Facebook Disruption Podcast

This is Encrypted Ambition, a podcast about the builders rewriting the rules. Join Petronella Technology Group as we decode the ideas, challenges, and momentum behind tomorrow's business, technology, and leadership breakthroughs. All right, well, welcome to the Petronella podcast. My name is Erin. I'm an employee at Petronella, and we also have Blake.

One of my coworkers, and we are going to possibly be joined by some other people later. But if not, that's fine. But we definitely wanted to discuss what is going on in Facebook world right now, the impact that it had, and just kind of our thoughts on it. So.

Blake, what were your what were your initial thoughts when you heard about the Facebook outage? Um, well, I was I was thought my internet had like went out, and I was like, okay, it's it's sad we live in a world where if you can't access Facebook, you know, you feel like your internet's broken. But um, but yeah, I remember trying to access Facebook, Instagram.

I use WhatsApp pretty regularly, and like my messages weren't weren't going through. So I was just like, "Is my internet not working?" Oh yeah, I imagine if you tried on three different apps and none of them were working, it's probably pretty confusing. And then usually, like, it's weird because, like, if you're testing, you know, like like you're you're pinging the internet, you know, like.

The rule of thumb is to ping like eight dot eight dot eight dot eight, which is Google. So, so usually Google is known as the source. Like, hey, if the internet's working, let's just go to try visiting Google. So, so yeah, three different sources. I was kind of surprised, and then I reached out to Jonathan, and and he was like, "No, it's working fine for me." And I was like, "No, it has to be down."

So, yeah. What about you? How did you? I found out. I didn't. I didn't know there was outage until you guys messaged us on Teams, or I guess it was BJ messaged us, and then I went and looked on my app, and I was like, "Oh, I I can get on Facebook."

Um, so I thought you guys were like crazy or whatever. Um, but then, the BJ said something about posting, so I tried to post. I think my post was, "Hello, is this thing on?" And it never, it never posted. And then I messaged a couple of my friends on the messenger just to see. Um, and then I think I checked back like when I got home because I was.

Helping out at my brother's house, I checked out or checked back when I got home, and it was working for like a couple minutes, but then apparently it stopped working. But then it was then was back on. So for me, it wasn't really a major anything because I was just super busy, which I know we all are. But I didn't I didn't notice it because I also haven't been on Facebook that much in the past like year or so.

Compared to like a year ago, I got a little burnt out. I think. But how often do you use Facebook? It's weird because I I use Facebook Messenger pretty regularly, but not the actual like Facebook side. Um.

But I mean, yeah, I'm a member of like some Facebook groups that I think are pretty, pretty awesome, and they're pretty nice little communities. And I think if Facebook were to ever go down permanently, those would be the only things that I'd really miss. And then, of course, like the whole advertising platform of Facebook.

But I could totally live without Facebook, and I say that now. But you know, I guess maybe a week into it, I'm I may feel like I'm going through withdrawals or something. You know, you might very well and not realize. I mean, I you know, I think I mentioned on our team chat yesterday. I was like, well, I don't think I would be super sad if I lost Facebook, but in reality.

You know, most of my pictures I have on there. You know, all those memories are really sweet. You know, and I have, you know, some friends that have passed away. So it's nice to kind of, you know, reminisce on their pages sometimes. So for all of those things, I think Facebook is great for the politics and and kind of what has been.

Whistleblown in the past few days, I think makes makes Facebook feel a little more. What's the word? Insist. Oh, I can't. Insidious. Insidious. That's the word. I feel like a lot of people, and this is sad to say, but I feel like a lot of people use Facebook as like their primary news platform.

Um. So, and there's always not a lot of credibility, like attached to that. So, you know, you might see a lot of misinformation disappear with Facebook. That's the right word. Absolutely. I mean, and that was the other thing too. I was kind of telling you. Um, I was reading into, what is her name?

The whistleblower's interview. She did a Wall Street Journal interview, I believe it was. But it was really good, and it talked about that too, like how basically Facebook puts profit over security. So she was saying that, you know, if the misinformation would reduce by ten percent, but

Profits would also reduce by, or would reduce by one percent. They chose that one percent profit over security, which, yeah, I mean that's basic capitalism at work here. You know, I mean that's one of one of the issues people have with it is that often.

You know, it's it's profit over everything else, and including human lives in a lot of respects. So, I was gonna say, like, if you think about Facebook's one percent, you know, like the one percent versus the ten percent, you know, Facebook's one percent margins are like huge. Like, who knows, like millions, you know, of dollars. So.

I don't think it's very uncommon for businesses to put their profits before their customers. Well, no, it's definitely not. It's it's uncommon for the opposite to occur, really. Yeah, and if you think about it, like I think that's how you can segregate yourself as a business, you know, by putting your customers first and.

You know, really taking care of your customers. I think that's how you separate yourself, especially in the marketplace today, where nobody cares. You know, so. And she was also the whistleblower is also saying that, like these concerns were brought up to Facebook, and they just they just decided never to do anything because they can also.

Help to de-radicalize the content that's seen by people, but that would also reduce profits, and it reduces the amount of time people stay on Facebook. And I mean, what incentive do they have to fix it? They don't, so that's why. Like, I I think I was kind of born like.

Sort of an anarchist, almost like I hate rules and authority, but I do see the need for them, especially in a society like this where we do generally put profits over people because of just how our economy is set up. I mean, otherwise, and I'm not saying I'm anti-capitalist; that's not what I'm saying. But I do think we have to have.

Checks and balances in place, because people should be more important than profits. Oh, for sure. I mean, it's sad that people value money over somebody else's well-being. You know, I think that's really sad. And you know, I I personally like call me like.

Like somebody, I don't know. You know, you could say I'm a boycotter or whatever, like for not patronizing businesses like that. But you know, if you're not providing good service, or you know, you're not taking care of your customers, and I immediately see that, like in our in our in our interaction, then of course, I mean, I'm not gonna spend my money there.

I mean, I don't know about you, but you know, earning and having my business, I feel like is a privilege. So, you know, you have to earn that privilege instead of me just giving it to you. You know, you know, anybody that you know puts their profits over me, or you know, people take - I think people take their customers for granted, especially successful.

Businesses, and so you know, my business is a privilege. You know, it's not something I give away. And so the the the the first time, or maybe the second time, you know, I have a negative experience. You know, it's unlikely that I'll ever spend money there again. Not wrong with you, but.

I mean, I feel like Facebook has me hooked right now. It really sucks, right? Because I enjoy the platform for, you know, the reasons of as I, I don't know if you could hear me or not, but you know, like memories. I like the memories. I like the pictures. I like being able to go look on people's profiles and see how they're doing and things like that.

I don't like it for the civil discourse. I don't like what it's done to the country and the democracy, just in general. I think it's pretty crazy, and I do think that there should be checks and balances on it. I mean, you know, I I'd like to say I believe in free enterprise because I get it, but the problem with free enterprise is that, again, corporations, they're.

Goal is profit, which you know it makes sense with markets and things like that. But we have people that we have to protect, and when I mean companies can clearly cannot be tasked with keeping people safe for the purpose of keeping them safe if it costs them a dollar. So it's.

Unfortunately, I think that there needs to be some regulation over it, and I do think that they should take responsibility and start making changes that are going to positively impact the society instead of negatively impact it. Yeah, I would, I would love to see how that would roll out. You know.

Like how these changes would affect like the modern system, and and I just don't ever. I guess I don't ever see a company like Facebook ever really caring. And I think as I, I understood that, you know, I kind of knew. I mean, everybody's seen the movie The Social Network, right? I mean, everybody. And I don't know about the accuracy.

But I think it was kind of inspired by some truth because you know, absolutely, there was a bunch of lawsuits based on you know, or that were targeting you know, Zuckerberg and everything. So, so yeah, I mean, there was some truth there. I'm assuming, and if you watch that movie, you know, it just really makes me.

Think about how terrible of a person he is, and how you know he really doesn't care about anybody. You know, especially considering some of his friends that you know that bootstrapped him from day one, that were investing in him and his ideas.

You know, it just really quickly shows you how you know once you get some cash in your hand, like how quickly it will change you. You know, I mean, I just can't imagine having that mindset. It's like, I mean, even if you just had a just a billion dollars, like, isn't that enough? You know, like, why don't you start doing good now? Do do good for society. Do you know, like, how much money does a person need?

You know, it's it's, and again, it just kind of shows that corporations can't be, they will not make the right decision. Generally speaking, if it negatively impacts their bottom line at all, I mean, Facebook could lose ten percent of its revenue and still be okay. You know what I mean?

I'm not saying that that's the exact amount or anything like that, but it's like he lost six billion dollars in that whole event. That's nothing to him. Yeah, of course. Yeah. I mean, I wonder if it really faced him, you know. But, but yeah, I mean, it's such a challenging thing to comprehend.

You know, all the rights you know that that that our ancestors you know fought for, you know, we give away. You know, yeah, that's a good point too. You know, and maybe this is very conspiracy theorist, but I can't help but think that maybe that was a distraction.

Them doing that was it trying to distract from the whistleblower. The timing is really suspicious. You know what I mean? It's like your whistleblower comes out, and now all the news is about the outage as opposed to the whistleblower. I don't know. I don't know. I don't. I think.

I think maybe anonymous, or you know, one of those those organizations, kind of wanted to make an example, maybe a slap on the wrist of Facebook. I mean, again, this is I'm probably I just this was my my opinion. I don't know. There's no grounding, right? But pure speculation.

Yeah, yeah, that's a good, good way to put it. But, I mean, really, who would do that to him? You know, obviously, if Facebook's down and all the Facebook services are down, Mark Zuckerberg knows that he's going to lose money. And then, obviously, we know that money is probably the most important thing to him, considering you know the history of Facebook and right. But think about it.

If he deflects, if he deflects the news from the whistleblower to this six-hour outage, yeah, he lost six billion dollars. But is he like maybe gambling and thinking that he would lose even more if people paid attention to the the hearing or testimony? I guess.

I actually don't know about that, but I actually think that, like I said, people don't value their privacy anymore. Like, I think there there is some like era that we're going through right now where people are starting to value it more than they have within the past ten years, but.

You know, where people are actually starting to read the terms of service, and you know what they're buying into when they sign up for some some free website. But I think you know the tables are turning. But I think you know majority of the Americans, you know, or some of us, you know, know that free comes with some type of cost. You know, I mean.

Nothing in this world that's awesome is free, you know, except for like life, you know, I guess, and and air, and you know, stuff like that. But, um, but it comes at a cost, and that cost is your your information, and you know, that's that's how Facebook is monetized through, you know, your your your data.

You know your information that you give. You know, like we were talking about, like people that go in there and they like a sports team, or like they like a movie, or they like a book. Like, you know, they're able to to build a a persona around you, um, and that really helps advertisers and you know, um, other companies that are looking to tap into the.

The golden egg of Facebook, you know, to to understand you, and that that's what that's what an advertiser wants or a business wants. They want to understand their customers because once they understand their customers, they can find more customers. I mean, but do you think this is ever going to be regulated? Because clearly, businesses aren't going to self regulate. They're going to use as much as they can to.

You know, maximize profit if possible. But do you? I mean, you know, yes, you can say that we as citizens have a right - or not a right, but a duty - to ourselves to read all the small print and know what we're getting into. But I mean, realistically, the world is just so fast.

And massive and connected these days, I feel like I feel like the onus needs to be taken off of us and put more on businesses. Businesses need to be responsible and stop trying to trick us. You know, like they, but they have no incentive to do so. I, I don't think I don't think it can be regulated. I mean, I could be wrong. I mean, it.

I think it should, and I mean, I don't know. I mean, I think you'll see a lot of pros and cons to that. But you know, the second some type of entity starts intervening on behalf of these companies, there is going to be some retaliation or something, but.

I definitely. I mean, you have to be your own advocate in that sense. You know, read the terms of service before you sign up. You know, consider what your data means to you, and consider what you want to put out there. You know, I know people that that have burner phones. You know, that literally only use their burner phone for like, for signing up for like text based services or.

I know people that that don't use credit cards online. You know, they're usually the older generation. But or you can go out there and get a Visa prepaid. You know, and um and sign up for some you know buy stuff buy stuff with that. So that way, your real ATM bank card, where all of your money lives, isn't out there. You know.

I mean, I hear you're saying, but to me, like, this is not what I would consider freedom. Like, having to watch my back every step of the way just to make sure that some corporation isn't taking advantage of me. Like, I don't want to have to live like that. Sounds crazy, or whatever, and maybe a little entitled and spoiled. But like, like, there is too much.

Too many other things going on that I want to focus my attention on. Like, I don't. I like I said, I really enjoy the aspects of social media where I can connect with people and see what people are doing that I haven't talked to in a long time. Like, I love that part of it, you know. But it's like I don't have to want. I don't want to have to keep watching my back. Like, that's just.

That's like, come on, you know. Take some. They. I feel like the responsibility needs to stop being put all on us. I mean, we do have to do that too, right? But to what extent? And I feel like they just need to stop. Like, they need to stop taking advantage of consumers. I think there's a lot of people that fit into the same mindset as you. Like, hey, like.

Like my my data is like I'm okay. I'm okay giving away my data at the convenience of being able to connect with my friends, or being able to catch up with people, or being able to communicate with people efficiently. Like that's what I was kind of, I think, alluding to kind of earlier. Like I don't think it's ever going to happen. You know, I don't think.

The the government's ever going to step in? Well, see, but I will say I don't I don't necessarily like I don't think that I'm okay with giving my data. You know, I it's like we don't realize, even working in the industry that you know you and I work in. I mean, I understand that the data is deep, right? And the amount of data that they have on us is extensive.

But you know, when you first sign up for it, like I wasn't aware that, like, I would say the word "green shoe" and seventeen seconds later, a green shoe ad would pop up in my newsfeed. Like, I didn't really agree to that. I mean, maybe I did somewhere, like, officially, but I didn't, you know. Because you - that's the thing. It's like this is a huge company, and you know, you kind of have.

I don't know. Maybe it's just me. I I want to have trust in businesses and stuff, but I guess I trusted them too much, and now I feel like they've. I feel like I feel like not only me, but I feel like other consumers have been taken advantage of. And I just, it's yeah, like I should have done a better job keeping an eye out, but like this is messed up. Like I shouldn't have.

To do that, has has that ever happened to you? Like the green shoe? Are you kidding all the time? Really, all the time? Yes, I will say a word, and then like a couple minutes later, like I get an ad for you know a robotic clock or whatever it is. Right? I mean, yes, it happens all the time.

Is that something that you're actively searching on the internet, or is it something like where where you say like, "Oh yeah," like let's just say you spend all day looking at shoes, and then you talk to your significant other, and then you say, "Oh yeah, I was looking at shoes," blah blah blah, and then all of a sudden, you know, I found this green pair of shoes that I like.

And then all of a sudden, there you. No, it's both. I mean, it's both, right? It's like when I do a. I remember it's for. It kind of freaked me out when it first happened. Like when I would Google it or whatever. But after, it's more. I'll have a conversation with a friend, and I I've heard, like, I feel like pretty reliably that when you use your Facebook Messenger app on your phone.

That it can hear you. So, you know, but I still use it. I shouldn't. I don't know. I mean, maybe, maybe I don't have that experience, or I've never had that because, I mean, I don't have like an Alexa.

In my house. I don't either. I live. I live on a boat, dude. I don't. I don't have. Yeah, I have no need for. Yeah, this is. I don't have anything like that at all. I've never had one. Well, I guess we probably should should talk to other people, you know, and see. Like, oh, I have talked to other people. I'm curious now. It's all over social media. Look it up.

Like we've, I've talked to friends. Like you now, now it's like kind of a joke, right? But I mean, it's. Do you use the Facebook app? Um, Messenger. I I have Messenger, and the only reason why I have Messenger is because like I wanted to send people Facebook messages through the face, like the web or the web presence or whatever.

Um, without the Facebook app, and then they essentially stopped letting me send messages to people, um, who didn't have or because I wasn't using the Facebook app, so I was kind of forced into that. Yeah, but I think now I have the Facebook app, and I think I also have the Messenger app on my phone. Yeah, this stuff happens.

All the time, and I - I don't even think it's necessarily like - I don't think it's when you're messaging people, but it's when you're talking. Hmm. So, I mean, I don't - I don't ever send voice messages if that's what you mean. No, I mean, like I might literally like I'll be talking to my boyfriend in my room, like back and forth.

And then I get like I don't type it. I don't do anything. Nothing else. I'll be like a pink rainbow, and I haven't googled the pink rainbow. I haven't put pink rainbow on social media. Nothing. Just said the words. I don't know how it picks up certain things, but it does. Crazy.

I guess I'll have to start paying more attention to that. I noticed it, and and then other people have like talked about it and stuff. Huh. Yeah, I mean, I can't. So I can't confidently say that that happens to me. But now I'm going to be on the lookout for it.

But you also can't say it hasn't. Yeah, well, I'm so I'm gonna put this on the record. Like, I am starving, and I'm gonna gonna say Chipotle like eight thousand times, like Chipotle, Chipotle, Chipotle, Chipotle. And then, I mean, let's see an ad start appearing. So, so you haven't Google Chipotle, you haven't messaging anybody about Chipotle. Nope. All right. Let me.

Let me scroll the feed. Let me scroll the feed. Because I'll say that I get Chipotle all the time on, like, on DoorDash, and I don't think they do. I don't think I've gotten any Facebook ads for Chipotle. Maybe, maybe Chipotle is like, I don't need to advertise. Maybe, I don't need to put money into that.

Oh, I will say I like adobo better. I like adobo better. I used to work at Quindio, but like a long time ago, it's like one of my first jobs. And really, yeah, yep, yeah. I used to make the rice. I remember like mixing all the salt and the lime with the rice, and you're making me hungry.

All right, Quero, Quero, the Quero. So let's see, let's see if I get ads from both. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna scroll Facebook, and then I'm gonna scroll for just a couple minutes, and then I'm gonna scroll Instagram, like next to each other, and then we'll see. You know, I don't, I don't even know like what is an ad and what isn't an ad anymore.

You know, it's like I scroll through it so quickly, like I don't even see the sponsored stuff. So yeah, I was looking at like gardening stuff, and so I did. I do see an ad for gardening stuff, and I expect that. I still don't like it, though. I don't know. Like, I don't want them to. I don't like it.

Like get get your advertisement the old way, the old fashioned way, with you know, like they're just making up rules as they go because they can. I don't like it. I do see an ad for food. I'm starting to see ads for food. Really? Yeah, but then again, to be fair, I mean, I was looking at like meal prep services and stuff, so that one I can.

I can account for. I'm I'm getting ads for. Let's see, morning bliss. Okay, an alarm. My own sunrise alarm. That's weird.

Yeah, watches. I look at watches all the time, so that that one makes sense. Purses and clothes. I I do like purses and clothes. I am typical female in that way. Yeah, I don't I don't know if this is going to work for me. So I just scrolled Instagram, nothing, and now I'm scrolling Facebook. Well, sometimes it takes longer than other times, honestly.

It might be. Yeah, it'll be like after. Obviously, I'll go. I'll go on to DoorDash and then make the order for Chipotle, and then it'll come to my door, and then I'll start seeing ads for Chipotle. Yeah, which I expect to happen. Like I expect that to happen. Um, but.

But yeah, I don't. I don't think it's going to work for me, or at least it hasn't, or it doesn't. Or so it has definitely happened to me. Do you? Well, another thing, I don't usually talk on headphones. Do you? I'm talking on headphones right now. Are you currently? Yeah, I am. I am talking on AirPods. So maybe.

It's somehow well. No, that maybe it's list. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know how it works. So I can't. I can't say. Huh. Well, I guess we'll have to to think about. Yes, I need an update. So I need an update by tomorrow. Let me know. Usually, I mean, by tomorrow, it would definitely be doing it.

Well, of course, he's gonna have him by tomorrow because I'm gonna go order some Chipotle, and then they're gonna see my my dollars come in and and try and get some more dollars. Well, then we gotta do something else. We gotta do something. Talk to me about something later, and we'll see if it works. That you're not gonna look up. Okay, so how about this? I've been I've been looking at.

Um, like like furniture for my house. So, um, so yeah, let's just let's just see if you've been you've been googling it. Something that you haven't done. Okay, hold on. So let me let me wind it back. So I was googling it like maybe like a couple weeks ago.

And I've been thinking about furniture, and now I am talking about it and saying, "Hey, I need some furniture." Um, so, so yeah, I haven't, I haven't done it in a couple weeks, but so let's see, let's see, maybe it will, maybe it won't. I have an, actually, I have an idea. I have an idea, something that you probably never googled.

Hairbrush. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I never give a hairbrush. Never. So tell me, I need. Tell me that you need a hairbrush. I I do need one, indeed. Have you been looking for a hairbrush? I haven't. You haven't what? I haven't been looking for a hairbrush. Oh, okay. But now you're looking for a hairbrush.

I think Facebook and Google want me to buy a hairbrush now. I think that Google and Facebook will make it so that you have no choice but to purchase one. I know. I'll know everything about hair brushes within 24 hours if this if this works. Like, I will know like which one is the best, and I can tell. I can tell you which one's the best.

By the way, not plastic. Is it not made from? It's called be hairful. B e h a i r f u l. It's like a thirty dollars brush, but it's so worth it. So you're trying to trick me because I was just about to Google that so I could see what it looks like. Don't you dare! And then all of a sudden, I will start seeing hair brushes everywhere. So I'm trying my best not to Google it. Don't Google it.

Tomorrow, I'll send you. I'll send you a link just so you can look at it. But yeah, stay curious, stay thirsty till then. Okay, okay, I will. Well, yeah, I think we've probably said all that we can say about hairbrushes and hair hairbrushes too. Cybersecurity, hair care products, you know.

Yeah, yeah, and I think, yeah, I think the we'll see what happens. But I'm curious. I think we put together a form, maybe like a questionnaire. We did, yep. About what people think the future of Facebook security is, and.

Um, a couple other questions about like how people understand cybersecurity. So I'm sure we're going to link that somewhere, and we should. So if you're listening to this, we want to hear your thoughts on cybersecurity, and and what you think the future is, and and and even how you think Facebook is going to.

To be impacted by this, besides the fact that they lost six billion dollars, but you know, what do you think? You know, do you think Facebook will be held accountable for this? For one, and if no, do you think Facebook will make changes because of this, or they'll just continue kind of?

Continue on the path that they're going on, not caring. You know, so I think we got questions in there about that. Yeah, we do. We do have some questions, and we are extremely interested in hearing your thoughts on the Facebook disturbance and outage. And I don't think we have any questions about the whistleblower, but we do have text boxes that you can fill in. So.

If you want to expound on your thoughts, we we definitely want to want to hear what everybody has to say because I mean, this is this is big. Social media is still a pretty new media platform, and you know, regulations and all that stuff are still getting hashed out. So, I do think it's an important topic.

To discuss, and you know, think about how you know something like this could happen to Facebook, and they lose six billion dollars. You know, what do you have in place to help mitigate that kind of thing? Or if you have any, you know, suggestions to give to people, that's always nice to hear too. Me make suggestions? No, I'm saying I'm talking.

Listeners, as as if people are maybe somebody's listening. I was lying. What are you talking about, it? Yeah, I am not gonna. I can't help anybody. You can help lots of people. Like, you can help me by telling me tomorrow if.

You got any hairbrush ads on your Facebook? I certainly will. I'm gonna keep my eyes out for it, and it's gonna be the most random thing ever because I'm gonna be scrolling through something, and then yep, and you're gonna like, you're gonna fall out. Dotsy was right. I wonder if it'll ever come to a place where, like, just from.

Like seeing things, like let's just say I'm looking at a picture of a car, and I look at a picture of a tire or like a rim on that car. Will they be able to tell? That'd be really creepy. That'd be extra creepy. That's it's already too much, but like that's just really going extra extra.

It's like they'll be able to use the camera of my computer, like my webcam, to see where my eye is at the screen, and then they'll use like a combination of an algorithm that like shows what I was looking at versus the direction of my eyesight. That's like consumerism consumes the consumers. Like that's really.

What it feels like - it's a little scary. Hopefully, I don't know. Hopefully, we'll get something resolved, but maybe we won't. And I guess only time will tell. Absolutely. All right. Until next time. All right. Yay, conspiracy theories. Yeah. All right. I'll talk to you later, Blake.

All right. Take care. Bye, guys. Bye. That's a wrap on this episode of Encrypted Ambition. Subscribe wherever you listen, and if today's guest inspired you, leave us a review or share the show with someone in your circle. To learn more about how we support innovators with AI, cybersecurity, and compliance, head to PetronellaTech.com. Thanks for listening, and remember, the future favors the bold.