[jmcdowell]

I'd recommend listening to the first hour of the podcast this is taken from just as he was more candid than I thought he would be.

Zuckerberg at points brings up how the EU as is very defensive and has taken social media companies to court for the sum of 30 billion (never mentioning why). He laments how the US government need to be more protective of US tech companies overseas specifically naming the EU. When talking about Dana he says how he will explicitly help with them work with difficult foreign governments (be that through how he did it with the UFC or his relationship with the new administration).

It sounded quite like they're preparing to more confrontational with the EU and he at one point mentions how he thinks the new admin is going to protect them more with foreign countries.

[jjulius]

This requires us to trust what comes out of his mouth. If folk are still doing that after all this time, I've got a mighty large bridge you'd likely be interested in purchasing.

[ilikehurdles]

You're welcome to your opinion, but this view of adversarial views and people who hold them is building precisely no bridges from your silo.

Listening to someone talk it out for an hour or more, and flesh out their views without constant interruption really helps you understand something about their mind and their drives in life. Very few people can keep up a facade of rehearsed talking points and bullshit for 3 hours.

[bamboozled]

What Joe does is let people be persuasive for 1-3 hours. It doesn’t reveal anything secret or give you any special insights into their real character, motives or intentions.

You need to judge people through their actions, past history and ideally by working with them directly.

This is all just PR, not saying it’s bad, or even intentional. But it’s a form of self-promotion most of the time.

A fun podcast to checkout is called “Decoding the Gurus” where they dissect a lot of these conversations.

[jjulius]

Exactly this. We've had two decades of watching whether or not his words match his actions. I'm glad that someone might enjoy listening to another person wax poetic relatively unchallenged for three hours, but there have been 156,966 hours since Facebook went public on 2/4/06. That's a much larger dataset.

[jjulius]

In addition to what I and someone else mention in the other response chain, I have absolutely no desire to build a bridge to Zuckerberg/Meta. Zero. What he has put together has had a tremendously negative net impact on society and we've had twenty years with which to learn how he acts relative to what comes out of his mouth.

There should be no bridges to him.

Edit: I should also clarify that I try to be open and bridge-building in most cases. Shoot, I was in this instance too, for a while, even in spite of that cliche that "he told us who he was from the very beginning". Well I'll be absolutely damned and tickled rosey pink if it didn't turn out to be true.

Edit 2: And then there's this[1]. Plenty of salient points in there as to why letting someone just ramble and "flesh out" ideas while hardly being challenged isn't actually helpful. Yet even in moments where Joe asks him to clarify a point, he kinda stumbles, can't provide evidence. But you want me to trust him based on this very interview? Pfft.

Edit 3: His $30 billion claim during the interview might also be bullshit[2].

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2025/1/10/24341117/mark-zuckerberg-...

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42666620

[jjulius]

"But wait, there's more!"

>According to him, neither he nor the board, an international group of experts in law, human rights and journalism, were not told about the new policy ahead of time.

>Meta executives, however, allegedly informed Trump officials about the change in policy prior to the announcement, a source with knowledge of the conversations told the New York Times.

Yes, if we're going to make moves to fight EU regulations and other international matters, let's not talk to the group of experts in international relationships before making this move!

That's a pretty glaring example of his actions this week not matching the words of his "fleshed out" three-hour interview.

Boy, that facade you mentioned sure crumbled pretty fast, huh?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/mark-zuckerbergs-meta-board-co...

[bigtimesink]

> When talking about Dana he says how he will explicitly help with them work with difficult foreign governments

Isn't this what Nick Clegg was an expert at?

[coffeebeqn]

Dana works with quite a different set. UAE, Saudi’s , etc

[ricardobeat]

I wonder where that 30 billion figure comes from, could you have misheard?

Meta was fined for €1.2 billion (the largest fine ever) for mishandling user data in violation of GDPR. The other fines they had add up to less than two billion:

1. $800M for antitrust violations with Marketplace

2. $400M for collecting children's data on Instagram

3. $200M + $180 in Ireland for forcing users to accept new advertisement/personalization terms

4. $200M for a personal data leak

5. $200M for WhatsApp "unclear privacy policies"

6. $60M for failing to allow opt-out of third-party tracking

The law allows up to 4% of global revenue but it you stack fines it does start looking a bit ridiculous (especially #5). Though, as an EU resident, I'm happy someone is fighting for privacy and more a humane internet - even if that feels like a lost battle already.

[jjulius]

I think $30billion was in reference to a fine that was thought could've been imposed on Apple last year. I don't think that actually happened, though.

https://gizmodo.com/apple-30-billion-violating-eu-digital-ma...

[consumer451]

White is very pro-Trump. I don't think that we need to look any further for an explanation of TFA and White on the board than this:

> Former President Donald Trump writes in a new book set to be published next week that Mark Zuckerberg plotted against him during the 2020 election and said the Meta chief executive would “spend the rest of his life in prison” if he did it again.

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/08/28/trump-zuckerberg-el...