Facebook: Seduced or Manipulated?

Facebook: Seduced or Manipulated

Image 1. Emotional manipulation media (Gostujuci, 2014)

I have chosen the social media community of Facebook to observe and dissect over the coming weeks. Facebook works by allowing people to connect in an online community, through individual personalised accounts. Facebook users can add other users as ‘friends’, creating a virtual relationship network, regardless of whether you know these people in real life or not. With just a few clicks of a button you are linked in with people anywhere in the world.

Like most large companies, Facebook has a mission statement listed on their website. Facebook (2017) states their mission is to "give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together” (para. 2.). If you have a non-existent social life, or have spent years isolated at home and can only dream of exploring the world outside of your living room, a social network such as Facebook can be life changing. Schawbel claims that “In this day and age, if you aren’t active on social networks, you are in danger of being out of the loop” (as cited in Kuttainen, 2017). 

Facebook today, as stated on Ebizmba (2017, para. 1) is the biggest social network in the world, with an estimated one and half billion monthly visitors. Having the title of the world’s largest social network would bring power to those behind the scenes. The software and systems people in charge of controlling data and personal information, and all that passes through various online connections.

The founder of Facebook, billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, has stated that he wants to use Facebook and the influence that it has to build a global community.  Dye notes “the elite are the few who control what is valued in society and use that control to shape the lives of others” (as cited in Kuttainen, 2017).

Facebook use the word ‘power’ to describe something that people have, in relation to their mission statement but also within their data collection, usage and privacy policies. Relating this to the six modalities of power: domination, authority, seduction, manipulation, inducement and coercion, as noted by Allen (2003, p. 2). It conjures up thoughts of a large global entity, sitting in cyber space. An entity that has the authority to seduce people into willingly providing information, so they can have the privilege of joining millions of other users within an online community.

If users agree to be connected on Facebook, you relinquish being able to have total control over the information you provide within the network. That control is transferred as power to the social network. Facebook is a legitimate power, the resources within are controlled from the top, a person of authority, in this case that power belongs to the creator, Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook is a social network that is able to blend into cyber space, it is there but you can't touch it. On the surface it appears as a singular company that wants to promote virtual social connections and an online community. Underneath it is gathering information and is a super-connector with third party integrations.

Facebook has domination over the social network world. I wonder if users ever feel manipulated or just lovingly seduced.

References

Allen, J. (2003). Lost geographies of power. Maiden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Ebizmba. (2017). Top 15 most popular social networking sites. Retrieved from http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/social-networking-websites

Gostujuci. (2014). Emotional Manipulation Media Image. Retrieved fromhttp://digitalizuj.me/2014/07/facebook-emocije-mnogo-buke-ni-oko-cega/

Kuttainen, V. (2017). BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives and the making of place lecture two: Power. [PowerPoint Slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au.

Zuckerberg, M. (2017). Global Community. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/notes/mark-zuckerberg/building-global-community/10154544292806634