Well, you are really only looking at a part of the economic picture there. What exactly is the attraction that facebook is selling that they are able to make money off of advertising? It is the content produced by the users themselves. What gives the owners of facebook the right to keep all the profit that is essentially generated by a large group effort that they are really only a small part of? They have the the ability through control of the system. That doesn't give them the right. So those actually producing the content do have a right to speak up about how it is managed.
As I mentioned in my post I kinda sidestepped the issue of the pros and cons of that system. But to understand it better think of the basic premise of communism, from each according to their means and to each according to their needs. With capitalism it is from each according to their means and to each according to the value of their contribution. With fascism it is from each according to their means and to each according to how much control they have over the situation. Many also call this corporatism, which is what we have here.
Again, I won't delve into the rightness or wrongness of that in principle. But it is not good for the overall health of the organization in the long run. It is short sighted.
I don't know what FB's business model is, besides targeted advertising, to be honest. I am what one might consider a light user. I don't play games and I block all of the applications and don't venture away from my update feed. I just think of it as one of those sites that I use, I enjoy, but if it disappears, then so be it. I would be SO much more upset if Livejournal went away.
You ask a good question - What gives the owners of facebook the right to keep all the profit that is essentially generated by a large group effort that they are really only a small part of? - I don't know. What does give them that right? The fact that they're paying people to run the site, paying for the infrastructure, footing the entire bill for the operation? If a user creates content that prompts somebody to go to a different page, and they see an ad that they click on and purchase a product... should the credit go to the person who made the initial post? Should they get a cut of the advertising revenue?
I won't disagree that their approach seems shortsighted. People get extremely upset when they spring surprise changes (have they not looked into the effect of change on humans?) - one friend said, "They suck you in, then they fuck with you!" and I suppose she's right!
As I mentioned in my post I kinda sidestepped the issue of the pros and cons of that system. But to understand it better think of the basic premise of communism, from each according to their means and to each according to their needs. With capitalism it is from each according to their means and to each according to the value of their contribution. With fascism it is from each according to their means and to each according to how much control they have over the situation. Many also call this corporatism, which is what we have here.
Again, I won't delve into the rightness or wrongness of that in principle. But it is not good for the overall health of the organization in the long run. It is short sighted.
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You ask a good question - What gives the owners of facebook the right to keep all the profit that is essentially generated by a large group effort that they are really only a small part of? - I don't know. What does give them that right? The fact that they're paying people to run the site, paying for the infrastructure, footing the entire bill for the operation? If a user creates content that prompts somebody to go to a different page, and they see an ad that they click on and purchase a product... should the credit go to the person who made the initial post? Should they get a cut of the advertising revenue?
I won't disagree that their approach seems shortsighted. People get extremely upset when they spring surprise changes (have they not looked into the effect of change on humans?) - one friend said, "They suck you in, then they fuck with you!" and I suppose she's right!
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