Misgivings

I resent that my career involves incentivizing advertisers to feed more and more revenue into the gaping maws of Google and Facebook.

I used to be a big fan of Google and Facebook, but now I think that both companies are actively making the world a worse place.

I remember being so excited to sign up for my beta Gmail account in 2004. Google made things easier than any other company did!

I signed up for Facebook in 2008 when I went off to ASU. At the time, Facebook was a breath of fresh air with its real name policy and straightforward approach.

Unfortunately, both of these platforms have been weaponized against their users. It was always true that user information was the product being sold, but at a certain point, Google and Facebook went beyond doing that.

Google and Facebook have each taken increasingly authoritarian viewpoints, and both seem to have been largely captured by people that enjoy browbeating others for perceived political gain.

No matter what you think about Edward Snowden, his warnings about mass surveillance went largely unheeded.

Remember when Facebook admitted to “optimizing” its news feed algorithm to maximize controversy?

Even if Google and Facebook stopped doing these things, I find it somewhat distasteful that my effect on the world can be described as using money to change people’s opinions. Eventually, I hope to hitch my wagon to a cause I feel AWESOME about, and leave marketing behind forever.