How do they get away with this?

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Do you want to buy 2 cubic metres of French Oak ? ..I can do you some at cheaper than UK prices..but I think ( in fact I'm certain due to brexit etc ) that the delivery charges would be more than the oak. ;-) If the forecast thunderstorms don't start in the next hour , I'll be cutting green oak logs from trees that I have cut and are in a huge pile outside , into smaller logs , to go under cover.

@Kayen..no..I'm not making it sound like you inferred at all.

Machines not people read the data that facebook slurps, and act upon it. Although if one pays one gets access to "you" as a target with all your details, but only facebook also has your real name, phone address etc. You are missing the point.

They do not just influence what ads you see on facebook, they influence what ads you see on all other sites that you go to, prices that you see on all other sites that you go to, choices of sites and pages that are presented to you when you search on facebook etc..

Just in relation to the ads ( and there are a whole slew of other things that this "profiling" ( what they know about you ) influences, from your politics to your sexual proclivities, and the same about the people that you know ..

But lets just deal with ads shown there or elsewhere to you.

A simple "for instance".. when you see an ad on facebook for say car insurance..if you are thinking of changing yours, you may click on it. If you lived next door to Terry, drove the same car, same year, same "everything"and were the same age as Terry, same driving record, same number of years since holding a license.

Your facebook "profile" will affect the premium showed to you on the insurers website after filling in all your details for a quote.

Terry if he clicked on the same ad, would get a slightly different quote.

Could be higher, could be lower.

In each case no human has sat down a read your profiles, machines ( both at facebook and at the insurer ) have communicated via "the famous algorithms" and set the rate shown to you individually. All the other websites on the internet that you or Terry have ever looked at , how long your mouse hovered over certain areas of them, how quickly you clicked through to certain parts of any of them will affect that facebook profile, because facebook has scripts, cookies ( 3rd party ) and trackers all over the web on the majority of websites on the web,even government ones etc.

(Google does similar..MS not so much as they don't need to, they already know everything you do on your computer if it runs MS.)

The highly nuanced result of that profile, unique to you, and tied to your personal details, affects the data that is used when the insurers algorithms talk to facebook's. Prices presented and choices presented , and news articles presented to any internet user on the vast majority of the websites that they visit, depend on their individual profile, usually on the profile that the website is connected to at facebook or google or both..( other companies such as criteo etc also build profiles on everyone ) Facebook in particular has far more detailed profiles of it's users than any of the others .

The ads ( for services , products, jobs, holidays etc ) that you ( and your friends family and kids ) see on other websites, even the actual content that you or they see on other websites depend on your or their profiles ( and the interaction between your profile and theirs ) that interaction , at near light speed, and constantly updating adds to all profiles, on news websites that can influence what will be the content of articles , the "spin" which is designed to influence how you think on certain subjects, and how you react on them, and how you vote on them. All of this is being done at near light speed and decided by machines, not by groups from the marketing dept at facebook or anywhere else.

Even someone ( who you don't know, never will, on the other side of the world ) who "likes" something you say on facebook will affect your profile..what they "liked" will affect their profile.."Degrees of separation".

Facebook has profiles ( "shadow profiles" ) on people who have never used facebook, but whose family or friends have, or do, If you upload a photo and tag the people in it with their names, facebook do not forget who is who. If someone ( person A ) that is in a photo you post and tag with their name on facebook, meets someone ( person B ) who has a sister who is on facebook, facebook will suggest to the sister that you might be interesting. facebook's algorithms want to know it all, they were designed that way, and now they are writing themselves so as to know more, because to know more is to be more efficient.

People often say "well if they are so smart, why do they keep showing me ads for what I just bought" etc. That stupidity is not the algorithms.That is the person who set up the ad campaign simply not clicking the box which says do not show repeat ads to someone that has already purchased within a time frame of X. The algorithms will keep showing the ad for what you bought to you, unless told otherwise, because the "platform" facebook, amazon etc gets paid each time the ad is shown, and so does the ad agency. What ads you see is / are decided partaily even before you click, and in the instant after you clicked to land on a page, before the page "paints" on your screen, the decisions are made by algorithms running on machines, and the price that the ad costs is decided by machine based on your profile.All done at near light speed.

Ps..previously the content of web sites could be changed / tailored dynamically via scripts running on servers or on the user's devices according to the IP of the visitor ( this forum for example uses that technology ) and their profile data accessed in real time could a invariably did affect what they saw..Now with the advent of AI the articles and or content of anyweb page can be entirely written personalised by AI whilst your screen is "painting" the page based on interaction between the AI engine and your various profiles at facebook and elsewhere. everyone in there own little world based upon their profiles, except they'll think that they can still "find out about things for themselves and make their own minds up"..
 
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Its not a case of FB doesnt give a rats, there are millions of pages and it is unreasonable to even think FB vets each and every one.

Much like on here or any other forum. If something looks suspect, its the users that report it to the mods, who then take care of the problem.

so if you see one of these obvious scams on FB, dont go running off to a different forum to complain that FB isnt doing anything and therefore FB is a whatever, hit report and report it yourself as i have done many times.
I Don't think it's unreasonable, it should be custom and practice. They need to take back control and vet everything first before being allowed on its site. And not only the product scams, but the false advertising too.

Technically they are making revenue off illegal trade practices, so why not charge them for facilitating a crime or handling stolen property ?
 
Do you want to buy 2 cubic metres of French Oak ? ..I can do you some at cheaper than UK prices..but I think ( in fact I'm certain due to brexit etc ) that the delivery charges would be more than the oak. ;-) If the forecast thunderstorms don't start in the next hour , I'll be cutting green oak logs from trees that I have cut and are in a huge pile outside , into smaller logs , to go under cover.

@Kayen..no..I'm not making it sound like you inferred at all.

Machines not people read the data that facebook slurps, and act upon it. Although if one pays one gets access to "you" as a target with all your details, but only facebook also has your real name, phone address etc. You are missing the point.

They do not just influence what ads you see on facebook, they influence what ads you see on all other sites that you go to, prices that you see on all other sites that you go to, choices of sites and pages that are presented to you when you search on facebook etc..

Just in relation to the ads ( and there are a whole slew of other things that this "profiling" ( what they know about you ) influences, from your politics to your sexual proclivities, and the same about the people that you know ..

But lets just deal with ads shown there or elsewhere to you.

A simple "for instance".. when you see an ad on facebook for say car insurance..if you are thinking of changing yours, you may click on it. If you lived next door to Terry, drove the same car, same year, same "everything"and were the same age as Terry, same driving record, same number of years since holding a license.

Your facebook "profile" will affect the premium showed to you on the insurers website after filling in all your details for a quote.

Terry if he clicked on the same ad, would get a slightly different quote.

Could be higher, could be lower.

In each case no human has sat down a read your profiles, machines ( both at facebook and at the insurer ) have communicated via "the famous algorithms" and set the rate shown to you individually. All the other websites on the internet that you or Terry have ever looked at , how long your mouse hovered over certain areas of them, how quickly you clicked through to certain parts of any of them will affect that facebook profile, because facebook has scripts, cookies ( 3rd party ) and trackers all over the web on the majority of websites on the web,even government ones etc.

(Google does similar..MS not so much as they don't need to, they already know everything you do on your computer if it runs MS.)

The highly nuanced result of that profile, unique to you, and tied to your personal details, affects the data that is used when the insurers algorithms talk to facebook's. Prices presented and choices presented , and news articles presented to any internet user on the vast majority of the websites that they visit, depend on their individual profile, usually on the profile that the website is connected to at facebook or google or both..( other companies such as criteo etc also build profiles on everyone ) Facebook in particular has far more detailed profiles of it's users than any of the others .

The ads ( for services , products, jobs, holidays etc ) that you ( and your friends family and kids ) see on other websites, even the actual content that you or they see on other websites depend on your or their profiles ( and the interaction between your profile and theirs ) that interaction , at near light speed, and constantly updating adds to all profiles, on news websites that can influence what will be the content of articles , the "spin" which is designed to influence how you think on certain subjects, and how you react on them, and how you vote on them. All of this is being done at near light speed and decided by machines, not by groups from the marketing dept at facebook or anywhere else.

Even someone ( who you don't know, never will, on the other side of the world ) who "likes" something you say on facebook will affect your profile..what they "liked" will affect their profile.."Degrees of separation".

Facebook has profiles ( "shadow profiles" ) on people who have never used facebook, but whose family or friends have, or do, If you upload a photo and tag the people in it with their names, facebook do not forget who is who. If someone ( person A ) that is in a photo you post and tag with their name on facebook, meets someone ( person B ) who has a sister who is on facebook, facebook will suggest to the sister that you might be interesting. facebook's algorithms want to know it all, they were designed that way, and now they are writing themselves so as to know more, because to know more is to be more efficient.

People often say "well if they are so smart, why do they keep showing me ads for what I just bought" etc. That stupidity is not the algorithms.That is the person who set up the ad campaign simply not clicking the box which says do not show repeat ads to someone that has already purchased within a time frame of X. The algorithms will keep showing the ad for what you bought to you, unless told otherwise, because the "platform" facebook, amazon etc gets paid each time the ad is shown, and so does the ad agency. What ads you see is / are decided partaily even before you click, and in the instant after you clicked to land on a page, before the page "paints" on your screen, the decisions are made by algorithms running on machines, and the price that the ad costs is decided by machine based on your profile.All done at near light speed.

Ps..previously the content of web sites could be changed / tailored dynamically via scripts running on servers or on the user's devices according to the IP of the visitor ( this forum for example uses that technology ) and their profile data accessed in real time could a invariably did affect what they saw..Now with the advent of AI the articles and or content of anyweb page can be entirely written personalised by AI whilst your screen is "painting" the page based on interaction between the AI engine and your various profiles at facebook and elsewhere. everyone in there own little world based upon their profiles, except they'll think that they can still "find out about things for themselves and make their own minds up"..
Well it sounds as though when this AI stuff gets it's act together we will be proper shafted......
 
The "shafting" has already begun.
on a related note..
marc z has announced that he will be launching a competitor to twitter ( on the grounds amongst others that twitter has become too chaotic and unreliable under musk..there he has a point ) it will be called threads, and will run on the mastodon platform ( open source system ) his will be obviously run via him, but he says that current mastodon users ( many of whom went to mastodon when musk bought twitter ) will be able to integrate with his "instance"..and that his will be more trustworthy than twitter.certainly it would not be hard to be more trustworthy than musk, but that is the pot calling the kettle black.
https://www.theguardian.com/technol...plans-launch-twitter-rival-meta-oprah-winfreythreads used to be the standalone messaging platform connected to instagram ( owned by marc z ) but he shut threads last year, now he is resurrecting it.Mean while on instagram, he has an enormous problem with his algorithms promoting chldpron.He says that he now hos an urgent taskforce looking at the matter..but apparently the algoritm still pushes it, and the human overseers so far don't find some of it a problem, so they leave it in place even when it is reported to them.
https://amp.theguardian.com/technol...m-self-generated-child-sexual-abuse-materials
apart from some PR handwringing when problems with illegal content are pointed out, basically as I said earlier, he couldn't give a rats rear end..the sound of all the money coming in from the advertisers is just too distracting for him.
 
I got my morticer for £175 off FB.
eBay had them for £400+

It's a marketing platform of course but just ignore them!!
FB marketplace is a very useful thing to use - and like other's Ive had some great bargains, and sold items that are just too bulky for ebay for prices that I can live with - not the most profitable because of a much smaller audience - but MUCH easier.

I do report scam listing when I see them too - all the time, and yes the rest is just a cesspit.
 
I saw an advert for a compact tractor with about 9 implements, advertised in Cardiff - 50 miles from us so quite do-able. Very cheap price. On enquiring, it was in Devon and if I send the full price they would tell me where to go to view, they would arrange delivery, and refund the money after 2 weeks if not satisfied. I asked about viewing first, and a few other relevant questions but had the same response - no other purchase options available. Hmmm

K
 
I saw an advert for a compact tractor with about 9 implements, advertised in Cardiff - 50 miles from us so quite do-able. Very cheap price. On enquiring, it was in Devon and if I send the full price they would tell me where to go to view, they would arrange delivery, and refund the money after 2 weeks if not satisfied. I asked about viewing first, and a few other relevant questions but had the same response - no other purchase options available. Hmmm

K
Hehe, were the magic beans included in that price, or were they extra 🤣
 
Ther are many to-good-to be-true ads on Marketplace, eg fully electric small vehicle for £80! - really? However,it has to pointed out that Marketplace don't make it easy to list a price so many things listed as £0 because of the system even though the seller obviously wants something something as he is selling. To overcome this problem some sellers put £123 for the same reason - buyer beware etc
 

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