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Chris Hughes, the co-founder of Facebook, delivers a speech in Montreal (2011). Paul Chiasson

Facebook co-founder says it's time for the government to break up the tech giant

“I feel a sense of anger and responsibility,” Chris Hughes wrote, who worked on the first News Feed team.

CHRIS HUGHES, THE co-founder of Facebook, has said that he feels “angry and responsible” about Facebook’s mistakes, and that he thinks the company should be broken up by the US government in an effort to fix them.

Writing in the New York Times, Hughes says that since 2017, the reputation of Facebook has “taken a nosedive”.

“The company’s mistakes – the sloppy privacy practices that dropped tens of millions of users’ data into a political consulting firm’s lap; the slow response to Russian agents, violent rhetoric and fake news; and the unbounded drive to capture ever more of our time and attention – dominate the headlines.”

Facebook has been at the heart of a number of scandals over the past few years: accused of being used as a tool to spread hate speech (in Myanmar during the Rohingya persecution), disinformation and to manipulate voters during elections and referendums through sponsored, targeted advertising where the source of the political message isn’t clear (a major fear for the upcoming European elections). 

Facebook was also accused of compromising its users’ data, after it was revealed that the personal details tens of millions of Facebook users worldwide was hijacked by Cambridge Analytica as it worked for US President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign.

“It’s been 15 years since I co-founded Facebook at Harvard, and I haven’t worked at the company in a decade. But I feel a sense of anger and responsibility,” Hughes wrote today.

I’m disappointed in myself and the early Facebook team for not thinking more about how the News Feed algorithm could change our culture, influence elections and empower nationalist leaders.

Facebook’s News Feed has been criticised for only promoting the type of content that users have already expressed an interest in, creating a bubble where users are blocked from reading about issues or opinions that they haven’t been previously exposed to.

Ironically, Hughes adds: “And I’m worried that Mark [Zuckerberg] has surrounded himself with a team that reinforces his beliefs instead of challenging them.”

Chris Hughes was on the original News Feed team (his name is on the patent).

As a solution, Hughes says “it is time [that the government] break up Facebook”.

He said that it was a mistake of regulators to allow Facebook to acquire Instagram and WhatsApp, adding that neither had any meaningful revenue but were “incredibly popular”. 

Now, the founders of Instagram and WhatsApp have left the company after clashing with Mark over his management of their platforms. But their former properties remain Facebook’s, driving much of its recent growth.

He suggests that Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram should be broken up into three distinct companies “most likely publicly traded”.

He also suggests that a new US agency is required, empowered by Congress, to regulate tech companies, and praised the EU’s GDPR privacy protections.

Facebook’s business model is built on capturing as much of our attention as possible to encourage people to create and share more information about who they are and who they want to be. We pay for Facebook with our data and our attention, and by either measure it doesn’t come cheap.

Hughes also says that Zuckerberg has huge power to control the direction Facebook takes, and that the US government should hold him accountable when things go wrong.

Mark may never have a boss, but he needs to have some check on his power. The American government needs to do two things: break up Facebook’s monopoly and regulate the company to make it more accountable to the American people.

“Mark Zuckerberg cannot fix Facebook, but our government can.”

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    Mute Pat Casey
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    Feb 21st 2022, 8:10 AM

    A big thank you to the ESB crews out there working in atrocious conditions to get power reconnected around the country.

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    Mute ed w
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    Feb 21st 2022, 2:19 PM

    @Pat Casey: definitely. but powercheck just said my house has gone from the power due back at 12.30pm to 10pm hope they get it on a bit sooner !

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    Mute Barty
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    Feb 21st 2022, 8:20 AM

    Strongest winds out of the three storms goes to Franklin.

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    Mute Gabriel Holmes
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    Feb 21st 2022, 8:32 AM

    @Barty: Depends on were you are.

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    Mute saoirse janneau
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    Feb 21st 2022, 8:34 AM

    @Barty: definitely. Wind from the NW is the new norm.

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    Mute ed w
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    Feb 21st 2022, 11:39 AM

    @Gabriel Holmes: nope, highest recorded mean wind speeds were higher at 107kmh for mace head vs 93kmh roches point for eunice.

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    Mute Joe_X
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    Feb 21st 2022, 2:53 PM

    @Barty: definitely but were Met Eireann caught on the hop? We seemed to have a couple days notice Dudley and Eunice, but there seemed to be no mention of Franklin until after it had made landfall! Was it how it did not affect the east coast or what that they took their eyes off the ball!

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    Mute Shane Fleming
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    Feb 21st 2022, 8:05 PM

    @Barty: Not in Kerry it wasn’t. Friday morning was absolutely horrendous.

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    Mute Locutus Of Borg
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    Feb 21st 2022, 1:43 PM

    A big shout out to those poor souls relying on electric heat pumps to heat their homes. It must be freezing with no power

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    Mute Darren Byrne
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    Feb 21st 2022, 2:56 PM

    @Locutus Of Borg: I’d imagine any system that is relying on a pump to push hot water around the radiators in a house is going to have a problem.

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    Mute Reuben Gray
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    Feb 21st 2022, 3:01 PM

    @Locutus Of Borg: As opposed to a gas boiler which requires no electricity at all and runs on magic?

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    Mute Locutus Of Borg
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    Feb 21st 2022, 3:28 PM

    @Reuben Gray: well I was thinking more along the lines of those who built houses last year or had houses builtl for them and were denied the opportunity to put in a chimney to allow for the use of a stove or open fire so as to at least have a fire to sit around when the inevitable power outages do happen

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    Mute Quiet Goer
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    Feb 21st 2022, 3:15 PM

    Global warming

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