The Blame Game

Mark Zuckerberg is a Millennial, a Harvard dropout and one of the world’s youngest, richest and most famous men. He is 33 years old and has a net worth estimated at $46 billion dollars.  He is a computer programmer, Internet entrepreneur, and philanthropist.  He is the chairman, chief executive, and co-founder of the social networking website Facebook.  He is an amazing young man, normally seen wearing flip flops, a grey T-shirt and a hoodie, similar to the attire of Apple founder Steve Jobs who wore jeans and a black turtleneck shirt.  His dress code seems to irritate some, even prompting one government official to mockingly wonder out loud (into media microphones, of course) if Zuckerberg would wear a decent shirt for his appearance before the US Senate committee yesterday.

Zuckerberg was called to testify about privacy issues in relation to the  data mining firm (Cambridge Analytica) which gathered personal information from 87 million Facebook users in an attempt to influence the 2016 election.  You may recall the Senate also held hearings with the CEO of Equifax and others regarding the cyberattacks that harvested personal information from an estimated 148 million Americans not very long ago.  Privacy is a serious issue in this new technological age and the issue must be addressed.  On the other hand, Fake News, Russian meddling in our elections, Hate speech, Terrorist propaganda and other manipulative infringements using Facebook and other platforms are equally as dangerous as the privacy issues.  These, too, must be addressed.  

I noted that the majority of senators and representatives are over 60-years of age.  There is nothing wrong with that in and of itself, but there is something wrong with it when dealing with the new technology and with a 33-year-old.  Those of us over sixty years of age cannot fathom the depths and nuances of the new technology no matter how well-informed we try to be.  We are “out of it!”  Facebook is not an American “thing”—Facebook is a community connecting over 250 million people all over the world!  That fact alone is mind-boggling!  How it all works, or  how such a thing can be held together is beyond me!

But what was most mind-boggling to me yesterday was hearing a 33-year-old billionaire take the blame for the privacy scandal as it relates to his domain—Facebook.  “We didn’t take a broad enough view of our responsibility, and that was a big mistake….It was my mistake, and I’m sorry.  I started Facebook, I run it, and I’m responsible for what happens here.”  Have you heard recently any US senator or representative say the same?  The Blame Game is a biblical thing—it began way back in the very beginning of time—and it continues!