The toughest time for the Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg has put him into tensed situation.
The internet use has drastically increased over the last two decades. Today, sky is the limit for the things you can do on the internet. This rapid change has implemented new habits into our daily lives and some of these are categorized as addiction. When we look into the internet age, we can identify unbelievable changes including multinational corporations started to lead many industries. We can name any industry and we can spot at least one internet company making a difference. In my opinion, I would name Google, Facebook, and Twitter as top three. Of course, there are number of other tech companies providing various innovative services and products. However, these three multi-national corporations have made a huge difference on the internet world.
As you all know, Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg faces a 2-day House hearing due to data leak to Cambridge Analytica. The first day, Mark Zuckerberg has taken all the responsibility as he was the founder and the leader of Facebook. This was a great gesture, but it didn’t change the fact that there was a data leak and Facebook officials didn’t show enough effort to change the situation. I’m hundred percent sure that the last two days have not been so comfortable for Mark Zuckerberg and its team. Because everyone around the world has been watching the hearing and adding their comments on it which is disruptive. This is why I wanted to look into the situation from a different perspective. Let’s start by understanding how things have gotten to this point.
Why Does Mark Zuckerberg is Facing a House Hearing?
There has been numerous news came to light in the past few months with the concerns of Facebook users’ personal data leak. Later, celebrities and companies started to deactivate their Facebook accounts and Pages. With no doubt, Elon Musk’s move against Facebook was the most harmful one and grabbed huge public attention. He didn’t only delete his companies’ Facebook Pages, but also made humor about Facebook’s existence.
READ MORE: Why Do Celebrities Boycott Facebook and Delete Pages?
The increasing public attention has basically made it necessary for Facebook officials to explain themselves in a public hearing. Of course, the hearing wasn’t only limited to the data leak. There were few different important questions raised due to Facebook’s plans and actions both in the past and future.
The Change of Societal Habits with Internet
First of all, we all have social identities in today’s world. Some people are great writers who can fit a book into 140 characters. While some others could simply take the most brilliant photo of an ordinary scene. Moreover, we have discovered hundreds of people with talents in various subjects. Basically, social media has helped people to express themselves the way they want. Yet, there have been many apps which basically destroyed privacy.
SEE ALSO: Does Social Media Popularity Means Social in Real Life?
People have started to post every detail in their lives and share it with public. Snapchat had a slightly different target with their stories. However, almost every social media platform has stories including Facebook, Instagram, and even WhatsApp. We share what we eat, where we eat, our daily routines, etc. Yes, there is an option to limit these things to a circle of people you know, but no doubt that there is less privacy in comparison to traditional methods. So, can we really blame the companies who use all the information we put out there? Let’s look at it from the business perspective in the next section
The Mega Internet Companies Changing the World
Let’s take a moment and think about some of these mega internet companies. Most of these companies have billions of dollars funding due to their access to data. Because you know the motto of our age: Information is power! Some of these companies worth billions of dollars without any collateral as they have access to people’s information. In the last decade, they have started to make huge money from advertising because marketing world has shifted into the online world.
So, if we value these companies with their access to people’s personal data whether it’s accurate or not, how can we blame them for using this information? Let’s mention that I’m not saying that they should go door to door just to sell this information they have. However, using the collected data is number one power for them to keep the advertisers in the house. This is the primary reason advertisers decided to focus on the online world for their campaign. Moreover, Facebook hasn’t sold the information directly, Cambridge Analytica stole the data in the past.
Is Blaming Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg a Solution to Online Privacy?
Maybe I’m just looking at it from business perspective and considering Zuckerberg’s actions as a businessman willing to keep his advertisers in the house, I can’t totally blame this on him. In my opinion, we should start blaming ourselves for publishing all the private information about our lives with the online world. On the other hand, I definitely believe Facebook has a horrible action plan regarding this issue. They could have prevented this data for being used to lead Trump to become the United States President.
SEE ALSO: Why do Shithole Minds Govern Our Generation?
What will Happen to Facebook?
It’s hard to determine for sure at the moment. However, we can understand that they will lose some portion of their users. That’s why they need to come clean and take bold actions to rebuild trust with their users. It seems that the company will have a short period of struggle which will push them to become more innovative. Maybe, Mark Zuckerberg can consider purchasing another app to keep users interacted with their platform. I’m sure they already have some stuff planned to recover their reputations including house hearing. Let’s wait and see how it will turn out.
