this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2023
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I linked the discussion because I didn't know enough about the content

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[–] [email protected] 194 points 11 months ago (2 children)

The fact that Harvard bent over for a “donation” is just pathetic. They have a $50bn endowment. What is even the point of having that much money if not to be uncompromising on academic freedom?

[–] [email protected] 113 points 11 months ago

I dunno if you've heard this, but under capitalism, more > less. And they got 1% more!

Harvard has been unethical in many cases in the name of growing their endowment. As if they were a corporation beholden to shareholders. Harvard Has a Brand Problem. Here’s How to Fix It.

[–] [email protected] 73 points 11 months ago

How do you think they got said $50bn endowment

[–] [email protected] 125 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Imagine how damning their behavior must be that they paid half a billion to cover it up. 10,000 people in the US could live comfortably for a year on this single hush money payment.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 11 months ago

Well, it has been criminal in several uniquely terrible ways for an incredibly long time. 500M to save on 1B in fines is reasonable being that Facebook is nearly dead in Europe and needs the US far more than it used to.

[–] [email protected] 92 points 11 months ago (1 children)

No college has real prestige.

They're all just political book clubs.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 11 months ago (1 children)

South Harmon Institute of Technology though

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

It's got that rizz, no cap. Bet.

[–] [email protected] 78 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The poison of personal data collection is too great for any company with any amount of tech to ignore. Profit on data sales must have crazy high margins or it must be so easy to do that you might as well. We needed regulations on this 20 years ago. Now who knows how many dark hats know you fucked Shelley in the back of your 2020 Subaru. It should have never gotten here in the first place. Now it will take some C Suite with way too much power and not a shred of responsibility to have his vile conversation on how poor people should die and women are objects for this to get 1/3rd of the regulation it should have.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

I agree.

But no one knows about Shelley because I've never posted about it. .

.

.

.

DAMMIT! 🤣

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Oh damn. The Shelley club up in here!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

Shelly and 2020 Subarus.

If I were a data miner, that sort of info could identify, well, more people than I expected, honestly.

[–] [email protected] 63 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Academia should be investigated by a new division of special authorities

[–] [email protected] 30 points 11 months ago

Ron Desantis is already on it. Careful what you wish for

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

And what should the outcome be? No more higher education?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Could this new division wear brown shirts, please? Perhaps the books could be burnt in the streets.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

They did the putsch, it was a Nazi putsch. They did the putsch, it was a beer hall putsch. Wah oooooooooo. Wah oooooooo.

[–] [email protected] 62 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Stop using facebook/meta, Instagram, Whatsapp. You're giving them power by using their services. Use alternatives like Friendica, PixelFed, or Signal.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (3 children)

That's all well and good, but if you think that Facebook isn't mirroring all data from the Fediverse, and any other network it can touch, and then correlating what it can back to whatever individual/digital/personal profiles it can, you'd be mistaken.

The only solution here is a political one with significant judicial punishment as the enforcement mechanism. FYI I'm also including the guillotine in the list of nonviable solutions, as the problem is too large and geographically vast to behead our way out of it, even if it would be cathartic.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Can we have a little beheading as a treat?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I'm not opposed to the idea, and it it's purely for catharsis I'd prefer a good gibbeting at the National Mall, repurposing the NYPD's horses to aid with drawing and quartering them in Times Square, or... Well, basically anything that isn't as clean and quick as a guillotine.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

while I agree they are probably doing this and we should have better data privacy/ownership, the scope of the data they can pull from the fediverse is substantially less than what they get from their platform.

when you're on Facebook, they control and track everything. which posts you see, which you don't, and in what order, how long you looked at a given post, whether or not you scrolled through comments, every movement of your mouse, everything you typed and deleted in that text box, where on the screen you touched while you dragged to scroll, what text you highlighted, absolutely everything.

the only data they can probably pull from the fediverse is posts, comments, and like/dislike. maybe which posts you clicked into if that's public and I'm pretty sure they can't get which posts were shown to you without owning the instance you're on.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

Nearly everyone has a shadow account if you know someone that uses it.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago

Think of how different the entire world would be today if Mark Fuckerberg wasn't an irredeemable sack of complete garbage.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago

Harvard: Science for sale!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago

Hmm. Time to start another investigation.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

Zuckerberg is literally Satan.