Keller @ Large: Mark Zuckerberg Is Irresponsible And Greedy
BOSTON (CBS) - Here's the good news about Mark Zuckerberg, the boy billionaire who gave us Facebook – I saw him on TV Tuesday night wearing a tie! Attaboy Mark, finally dressing the part at age 32.
Now, the bad news – Zuckerberg still acts the part of the naughty seven-year-old, caught red-handed making a mess but declaring: "I didn't do anything!"
We're talking about the discovery that Facebook allowed its news feeds to be taken over by fake-story mills, which bombarded millions of voters with totally false information during the campaign, most of it damaging to the Clinton campaign.
Remember the story about Pope Francis endorsing Trump? Fake. The one about the mysterious death of an FBI agent suspected of leaking Clinton emails? Totally fake as well. And so on.
It turns out Facebook knew it had a fake news problem and did almost nothing about it, even though a New York Times columnist points out they had ample tools at their command. And now Zuckerberg is in full whine, claiming it's a "pretty crazy idea" that his negligence had any impact on a close election.
What's crazy is the sight of a company, making money in almost unimaginable quantities, completely neglecting its basic social responsibilities to be a responsible conduit of news and information.
It's like the gang at Twitter, knowing their product is being used to do real harm to people, but finding every excuse in the book to let it continue.
Move over, tobacco companies and toxic-waste polluters.
You've got fresh company in the Irresponsible Greedhead Hall of Fame.
Listen to Jon's commentary: