Kids and pseudo understanding of privacy.

[FAST6191]

So it seems the "I'm just on facebook for funny pictures and contests" line I first saw around here years ago, and observed equivalents of in other places ever since, has started to come home to roost in terms of hard numbers ( https://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-measurement/facebook-usage-declined-3-reasons/ ). Various reports are out saying that among certain age groups usage is dropping. Still a ridiculously high percentage of the population but shrinking never the less. In many cases the alternative is facebook's own instagram thing (not exactly a clone but not a radical departure either) but oh well.

While it does mean we might have to revisit a favourite xkcd what if https://what-if.xkcd.com/69/ I am taking it as confirmation of my usual adage when it comes to tech of "wait long enough and everything is a fad".

An offhand remark made in a few places discussing this news is that the kids might be leaving/not joining is because they have some understanding of privacy, and Facebook has had a few issues with that one. This seems odd given my experiences on https://gbatemp.net/threads/online-identity.379375/ (GBAtemp's give a go at doxxing me thread) and in general. Most articles did not go too much further as it was more interesting to ponder the effects it is having on certain businesses (years ago we saw some changes nail Zynga, and nowadays it seems a few clickbait "news" sites are also struggling) but that stuck with me.

Some years ago there was a kind of famous, at least in certain circles, rant about how kids, now having grown up with computers, don't actually know how they work beyond a superficial level. http://www.coding2learn.org/blog/2013/07/29/kids-cant-use-computers/ is it.
I would agree with a lot of that and to my mind it seems akin to expecting everybody to be a mechanic because their generation saw essentially every household own a car, and later on then often two or more. A pity really as more people with practical skills is always nice to see.

Anyway so the kids of today I have not seen knowing things like http://cryptome.org/2012/07/gent-forum-spies.htm , Moscow Rules, general tradecraft, counterintelligence ( https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...lligence/kent-csi/vol45no5/html/v45i5a08p.htm ), countersurveillance , general computer security concepts (much less the overwhelming desire to use them -- that Telegram application would be considerably more popular if so, or indeed proper signing, encryption and whatever else) and if that thread is anything to go by then even by a fairly self selected group of people inclined to push their computers a bit then offensive ops in the computer realm are also a bit of a mystery (most things I showcases in said thread were not novel, radical, the results of intense computing power, the results of serious training or much of anything really), for more general then The African Rebel series does not do much more and still gets awestruck people. At the same time I don't view it as an entirely baseless claim either.

The idea of this thread then is to start to thrash out the privacy equivalent of the understanding of computers above. I don't have anything terribly cohesive at this point but things I would probably start with to spiral out from:
Some knowledge of TOR, maybe as not great a desire to share everything, some knowledge of VPNs, somehow thinking the likes of peerblock are useful, maybe they heard to harangue the webmasters of their favourite sites about chucking a token SSL up there, maybe they have some idea of cryptocurrency (even if most of that is a get rich quick scheme), passwords can be a fun one as I see various things here from liking password managers to some understanding of things that won't be found in seconds with rainbow tables. There might be some tendency towards magic bullet thinking, as opposed to the "security is an ongoing journey".

 

[kuwanger]

Some years ago there was a kind of famous, at least in certain circles, rant about how kids, now having grown up with computers, don't actually know how they work beyond a superficial level. http://www.coding2learn.org/blog/2013/07/29/kids-cant-use-computers/ is it.
I would agree with a lot of that and to my mind it seems akin to expecting everybody to be a mechanic because their generation saw essentially every household own a car, and later on then often two or more. A pity really as more people with practical skills is always nice to see.

Having read through most of the link, let me say a few things. One, the purpose of using a computer as far as schools are concerned is job training so it's no surprise they pushed just enough knowledge along the lines of MS Office and a corporate network mentality. Two, OSs have becoming trivial to use and all the pushing for auto updates and at least attempting to block outright admin access have made modern systems substantially easier to use in a good way. I'd go as far as to argue that the complaints raised are equivalent to wanting people to revert from future self-driving cars to the first cars designed that required manual throttle control in the name of a better understanding of how cars function. That's just absurd. Three, his two made up numbers (the in the past 5% had computers but 95% were literate vs today where 95% have computers but only 5% are literate) only highlight something of an obvious tautology: most people don't care about being literate about computers and nothing you do short of sparking that interest will help. It's like the people complaining about how women aren't interested in STEM*.

As for the point about Facebook losing users? I agree about it not being about privacy. The fad bit is probably true to some extent, which is why some people are moving toward Instagram. Verifying the negativity or general disinterest claims could only really be measured if you count all social media platforms, but my guess is people are moving from one to another thinking maybe some platforms are better. I don't think 8% is a large enough amount to draw solid conclusions, although I can see Facebook worrying about advertisers becoming more aggressive.

Speaking about the way in which the media talks about privacy, I think one day someone is going to troll the internet. Back in the day, most viruses were more trolls than malicious. Today, most malware is out for money one way or another. I imagine some day in the future someone will write malware designed to attack out of day OS software to write troll posts on social media. Maybe it'll even go as far as trolling by overwriting a person's user files both locally and on any cloud storage to maximize chaos and all that. If that day comes, I'm sure the media will bring forth many people who were trolled, they'll begrudge the malware writer, and they'll promise to keep their system up to date. That last promise will be quickly forgotten though because "updates make the system slower!" *sigh*

* Fun fact: more women are in STEM than men, but apparently fewer women actually pursue jobs in STEM. One could argue that it's sexism. I'd tend to argue it's that people are sold on learning STEM because money but reject actually following through as a career because they hate it. I presume this goes doubly so with IT and computers.

 

[notimp]

No on many levels.

First - Facebook is creased, not even significantly wounded. What you are seeing is kids deviating from it, because of an uncoolness factor, thats all.

But this isnt even 2% (drew this value out of a hat ) sufficient here.

The reasons are obvious as they can be.

1. All the revenue losses for facebook have been subsumed and turned into profit, by instagram growth.

This isnt at all by chance - facebook is in the mode of buying up / or driving out ANY alternative in the messaging / social networking sector that gets traction. Its enraging, its unfair, its anti competitive, its the reality.

2. Facebook in itself isnt dwindling, but only slowly shrinking, because its userbase en large is staying. The high activity phase is over. Growth has slowed down, but no one is leaving for complicated stuff the average user doesnt understand.

In the end "grandma" isnt switching "what she has learned" and so the entire userbase stays, and just usage becomes a little different - as more of the conversation shifts towards "smaller groups based" platforms.


Facebook has still all the eyeballs, just in different brands - and the only thing they really have to do, is to come up with a way to monetize whatsapp and insta a little more in the future.

Zucky Boys new warcry is different "privacy level" networks (they arent private), for different usages. And what does he care, because he owns them all, so its just PR.
Especially since his current main goal is to consolidate the data of his different brands anyhow.

The thing is, you go with peoples usage modalities over time, you give them different service names for it. You still own the entire (western) market.

Future trajectories are wechat related, so facebook score, facebook bucks, facebook bank, facebook security envelope, ... All of which makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. So they'll probably rebrand.


One thing is ABSOLUTELY certain.


Nothing will ever replace facebook, until the people who have used fb, instagram, or whatsapp have died. They are natural monopolies. They are generational products (Although usage patterns slightly shift). People who argue for facebook having to be broken up are absolutely right in principle.

Reason why is the network effect.

NOTHING matters until you reach critical mass. And then the network as a whole becomes too valueable to replace it piece-meal. The only outs fb lawyers are proposing is "you own your data" (as well), and could move it to a different service - but thats not a real solution, since it makes migration so 'hard' (so you are transitioning 7GB and growing of data to a different online service? Really.), that no one will ever even attempt to. Much less entire networks of people.

And once you are on the verge of reaching critical mass as a new platform, facebook buys you up.

This has NOTHING to do with "but Netscape and IE where beat eventually" - as for them not even close to the same network effects where in place at their hey day. People just installed a different browser, had the same communities. With facebooks social networks, switching is only ever as viable as the willingness of you most technical illiterate, but "interesting" people to switch.

I'm so certain of all this, that I'll not even look up statistics to back me up. Everything else is unthinkable, on a motivation / mass psychology level.

Ive also seen lobbyists selling the popular believe that even giants falter, on the internet - but none of them has ever addressed the different nature of the beast here. FB (incl. Insta, Whatsapp, ..) needs regulation to ever matter less.

And thats the truth.

Telegram isnt picked up for the same reasion, it never peaked peoples interests (no exclusive college parties on there...), so it never reached popular mass. It has nothing to do with peoples knowledge. Their motivations are far more simple. They would sell out their entire conversations tomorrow, for 5 minutes of celebrity contact. You'd never reach them with a rational argument for privacy, on the "but what if I miss a party" level. Its horrible, but thats the way it is. And whats used is, what most people already are familiar with.

This can change, when people are new to a thing, or when "different needs" (smaller groups) arise, but only with a very small window of opportunity, against a player in the field that owns EVERY common social solution out there. And isn't above it to buy up or drive you out of his market.

"But what about myspace?" Not even close to critical mass probably, and held the wrong people for mainstream success. It was replaced by a more mainstream product. ("Pictures for your grandparents". Business contacts. Influencer smiles.)

 

[dAVID_]

The only real reason why I still use Facebook is because I need it to communicate, and I don't think others would be willing to swtich to other platforms.