Facebook lost an important friend when its former employee, Frances Haugen, broke ranks to turn whistleblower and reveal the dangerous reality of the company today. Her testimony captured attention across the world, but hers has not been the only one. Less famous is the story of a Dubai-based employee, who in May shared documents showing a sharp decline in trust for Facebook among its users in the Middle East.
In a bid to contain the fallout from such cases, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's chief executive, is rumoured to be considering a rebranding, including a name change, for the company at its annual developer conference, to be held this year on October 28.
It may be little more than a superficial gesture. Similar moves in the past have failed to address core issues that today make not only Facebook, but other social media companies appear to be a growing threat to societal well-being.
And anyway, users are unlikely to be fooled. Global data show that, year on year, Facebooks social networking platform has been falling out of favour. What makes the Dubai employee's revelations important is that it showed quite how much confidence is being lost in a part of the world that should be its biggest fan. The Middle East has a large young, connected and entrepreneurial population. So why are people switching off?
Facebook whistleblower, Frances Haugen, appears before the US Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Subcommittee. EPA
One reason is that social media-savvy youth are good at spotting hypocrisy. Accusations that Facebook and its sister company Instagram unfairly censored pro-Palestinian material throughout May's violence in Palestine and Israel caused, according to the report, a major dent to the organisation's reputation. And earlier this week, a major study found that nearly half of 18-20-year-olds in the Mena region have suffered online abuse and exploitation, much of which will have been funnelled through social media.
Editorials from The National
Ten years ago, the status of these platforms in the region was very different. Iran's Green Movement in 2009 was dubbed the "Twitter Revolution", and images of women refusing to abide by government-imposed dress codes garnered support across the globe on Facebook. Many still believe that the speed and breadth of social media was central to the Arab uprisings of 2011.
It is this simple purpose, built around enabling easy communication, that Facebook should return to if it wants to rebuild trust. The early zeitgeist of the social media movement was a forward-looking one, which looked as though it would be at the heart of creating a better future. Those days are over, for now, but they should be revisited. Doing this will require Mr Zuckerberg ditching name changes and rediscovering the good of which his technologies are capable.
In reality, Facebook is likely to go ahead with the rebrand and is even rumoured to be announcing a new "metaverse" concept, in which it would seek to fully hybridise the physical and virtual worlds, embedding itself even more intimately into users personal lives.
Very little of Facebooks power lies in the name. Rather, it is in the increasingly unaccountable, and monopolising character that the platform is taking on. Still, in the real world, consumers prefer simplicity at least, for now. For example, in the Middle East, trust in WhatsApp, Facebooks most straightforward product, remains persistently high. Facebook has succeeded in connecting the world and should work to regain its trust. Until social media giants do this, people with the most to gain from the technology may simply log off.
Published: October 22nd 2021, 3:00 AM
Original post:
The Middle East is unfriending Facebook - The National
- Five years since #MeToo, Tarana Burke is looking beyond the hashtag - Yahoo News - October 15th, 2022
- After Florence Pugh Freed The Nipple, Olivia Wilde Supported The Movement On New Magazine Cover - CinemaBlend - October 15th, 2022
- Barbara Kay: The Movement to Normalize Pedophilia Hits a Roadblock, but We Mustn't Let Our Guard Down - The Epoch Times - October 15th, 2022
- Is it Time to Decolonize Global Health Data? - Research Blog - Duke University - October 15th, 2022
- Claire Foy Doesnt Think Women Talking Could Have Been Made Before #MeToo - Yahoo Entertainment - October 15th, 2022
- Can the Congress rewrite its chronicle of a death foretold? - Scroll.in - October 15th, 2022
- We need a strong nationalist as a president - Daily Sun - October 15th, 2022
- The 19th Century Movement to Canonize Columbus - Catholic Exchange - October 13th, 2022
- Audemars Piguet toasts 50 years of Royal Oak with new watches, book - New York Post - October 13th, 2022
- Claire Foy Doesn't Think 'Women Talking' Could Have Been Made Before #MeToo - Yahoo! Voices - October 13th, 2022
- Best Bets: 6 nights of live music at Wussow's and more - Duluth News Tribune - October 13th, 2022
- Five Burning Questions: Bad Bunny Spends a 13th Week at No. 1 With Un Verano Sin Ti - Billboard - October 13th, 2022
- San Diego artist uses creativity to uplift Black culture and 'determine how we are seen' - The San Diego Union-Tribune - October 13th, 2022
- The Premier League at thirty - what should it sound like next? - Broadcast - October 13th, 2022
- Steve Braunias on Peter Ellis case: 'Moral panic, contaminated evidence and an innocent ghost' - New Zealand Herald - October 13th, 2022
- Constituency Statutes: The Overlooked Predecessor to the ESG Movement - JD Supra - October 2nd, 2022
- 10 books to add to your reading list in October 2022 - Los Angeles Times - October 2nd, 2022
- The Multiple Religions Coexisting Within the Catholic Church - Crisis Magazine - October 2nd, 2022
- 2023 Oscar Predictions The Rules of the Game - Awards Daily - October 2nd, 2022
- Kathy Sheridan: Brace yourselves for where Giorgia Meloni and Italy end up - The Irish Times - October 2nd, 2022
- The rise and fall of Sir Philip Green, the retail king who fell from grace - Evening Standard - October 2nd, 2022
- The lying flat movement standing in the way of China ... - Brookings - September 29th, 2022
- Namwali Serpell Distills the Disorienting Experience of Grief in 'The Furrows' - Shondaland.com - September 29th, 2022
- Dance & House Music Ruled the Summer. What Now? - Complex - September 29th, 2022
- It is time to back a new party in the elections - Morning Star Online - September 29th, 2022
- The empty feminism of Dont Worry Darling - The Guardian - September 27th, 2022
- Sunburn The morning read of what's hot in Florida politics 9.26.22 - Florida Politics - September 27th, 2022
- GOP candidate Trevor Lee ran a secret Twitter account that attacked LGBTQ people and Utah Gov. Cox. Now he's been rebuked by Republican leadership. -... - September 27th, 2022
- Peeling Back the Slasher-Inspired Look of HBO Maxs Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin with Cinematographer Anka Malatynska - Dread Central - September 27th, 2022
- If theres a settlement, XRP will pump: Finder founder and other experts speculate on ... - Stockhead - September 27th, 2022
- Natural Born Killers: the soundtrack that changed the 90s - Louder - September 27th, 2022
- Uttara (2000): Capturing the Zeitgeist of a Contemporary Turbulent Period and Decoupage - High on Films - September 3rd, 2022
- From Sri Lanka to Salinas: Will California Learn Anything from Sri Lankas Green Apocalypse? - California Globe - September 3rd, 2022
- Northeastern Creatives Bringing Their Art & Identities Into The Cultural Zeitgeist - Homegrown - September 3rd, 2022
- "I Think It's Limitless": MORTEN On the Volcanic Potential of the Future Rave Movement - EDM.com - September 3rd, 2022
- Chipotle workers in Lansing fear closure after union vote: Delta Twp. location first in the nation to be unionized - City Pulse - September 3rd, 2022
- @Jamwanda2 on Saturday: Triple C: Rendezvous of problems! - The Herald - September 3rd, 2022
- L.A. fashion trend analysis: It's time to reconsider Uggs - Los Angeles Times - September 3rd, 2022
- How Eliza Rose made the song of the summer - Dazed - September 3rd, 2022
- Friday essay: Joanna Bourke, the NSW arts minister, and the unruly contradictions of cancel culture - The Conversation - September 3rd, 2022
- Human Rights in the Crosshairs - Just Security - August 25th, 2022
- Around the Circle This Week: August 25, 2022 - lakesuperior.com - August 25th, 2022
- Australias Lockdown and Vaccine Narrative Has Fallen Apart - Brownstone Institute - August 25th, 2022
- Why Dont Millennials Have Hobbies? - The Walrus - August 25th, 2022
- Cheap, green vehicles are taking off overseas. Why are they banned here? - The Spinoff - August 25th, 2022
- The clock is ticking on the Rohingya crisis - The Business Standard - August 15th, 2022
- Augustus Owsley Stanley III: The sound engineer who kickstarted the counterculture movement - Far Out Magazine - August 15th, 2022
- Shailene Woodley Used to Get Offended When People Called Her a Hippy - Showbiz Cheat Sheet - August 15th, 2022
- Never Have I Ever Co-Stars Visit Phoenix, Talk About Their Netflix Hit Teenage Dramedy - Phoenix New Times - August 15th, 2022
- The real world is terrifying: Anne-Marie Duff on sisterhood, survival and Shameless - The Guardian - August 15th, 2022
- 'He wanted to break one of your ribs and eat it': Women describe Armie Hammer's sick requests in new docu - MEAWW - August 15th, 2022
- Never Have I Ever Season 3 review: Still one of the best teen comedies out there - Entertainment News , Firstpost - Firstpost - August 15th, 2022
- Black Panther: How Sound and Vision Made the 2017 Trailer a Zeitgeist Moment - Muse by Clio - August 2nd, 2022
- The five best albums produced by Butch Vig - Far Out Magazine - August 2nd, 2022
- Jennifer Lopez's 1990s-style summer hair: how to achieve the half-up, half-down look - The National - August 2nd, 2022
- 'The establishment didn't know what to do with me': Sanjeev Bhaskar on marriage, success and stereotypes - The Guardian - August 2nd, 2022
- Tasty ways to satisfy that craving for the iconic Choco Taco - FoodSided - August 2nd, 2022
- Publishing will never be fair - UnHerd - August 2nd, 2022
- Lena Dunham's "Sharp Stick" Is Sneakily Traditionalist Just Like the Rest of Her Work - InsideHook - August 2nd, 2022
- Attacking TV presenters, ruining Glastonbury and being banned by the BBC: how Carter USM became Britain's unlikeliest chart-toppers - Louder - August 2nd, 2022
- Gugu Mbatha-Raw on Apple TV+ show Surface, her dream role and why she likes to dig into the darkness at work - Evening Standard - August 2nd, 2022
- The Great Resignation: How Beyonc became the anti-work movement queen we didn't know we needed - New Zealand Herald - July 13th, 2022
- Dobbs is a win for the American experiment - Washington Examiner - July 13th, 2022
- 'Thor: Love and Thunder' Review: A Sequel Heavy on Humor That Almost Feels Like a Superhero Parody - Nerdcore Movement - July 13th, 2022
- Social Justice Ideology and the Decline of American Medicine: A Conversation with Stanley Goldfarb - Public Discourse - July 13th, 2022
- This political ad from Jerone Davison is pretty unhinged, even for the MAGA crowd - Mic - July 13th, 2022
- Riding the wave of the Crocs - Chicago Reader - July 13th, 2022
- Whats New on DVD Blu-ray in July: 'Everything Everywhere,' 'Drive My Car,' 'The Beatles: Get Back' and More - TheWrap - July 13th, 2022
- Where The Crawdads Sing director Olivia Newman on mysteries and myth-making - The A.V. Club - July 13th, 2022
- Local artist/writer duo document 2021 and beyond - The San Diego Union-Tribune - July 13th, 2022
- The best games of 2022 so far - NME - July 13th, 2022
- Children of the Counter-Revolution - Quillette - July 13th, 2022
- Boris Johnson Could Have Been Another Thatcher - Novara Media - July 13th, 2022
- How Google is Amplifying Alternative Youth Culture - THISDAY Newspapers - July 7th, 2022
- The revolution will be televised: why we are witnessing a big-boss backlash - The Guardian - July 7th, 2022
- The Origin of Vibes - The Atlantic - July 7th, 2022
- 4 Powerful Photography Exhibitions Will Debut at the National Portrait Gallery This Year - AFAR Media - July 7th, 2022
- Battleground Director Cynthia Lowen On Roe V. Wade And Pro-Life Views - Exclusive Interview - The List - July 7th, 2022
- Club culture in the 1990s: How Dublin danced to a new beat - Irish Examiner - July 7th, 2022
- Agency of the Year and MARKies Malaysia 2022 shortlists unveiled - Marketing Interactive - July 7th, 2022