Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO. Getty
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO, has 55% of the company's voting shares, giving him majority power.
Experts say it's "a bad idea" for one person to hold so much control of a behemoth such as Facebook.
The notion is more profound given leaked docs that show Facebook's dismissal of its societal harm.
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO, holds 55% of voting shares in the company, a former employee and whistleblower Frances Haugen told Congress last week .
That's significant, she said, because it's "a very unique role in the tech industry." She added, "There are no similarly powerful companies that are as unilaterally controlled." Or put more bluntly in another part of the hearing: "There is no one currently holding Mark accountable but himself."
He is, essentially, Facebook's "keyman," a person who has ultimate say in business decisions and without whom the firm would be heavily affected.
Experts told Insider that there is cause for concern around one person having control over a controversial family of platforms that affect hundreds of millions of people.
"I don't think it's a stretch to argue that Mark Zuckerberg is the most powerful person who's ever walked the face of the earth, and I think that kind of power being held by one person is generally a bad idea," said Whitney Tilson , a former hedge-fund manager and the CEO of Empire Financial Research.
Zuckerberg's outsize power has been debated for years Company founders with majority control of a firm aren't rare. It's most prevalent in the tech world, where dual-class structures are common . Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page , for example, stepped away from the giant in 2019 but remained on the board. Collectively, they still have majority control of the company.
"You typically don't have companies like GM or Ford or Bank of America that are controlled by any one investor," said Chris Haynes , an associate professor of international affairs and political science at the University of New Haven. "This is not the norm."
Proponents of the arrangement often say it allows company leaders to stay trained on long-term success without distractions from short-term pressures.
"Having a company controlled by a single person, 'the brainchild' when it comes to tech companies, it does make the company much more nimble, and they're able to really turn a dime," Haynes said, since they don't have to get a lot of investors on board to make a decision.
But it can also slow things down. Facebook lists Zuckerberg's outsize control as a potential risk factor for investors, saying it "could delay, defer, or prevent a change of control, merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially all of our assets that our other stockholders support."
Critics say the control can shield companies from concerns that can harm society and investors, and it can cause volatility.
"I think you're seeing that in the case of Facebook," Haynes said.
Facebook has had a rocky few weeks after documents leaked by Haugen to The Wall Street Journal showed Zuckerberg and other insiders knew the company's platforms had negative effects on the public and dismissed those concerns.
"Facebook is bigger than any religion in the history of the world, and there is 100% control residing in one man," Tilson said.
Joy Poole, a former Facebook employee who's now at the consulting firm Emergence, said lawmakers should "absolutely" explore how regulation could decide the amount of majority share CEOs have in their companies. But there may be more pressing issues.
"Mark Zuckerberg has majority control over a company with a tremendous amount of influence in the world," Poole said. "I don't believe for a minute, though, that if he had 49% control, that we would magically find answers to the complex questions we are facing here."
But last week's hearing with Haugen and her disclosure of internal documents to the US Securities and Exchange Commission could change things, Tilson said, though it's not likely.
If the SEC investigation finds that Facebook misled investors by failing to disclose research of negative harm on teens, among other findings, then the agency could demand that he step down, Tilson said.
"That would be the only way I can think of that would overcome his controlling voting shares," he said.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Far-Left ‘Netroots Nation’ Aligns with Mark Zuckerberg, George W. Bush, on Immigration AFP 8:25
The far-left Netroots Nation progressive group has paired with Mark Zuckerberg’s corporate investors to rally progressives in favor of wage-cutting, rent-inflating, job-shifting migration and amnesty policies.
The pro-migration cooperation was displayed on October 7 when the group allocated time during its virtual annual conference to let one of Zuckerberg’s lobbyists tout amnesty with far-left Rep. Joe Neguse (D-CO).
“It’s a commitment that I feel like binds your work and my work together, that we are committed to seeing relief for families, for immigrant communities who have suffered for far too long without any real solution,” said Marissa Molina, the state director for FWD.us, an advocacy group for Zuckerberg and other West Coast investors.
In response, Neguse lamented the growing unpopularity of the pro-migration goals shared by Zuckerberg’s group and some progressives:
There was a time not that long ago 15 years ago, 10 years ago, where there was general consensus about the principles that would undergird a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the United States Congress … What we’re really in need of is political will. And that’s it. I mean it.
The reality is what has changed from 2006 when Senator [Ted] Kennedy and Senator [John] McCain worked on their immigration bill with President [George W.] Bush, to 2013 when the Gang of Eight worked on their bill with President [Barack] Obama … [is that] the general contours were very clear. What has changed from then to today is we now unfortunately have political figures that use immigration to demonize and dehumanize, and I think, to create a political issue in order to win an election … absent political will, it’s tough to see a pathway to getting it done.
Neguse is the child of immigrants. He is also a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, which has quietly split over immigration policy.
In response to Neguse’s comments, the investor lobbyist, Molina, urged the progressives to help her employers:
We don’t just need bold action from Congress. We need bold action from everyone who is joining us and who is part of that Netroots Nation. We need to make sure that folks are engaged, that we continue to ask our representatives to deliver on these solutions, because the time to do so is now.
Molina’s boss, Alida Garcia at FWD.us, tweeted the conversation , saying “So proud of @MarisaMo!”
Netroots Nation started in 2004 as a reaction against President George W. Bush. But Bush is now working alongside the Koch network, Netroots Nation, and Zuckerberg’s group to push for cheap labor and more migration.
Supporters hold modified Robin Hood faces of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) while waiting for the start of the Netroots Nation 2015 Presidential Town Hall in the Phoenix Convention Center July 18, 2015 in Phoenix, Arizona. (Charlie Leight/Getty Images)
The 2021 conference was sponsored by Facebook, Google’s YouTube, plus the FWD-funded I Stand With Immigrants Initiative.
Molina is an experienced lobbyist for the FWD.us investors. In 2021, for example, she worked with Garcia to persuade Colorado’s Democratic establishment to let illegal migrants take blue-collar jobs that require professional licenses . The wage-cutting law passed while one in sixteen Colorado residents were unemployed.
Zuckerberg’s lobbyists have tried and succeeded in passing similar laws in many additional states , with only ineffective opposition from once-powerful unions.
FWD.us has also worked with many progressive groups, such as Make the Road New York, to help extract more people from poor countries so they can work and consume in the U.S. economy.
In June 2019, for example, FWD.us helped to persuade the New York legislature to grant drivers’ licenses to illegal migrants in the state. Breitbart News reported :
“I’m so honored to be part of the @ GreenLightNYDT coalition,” said a tweet from Eddie Taveras, a Latino progressive activist and lobbyist for the billionaire-funded FWD.us advocacy group. “ We fought for this bill every step of the way via a grassroots movement centered on inclusion & transparency,” said Tavernas, whose FWD.us employers include numerous wealthy West Cost investors , such as Mark Zuckerberg and Matt Cohler, a partner at the Benchmark Capital investment firm.
In 2011, Cohler helped launch Uber Technologies with an $11 million investment for 11 percent of the company’s shares. That investment is now worth almost $8 billion. Cohler sits on Uber’s board and helped launch FWD.us. Cohler’s Benchmark firm also invested in another food delivery firm, Grubhub .
The 2021 push for amnesty and more migration in the $3.5 trillion spending bill is being led by Zuckerberg’s FWD.us network of coastal investors . They stand to gain financially from the government’s delivery of more cheap labor , government-aided consumers , and urban renters .
The network has funded many astroturf campaigns , urged Democrats to not talk about the economic impact of migration, and manipulated coverage by the TV networks and the print media .
The investors at FWD.us have also pushed hard for the passage of immigration legislation that would vastly expand their companies’ ability to discard outspoken American professionals. In September, Breitbart News reported :
Democrat leaders “are blowing away all the numerical limits” on employers offering green cards to [college graduate] employees, said Rosemary Jenks, policy director for NumbersUSA. “There’s no limit anywhere.”
The pending bill would allow U.S. investors and executives to import and pay an unlimited number of foreign workers with the dangled reward of citizenship. That citizenship-for-work law would minimize executives’ need to recruit Americans or even offer good salaries.
The bill was revealed Friday, and on Monday, was quickly rushed through the House judiciary committee without C-SPAN coverage . Mark Zuckerberg’s astroturf empire is marketing it as a relief bill for deserving illegal migrants — but it boosts investors by dramatically expanding the flow of cheap workers, government-funded consumers, and room-sharing renters into the U.S. economy. Democrat leaders hope to squeeze the bill through the Senate via the 50-vote reconciliation process.
The expanded foreign worker pipeline will remain open until at least September 2031, even though many millions of Americans will need jobs during the next ten years after they graduate with debts and degrees in health care, accounting, teaching, business, design, science, technology, or engineering. “If you’re in the pipeline by September 30, 2031, you’re in [the 2021 amnesty bill],” Jenks added.
“The young [pro-migration] activists who are out there pushing for this to be a [multi-]trillion dollar bill are actually the ones who are going to have their futures taken away first,” said one Hill source. “It is the lambs leaving the lambs to the slaughter.”
Nationwide, migration is deeply unpopular because of its economic impact. It damages ordinary Americans’ career opportunities, cuts their wages , raises their rents , curbs their productivity , shrinks their political clout , widens regional wealth gaps , and wrecks their democratic, equality-promoting civic culture .
For many years, a wide variety of pollsters have shown deep and broad opposition to labor migration and the inflow of temporary contract workers into jobs sought by young U.S. graduates. This pocketbook opposition is multiracial , cross-sex , non-racist , class-based , bipartisan , rational , persistent , and recognizes the solidarity Americans owe to each other.
The donor-funded GOP leaders , including Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Rep. John Katko (R-NY) — and their staff — have downplayed the pocketbook impact of migration on Americans’ communities. One reason for this policy is to avoid making any campaign promises on immigration that would be opposed by the donors. Instead, the GOP tries to spin up the turnout of its base voters by spotlighting the non-economic aspects of the migration problem, including crime by migrants, border chaos, and drug smuggling.
FIX FACEBOOK: YEAH, DROWN THE LITTLE FUCKER!
Zuckerberg’s Mentor: Facebook’s ‘Surveillance Capitalism Is as Immoral as Child Labor’ Drew Angerer /Getty 2:58
Roger McNamee, a previous mentor to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, recently commented on the testimony of Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen earlier this week. McNamee has been critical of Facebook and Zuckerberg in recent years, and now calls Zuckerberg’s business model of surveillance capitalism “as immoral as child labor.”
The Guardian reports that Roger McNamee, an early investor in Facebook and mentor to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, recently spoke to the paper about the testimony of whistleblower Frances Haugen before Congress earlier this week.
American businessman, venture capitalist and former Facebook investor Roger Burroughs McNamee poses during a photo session in Paris, on September 19, 2019. (Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP) (Photo credit should read JOEL SAGET/AFP via Getty Images)
McNamee has been critical of Facebook in the past and serves on the Facebook oversight board. McNamee previously criticized Facebook for its growth and management style , as well as the company’s approach to “fake news.”
Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg askew on a TV ( MANDEL NGAN /Getty)
Discussing Haugen’s recent testimony, McNamee stated:
Frances Haugen’s revelations and testimony before Congress are devastating to Facebook. She is courageous, authoritative, and utterly convincing. We knew about the issues before, but she changed the game by providing internal documents that prove Facebook’s management had early warning of many horrible problems and chose not to take appropriate steps. In her testimony, she confirmed that the incentives of Facebook’s business model lead to the amplification of fear and outrage to the detriment of public health and democracy.
When Haugen notes the moral failing of Mark Zuckerberg prioritizing profits over public safety, we need to recognize that this problem is far bigger than Facebook. All CEOs are told to focus on maximizing shareholder value at all costs. Facebook’s business model – which the Harvard professor Shoshana Zuboff calls surveillance capitalism – employs surveillance to track us and the use of data to manipulate our choices and behavior. It was invented by Google and has since been adopted by Amazon, Microsoft, and companies in every sector of the economy. Regulations must anticipate the harms to come from new use cases.
Haugen has removed the last excuse Congress had for inaction. They now need to legislate in three areas: privacy, safety, and competition. With respect to privacy, people have a right to make their own choices without interference. Surveillance capitalism is as immoral as child labor and should be banned. We also need something like an FDA for tech to ensure that products are safe and new antitrust laws to reduce the harm from monopolies.
Breitbart News has reported extensively on Haugen’s testimony, read more at Breitbart Tech here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com
Report: Hackers Are Selling the Personal Data of 1.5 Billion Facebook Users AFP 2:22
According to a privacy research firm, the personal data of more than 1.5 billion Facebook users has been found for sale on a hacker forum.
TechRepublic reports that this week Facebook faced an outage of all of its online services that lasted for six hours and was forced to defend itself from the testimony of a company whistleblower . As if things couldn’t get much worse for the tech giant, the privacy research firm Privacy Affairs has revealed that the personal data of 1.5 billion Facebook users has been found for sale on a hacker forum.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg chose a hovering electric surfboard, the U.S. flag and a John Denver “Take Me Home, Country Roads” soundtrack to underline his everyday, all American boy self-regard on July 4. As you do. (Mark Zuckerberg/Screenshot)
One hundred cardboard cutouts of Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg stand outside the US Capitol in Washington, DC, April 10, 2018. – Advocacy group Avaaz is calling attention to what the groups says are hundreds of millions of fake accounts still spreading disinformation on Facebook. (Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)
Privacy Affairs stated that the data does not indicate that the seller managed to gain access to Facebook’s internal systems, instead the data appeared to be obtained by scraping publicly available data shared by Facebook users.
While the information was publicly available, it still contains names, email addresses, locations, genders, phone numbers, and Facebook User ID information, all of which could be used to compromise a Facebook user’s security. All of this data could be used as clues for hackers to reset user passwords and gain access to even more personal data.
Privacy Affairs stated that the data they examined came from samples provided on the hacker forums and appears to be legitimate. The seller alleged that the group has been operating for the past four years serving more than 18,000 clients.
Privacy Affairs founder and CEO Miklos Zoltan stated that if the data exposed in the leak is authentic it “may constitute one of the biggest and most significant Facebook data dumps to date.” All public data can be “scraped” by a bot and store in a database, but that isn’t the only tool that the hackers use, they also use Facebook quizzes to harvest data.
Zoltan stated: “Every time someone enters one of these surveys or quizzes, they permit the creators of these games to view their personal Facebook information such as full name, email, phone number, location, gender and more.”
Read more at TechRepublic here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com
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