Our Future with Facebook

During a lovely bike ride through B'game and over the Rosalie O'Mahony bike bridge then turning south towards what was once a popular drive-in movie site, I was faced with the same spider web of steel beams we have all seen from a distance.  Here's a view of our future.

And the Oscar for most asked question in town goes to "How are all of those people going to get to work?"

Comments

[Facebooker]

Frankly; as bad as Facebook is as a corporation I would have never have approved of their relocating to this town. Just a little research on their owner and the privacy concerns is enough to banish them from our community.

It would make more sense to allow 2000 crack dealers in this town than 2000 Facebook employees.

[Bruce Dickinson]

At least Burlingame didn't give all these tax breaks and incentives and fall over themselves like NYC initially did with Amazon. "Please, here's free money so you can grace us with your presence". In the meantime, every other normal corporation, not worth a trillion dollars, pays the same price to enter a city as any other small business. What makes Amazon so special vs every other business in America providing a valuable good or service?

With regard to "Facebooker" comment: Sounds like a comment from someone who doesn't own a house, as you will only be crowded out more by 2000 high income employees. And I think the FB employees will make for better neighbors than crack dealers.

No need to be bitter...Reeks of sour grapes!

[SalsApartment]

Why not chime in. Facebooker is right on as we see it. High income Facebook employees? You are kidding!!!!

And for evil deeds of Facebook read the following clip or just type "facebook spies on people" into your favorite search box. As others have said; at least with a crack dealers you know what they are dealing.

Read the article out of Quqrtz.

But the imperative to “connect people” lacks the one ingredient essential for being a good citizen: Treating individual human beings as sacrosanct. To Facebook, the world is not made up of individuals, but of connections between them. The billions of Facebook accounts belong not to “people” but to “users,” collections of data points connected to other collections of data points on a vast Social Network, to be targeted and monetized by computer programs.

There are certain things you do not in good conscience do to humans.

[Joe]

I'll put in a little plug for the Burlingame Voice here- we don't send nuthin' to nobody. We don't have back-end analytics and we don't want them either. Google crawls the site so it can render search results (that's become my way of finding really old posts). But other than that it's all right here in our little e-neighborhood--and we like it that way.

[Anon]

You never copied the IP address from anyones email header and compared it with your IP addresses visiting the Blog?

Come on Joe.

[Bruce Dickinson]

Guys, when it comes to Google and Facebook, it's quite simple: they are advertising companies. Just as direct mail would get info from you back in the day and sell it to others, or Nielsen would gather TV viewing habits from certain demographics with their boxes, or Soundscan would tabulate all my gold-plated records that I produced, it's the same thing except they know even more about us now.

Advertising businesses are here to make money, plain and simple. Bruce Dickinson finds it amusing on how some of these companies guise it as "changing the world for the better" "doing well by doing good", "helping people make connections" "bringing more information to your fingertips". No one actually seriously believes these motives trump anything other than the profit motive. You don't want any demographic info used, then don't use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google etc.

Of course, these tech companies do come across as hypocritical. While Wall Street has been vilified for producing very rich people who were overt about making money, what's worse, being honest, or disguising it by alleging a public good is being done while making even more money than Wall Street and invading more of your privacy than the financiers ever did!

[Joe]

Oh come on, Anon. The thought never occurred to me, not sure I could figure out how, not sure anyone enters a real email address and-- mostly-- not sure Russ or I care enough to bother :-)

[[email protected]]

I believe you have shared something that many are aware of, but no body cares.
For anyone, your description of the reality of all Computer use only benefit the most Wealthy Corp. Family, Religions, and "Special People" in the World.

[Peter Garrison]

Limebike was here just to gather data from credit card use and local buying habits and then move on.

[Veritas]

How evil is Facebook? https://youtu.be/pYSmFI9GAAs

I agree Facebook is not a good partner for our City.

[Mary]

The median age of a Facebook employee was 28 years. Yahoo's employees were the youngest with a median age of 27 years. The vast majority of Facebook employees are most likely renters and I'd expect will be very active in pushing rent control in 94010.

Good for them and I'd expect Dickinson will be able to get more for his property by tearing down his old shack and building a larger house.

Good news for old Dickinson.

[Bruce Dickinson]

Just a few words of wisdom from Dr. Dickinson: Of all the seven deadly sins, there is nothing more counterproductive than envy. Someone in the world will always be better off than you. Of all the sins, envy is easily the worst, because you can't even have any fun with it.

It's a total net loss!

[Peter Garrison]

Amen.
Augustine defined envy as a strange “sad anger.”
The worst.

[John]

@Mary Good info. Important for our City and San Mateo's growth focus for zoning and tax projections.

Thanks to Peter and Bruce our local sciolist.

[Joe]

I thought this was interesting and pertinent in the DJ yesterday:

Private ferry company Prop SF is no longer operating out of the Port of Redwood City after it began transporting Facebook workers across the Bay in June.

The company discontinued service to Redwood City in December, said Kristine Zortman, executive director for the Port of Redwood City. While Prop SF was initially only cleared to operate on a pilot basis for six months, Zortman said it’s unclear why the company did not attempt to continue operations in Redwood City.

“I don’t know if it was an expense thing or ridership,” she said.

https://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/port-of-redwood-city-loses-private-ferry-service/article_a9a34018-3ef9-11e9-aaef-37991f29e803.html

It would seem that the Facebook/Oculus/It-will-always-be-the-drive-in site would be a candidate for ferry service. There is even an available "port" more or less:

https://www.burlingamevoice.com/2014/06/the-sherman-will-be-leaving-burlingame-very-soon.html

[Adrienne]

I was planning on speaking about El Camino trees but I could not resist.

Oh my! One of my passions: Religion and Stupid Metaphors. Since someone mentioned Saint Augustine. I wonder if you understand how conflicted he was at a young age with the surprise erection he had in a public bath house. Screwed up his head for the rest of his life pretty much. It's amazing how people seem to still use his stuff when it fits their cause.

I suspect smarter active BlogJunkies tend to be less gullible and less likely to quote or believe in metaphors. The Seven Deadly Sins are pure garbage and written for the uneducated masses.

If you are going to quote metaphors from the Seven Deadly Sins written by a dead religious person; try out the one about SLOTH.

[Bruce Dickinson]

Speaking of leveraging internet technologies and identification, Joe time to do an IP sweep of the handles! Facebooker, SalsApartment, Veritas, Mary, and John all appear to be the same user, having a faux conversation amongst themselves and with the BV readers!

DON'T ask me how I know

*wink*

[Bruce Dickinson]

Add Adrienne to the list.

I would also expect MOST bloggers to show respect for both the religious and non-religious. Also, the toxicity exhibited by "Adrienne" has no place here on the BV considering one of our fellow bloggers on this site and participating in this thread is a retired minister/priest.

Shame on you!

And while I'm at it, the most important Commandment: Love Thy Neighbor!

*mic drop*

[Peter Garrison]

Hi John, Hi Adrienne-

Yes, some thread drift certainly... I believe Mr. Dickinson and I were noting how Facebook will change people’s home values (probably for the better) and how envy can erode the civility of neighborhood interactions.

As far as my religious stance, you may understand mine more by reading my book, At Odds with God- CSS Publishing, or Pastoral Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them- CSS Publshing (Both of the books and two others are available on Amazon.) For my take on the wider cultural and intensely personal aspects of my faith, please see The Death of My Atheist, published anonymously in The Forum Letter- Richard O. Johnson, editor, and recipient of the First Prize for The Best of Christian Writing 2016 through the Associated Church Press.

Your sciolist (I had to look this word up- so at best, a humble sciolist)

Peter

[Bruce Dickinson]

Looks like the BV gadfly got censored yet again.

On a more positive note, @Peter Garrison demonstrating the perfect example of "turning the other cheek."

Bravo!

[Joe]

Nobody has been censored and the Spam folder is empty (which sometimes catches comments for no known reason). I'm not following you.

[May]

When is the Book Burning starting? Gotta see this.

[[email protected]]

It already started.

[resident]

I propose we start with Lean In :-)

[Growling Tiger]

We would be way better off with a drive-in theater than a building that will end up half full of techies.