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Manila Bulletin devider Technews devider Facebook loses big

Facebook loses big

Published Feb 7, 2022 09:28 am

Meta/Facebook (FB) just lost US$200B in value right after reporting that they will be facing a loss of US$10B this year due to Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT), which asks users if they would allow applications to track them. In addition to this FB just lost around half a million daily users globally in the last quarter of 2021 -- when the world is still spending most of the time online. The writing is on the wall, FB is going the Friendster route, and before it is too late, users must look for a better, more privacy-friendly platform.

Globe and Smart, the two largest Philippine mobile operators, don't make this easy for Filipinos because they provide free access to a subset of Facebook. However, that (https://my.advocrazy.com/2022/01/26/is-free-access.html), as I have written about before. The question is - are Smart and Globe informing users when they are being charged for accessing parts of Facebook that are not free, Facebook definitely is not, according to the report? This is something that does not show up in the radar of the Philippine Senate and House because they are probably clueless about these things.

In addition to this, both Smart and Globe are openly exhibiting anti-competitive behavior when they offer deals such as Smart's GigaStories and GigaStories+ and Globe's GoShare plans, which provide special and preferential access to Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Kumu (and with the case of GoShare, it adds Snapchat to the mix). There are other packages offered by these two that are anti-competitive. It makes it difficult for other online services and free, open source software based equivalents to compete. Imagine, how can the likes of Mastodon.social, PixelFed.org, WeMe.com, Flickr.com, and PeerTube.org, to name a few. How can these online services gain traction when Smart and Globe are making it expensive for potential users to access as compared to their preferred Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, etc.? Why isn't the Philippine Competition Commission even taking a look at this and start requiring Philippine telcos to exercise net neutrality?

If (and that is a BIG IF) the Philippine Congress starts going after the likes of Facebook for its surveillance business and the free-not-really-free false advertising, and the Philippine Competition Commission starts investigating Smart and Globe's anti-competitive behaviors, then Facebook's journey to Friendster will be faster. UNFORTUNATELY, the chance of a crow turning white (pag itim ng uwak) is higher than either of these two happening.

For Facebook, the writing is on the wall. There is a generation of Filipinos that is quick to follow their western counterparts, who have mostly ditched Facebook, leaving Facebook mostly used by grandparents (Lolos and Lolas) and aunt and uncles (Titas and TItos), in other words, the grown-ups (gurangs). Yes, Facebook is no longer cool! Time to save yourself and dicth Facebook now.

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