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Comment by buboard | Hacker News Reader

Facebook is so full of themselves - they think they can run the world etc. Doesn't hurt that the mainstream media are (baselessly) convinced of it. Corbyn's campaign heavily dominated social media in the UK and it turned to a catastrophe. The rules for posting on their pages and using their API have become obnoxiously stupid. few days ago i got a request asking about a surge in calls to their API 5 years ago, as if i can remember (or give a shit about their API access for that matter). the witch hunting has gone out of hand , but i m loving to watch facebook and everyone else bursting in flames over who can manipulate the most. bring it on

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Facebook has increasingly become a media property for boomers and the technically illiterate. It is the “spam folder” of the internet. We used to have to build tech to filter spam, phishing and forwards with stupid nonsense and now we’ve got it all wrapped up nicely in the various a Facebook properties.

Facebook doesn’t realize that what it’s really become is humanities supermarket tabloid.

It will be remembered as the largest intellectual garbage heap in history. I feel sorry for the people that actual use it to share personal photos and memories. It would be like printing your family pictures in the Daily Mirror.

Garbage Meme - Last Picture of your Ant Muriel 5 years ago - Avocado Advertisement

> It is the “spam folder” of the internet.

I absolutley love this and I'm stealing it.

I will point out though that those moron boomers who cant fact-check are all usually voters.. Easily influenced by the whims of BS.

Except they own instagram too.

Instagram is no better. Maybe worse.

same level as trash tv really. bottom-of-the-barrel quality, but sellable

That’s really the best way to describe it. YouTube has been trending the same way now for a while which is where it’s easiest to see. We’ve created these content ecosystems where the content is terrible and it’s just barely sellable. Like no one would actually pay for it, but with ad model you can create content that is just barely more valuable than nothing at all. Just barely. The value of the vast majority of content now approaches zero but never quite gets there, and that’s where we are now. Improvements in targeting ensure the content actually becomes worse over time while still being sellable.

The insanity is that in the UK and in the US you have massive propaganda outlets misinforming the public financed by their own billionaires. I'm sure Russian propaganda is trying to get the outcomes they want, why wouldn't they? But the idea that they are more effective/more worrisome than Murdoch and co is ridiculous.

That said, Corbyn won every age group < 40 [1]. So those most likely to be heavily invested in social media did seem to get the message...

[1] https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2019/1...

Tangentially, I heard of a theory that some of the change in political landscape could be due to population life expectency increases and the ratio between young and old having diminished.

This is backed up by some research suggesting that people naturally become more conservative as they age.

Not saying that explains the UK elections, but your linked article reminded me of this theory.

I think there also is good evidence that we are looking more at age cohort effects rather than age effects. After all people who are 39 would not exactly have been considered young a few decades ago.

It's a smooth curve but the labour/cons cross over point aligns well with the age of those who were able to build their lives and establish their careers before the early 2000s and after. The economic and societal structure that worked well during the 20th century has not been delivering returns for a while. In the UK this is the generation that will be poorer than the generation before them for the first time [1] until they inherit.

I think the changing age structure is massive though. If you had this breakdown of voting behaviour with the age distribution of the 60s when the median age was 32 rather than 42, you are looking at a labour landslide.

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/81343d9e-187b-11e8-9e9c-25c814761...

> That said, Corbyn won every age group < 40

I.e. people who don't remember what Corbyn’s pre-Tony Blair Labour did the last time it had power.

Not a fan of Corbyn, but you can't deny that he was smeared heavily and unfairly. As was Milliband. Mostly by the papers who are owned by the people he wants to tax.

And the policies proposed in Corbyns manifesto would have brought the UK more into the central European mainstream. Nothing in there was terribly radical.

Corbyn is a communist sympathizer.

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