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113 points 1vuio0pswjnm7 | 2 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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LarsDu88 ◴[] No.45788405[source]
I think Zuckerberg understands something that most people on this forum seem to not understand at all.

Facebook, Instagram, etc... these are all only valuable as network effect monopolies.

Investment into AI can torch billions of dollars and still be worthwhile so long as it's done in the service of protecting those monopolies, because LLMs are both intrinsically threatening to Meta's existence and intriniscally valuable for building better recommender systems when platform monopolists like Apple add privacy protections (cutting Meta off from the data spigot that powers its revenue streams).

Once AIs with no wallets outnumber humans on Facebook, Meta has an existential problem. There is no way to avoid the inevitable, the best one can do is embrace it, and 25 billion is nothing compared to losing your platform.

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1. diamond559 ◴[] No.45788443[source]
So, burn tens of billions to infest your own site w/ bots bc it is somehow "inevitable" anyway? Why not spend that to try and make the user experience better for users with wallets? The investors are clearly fed up w/ burning cash and racking up debt w/ no profits to show for it.
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2. LarsDu88 ◴[] No.45800658[source]
Your idea of what would "make the user experience better" can be very different from what actually makes the experience more profitable to Meta.

As far as I can tell, the things that actually drives engagement are ragebait political videos, thirst traps, and fake AI generated videos of cats robbing liquor stores.

The investors have rewarded Meta with something like 5x stock increase since abandoning the Metaverse.

It's time to realize that "embrace the stupid" is indeed a viable business strategy and an accurate reflection of our society.