Thread by @matthewstoller

1. #DeleteFacebook is well-meaning, and it is good to start with boycotts. But saying 'glad I never used Facebook' or 'I don't use Facebook' is missing the point. This is not a scandal of privacy. It is not a consumer rights issue, aka Facebook users having their data misused.

2. The Facebook scandal is an issue of *market power* overwhelming producers, NOT consumers. It is Facebook's use of data to dominate publishers, artists and ad buyers that is the key problem. All tech companies do not do this. Only Facebook and Google are this dominant.

3. The amount of data that many companies and entities know about you is significant. That is not the issue with regards to Facebook. Zuckerberg isn't interested in knowing whether you're cheating on your spouse. He is interested in dominating the New York Times with your data.

4. This here is the threat to democracy. Not privacy, not Facebook failing to protect consumer data. It is Facebook's ability to mediate what you see and what political and commercial speech is financed and allowed to circulate. The data is a competitive weapon here.

5. This is why Zuckerberg and Sandberg are emphasizing how Facebook is now going to aggressively protect user data. They want to turn this into a *privacy* scandal when it is actually a problem of market power and democracy. They are going try and use it to reinforce their power.

6. For example, the point of inter-operability is regulate competition so the information we produce and exchange is not manipulated by Facebook. Some technologists are going to talk about how this could threaten privacy. They are missing the problem here.

7. Boycotts are good because they lead to politics, aka collective action essential to self-government. We have to think not as consumers or users, but as *producers* and *citizens*. The problem is FB/Google's control of the financing of news, art, entertainment, culture, etc.

8. This is ultimately not a scandal of privacy or technology *at all*. This is entirely a political problem, whereby Facebook uses your data as a means of extracting money from ad buyers for the value created by citizen producers.

9. @SenJohnKennedy is the most coherent politician on the political economy problem of Facebook.

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10. I am very interested to see how Zuckerberg's testimony will go. John Kennedy used Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch like a chew toy when Stretch testified.

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