I guess no one will be surprised to learn that Facebook, now Meta, has been chosen the worst technology company of 2021. The answer would be different if we ask about the reason for having that opinion, and that is that here we will find the most varied and even contradictory answers. Something that, and it is not that I am the biggest Facebook advocate in the world but I have to say it, may have to do in part with our own biases.
But before entering the analysis, clarify that the survey of which I speak has been carried out by Yahoo! Finance, and that due to its performance in the markets the award for the best company of the year has been received by Microsoft, which would have exceeded its previous capitalization records, with shares that have not stopped generating value throughout this year. Certainly they must be doing something quite well in Redmond to achieve these numbers.
But hey, let’s go back to the result of the survey, although it must be clarified that, unlike the winner, this loser title was awarded by popular vote, not on the basis of their numbers. Be that as it may, Facebook obtained more than twice the votes than the second worst rated company, Alibaba and, as I mentioned earlier, the explanations about the reasons for the votes were very diverse, showing that each person hates Facebook for a reason. different, or in some cases by a combination of several of them. What is impossible is to do it all at the same time.
Why? Well, because part of the voting participants argued that Facebook applies censorship to the voices and messages of the political right, a debate especially fired in the United States, and that peaked with the expulsion of Donald Trump from this and other networks social. A sector of the right thinks that their voices are silenced by the big social networks And, in response, we have already seen multiple movements to create new networks dedicated exclusively to users of the most conservative profiles.
At the opposite extreme, we find users who are very critical of Facebook because they consider that the social network has not ensured as it should to avoid the spread of false news, which some of them consider to be a tool used on a regular basis by groups of the so-called American alt-right to intoxicate the political debate and facilitate the entry of their positions further from the center and moderation.
But not only in politics do we find fake news, also in matters such as the coronavirus crisis, many users consider that Facebook has been a key platform for the dissemination of hoaxes that have ended up penetrating and increasing the base of deniers and conspiracy, thus contributing to aggravate the consequences of the pandemic.
Of course it was also mentioned the negligence with which the company has acted in relation to children and minors. As we have been informing you from time to time, the company was aware of the negative effects of Instagram on said audiences, and not only did it not act to combat it, but it even launched a project to create an Instagram specially aimed at said audience, showing that the Income statement was terribly more important in Facebook offices than the well-being and mental health of its users.
The name change, from Facebook to Meta, undoubtedly seeks to lighten part of the load that drags its brand image for a long time now. And along with the name change, of course, promises, many promises. Some of the future, such as the metaverse, and others of change and improvement, such as those of Instagram before its highest representative appears before the United States Congress. Will so many promises of something work?
The credibility of the company does not seem to be at its best either, and it is that of the survey participants, only three out of ten see possible that Facebook can redeem itself from its mistakes. The findings of the researchers and the statements of former company employees, especially those of former Facebook engineer Frances Haugen, have left her image as touched as the Titanic was battered after its collision with the iceberg. It is true that the company has more means than the captain had to close the waterways, but there are so many that, even so, it is difficult to make an optimistic forecast for the company.
