If you watched the “60 Minutes” interview with Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen on Sunday, or read The Wall Street Journal’s “The Facebook Files, you had a pretty good preview of what Haugen was going to say when she testified before a Senate committee on Tuesday.
"I am here today because I believe that Facebook’s products harm children, stoke division, and weaken our democracy,” Haugen said in her opening remarks. “The company’s leadership knows how to make Facebook and Instagram safer but won’t make the necessary changes because they have put their astronomical profits before people. Congressional action is needed. They won’t solve this crisis without your help.”
She called out CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg, and said, “Until the incentives change, Facebook will not change. Left alone, Facebook will continue to make choices that go against the common good, our common good.” (Disclosure: Facebook provides funding to Poynter to support content and training to strengthen media literacy.)
As I said, these are some of the things Haugen said in her “60 Minutes” interview and the Journal wrote about it in its explosive project based on tens of thousands of Facebook documents provided by Haugen. Yet it was still powerful testimony in front of receptive and united senators from both parties.
Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said, “I think the time has come for action, and I think you are the catalyst for that action.”
Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said, “I have rarely if ever seen or heard as credible or compelling a witness on an issue so difficult or challenging. Francis Haugen wants to fix Facebook, not burn it to the ground.”
Facebook put out a statement that tried to dismiss Haugen as a nobody at the company, saying, “Today, a Senate Commerce subcommittee held a hearing with a former product manager at Facebook who worked for the company for less than two years, had no direct reports, never attended a decision-point meeting with C-level executives — and testified more than six times to not working on the subject matter in question.”
Then Tuesday night, Zuckerberg himself posted a letter on Facebook that he had sent to his staff. He said many of Haugen’s claims “don’t make sense.” He said, “If we didn’t care about fighting harmful content, then why would we employ so many more people dedicated to this than any other company in our space — even ones larger than us?”
He also wrote that the idea that Facebook prioritizes profit over safety and well-being is “just not true.”
The letter is quite lengthy, so check it out if you want to see his full comments.
The New York Times’ Kara Swisher, who has reported on Facebook extensively, tweeted, “What Facebook top execs do not get at this important moment is that @FrancesHaugen of Facebook is @susanthesquark of @Uber — and we know how that went down.”
Swisher was referring to Susan Fowler, who in 2017 wrote a blog post about sexual harassment at Uber. That post and subsequent reporting led to major changes at Uber, including the resignation of its CEO.
Haugen’s testimony appeared to make an impact with the lawmakers, and likely many who watched.
Blumenthal said, “Mark Zuckerberg may be one of the richest people in the history of the world. But today Frances Haugen showed that one person can stand up to that kind of power and make a difference.”
For more details, check out The Washington Post story from Cat Zakrzewski, Elizabeth Dwoskin, Cristiano Lima and Will Oremus.
Takeaways from the testimony
The New York Times’ Sheera Frenkel wrote “Key takeaways from Facebook’s whistle-blower hearing.” Frenkel listed three things:
- Republican and Democratic lawmakers are united in taking action to stop the harms caused to teenagers on Facebook.
- Lawmakers have gotten smarter about tech.
- Facebook is sitting on an even larger mountain of internal research.
The one that really stood out to me was how lawmakers have become smarter about tech. In the past, we’ve seen instances where lawmakers asked pointless or embarrassing questions — as if they were asking checkers questions about chess.
But as Frenkel wrote, “Lawmakers in the hearing explored the role that Facebook’s algorithms play in amplifying problematic content, and the way in which the company consistently tweaks its algorithm to choose one type of content over another. That’s far more sophisticated than the kinds of questions lawmakers have previously asked about Facebook.”
More Facebook thoughts
Margaret Sullivan’s latest media column for The Washington Post: “Facebook is harming our society. Here’s a radical solution for reining it in.”
Sullivan wrote, “A problem that threatens the underpinnings of our civil society calls for a radical solution: A new federal agency focused on the digital economy.”
She added, “Something has to change. And that doesn’t mean a little tinkering around the edges of what already exists. The digital revolution requires a revolutionary change in restraining out-of-control practitioners.”
Pence blames media coverage of Jan. 6
On Jan. 6, Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, trying to stop the certification of Joe Biden as president. Much of the anger was directed at then-Vice President Mike Pence, who wasn’t going to overturn the results. Some insurrectionists even chanted “Hang Mike Pence.”
But during an appearance on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show this week, Pence somehow blamed the media. He told Hannity, “I know the media wants to distract from the Biden administration’s failed agenda by focusing on one day in January. They want to use that one day to try and demean the character and intentions of 74 million Americans who believed we could be strong again and prosperous again and supported our administration in 2016 and 2020.”
Wow. OK, on to the next item …
Sage Steele sidelined at ESPN
