful explosion because they ignored all the feedback.

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Basically - the companies are fighting their reputations for good reason. People HATE them. In my opinion, somewhat reasonably. Why are we letting them off the hook instead of forcing them to the sidelines to open up space for less hated alternatives?

If I know "Mike" skimps on paying good contractors, or abuses his employees, or does shitty work... me choosing not to engage with Mike's business, even though the price is good, is a perfectly reasonable choice. Likely even a GOOD choice.

lotsofpulp 2 days ago

> I think "reputation" is absolutely critical to functional societies,

See the popular vote results of Nov 2024 US presidential election. Reputations were on full display.

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  • nativeit 2 days ago

    Doesn’t that further defeat the argument for secrecy here?

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    • lotsofpulp a day ago

      The argument was that people's collective judgment, given transparency, will result in good decisions.

      But we see from the Nov 2024 elections (and others, but most glaringly that one), that that is, sadly, not true.

      So the people rejecting Facebook because of Facebook's reputation tells you nothing about whether Facebook is bad, because the people could have just as easily been bad.

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  • antonvs 2 days ago

    > Reputations were on full display.

    The problem is that many people liked what they saw. Reputation was still important, but there were different beliefs about what reputations were desirable.

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