[andrewcooke]

your logic is fine, except for the assumption that ethical obligations come only from maximizing profit.

why do you have such a low ethical standard for companies? i realise it's fairly common in the usa, but what's the motivation? is it just that you get your opinions from the same companies, and so eat what you are fed? is this what you want from your world?

do you simply feel you have no choice, and are stating a "hard reality"? something as complex as a society's expectations of ethics is so complex that it can (and will) respond to public opinion. by posting something like the above you're not just stating what you think is fact, but advocating it. there's no separation between those two roles when your trapped inside a system with feedback...

[ChuckMcM]

Culturally I suspect it comes from the principle of freedom of action, such that people are free to choose to act they want to act and others are free to interact/not-interact with them based on the choices made. So Facebook might choose to act unethically and then people would choose not to use them. Facebook would fail and a new more ethical company would arise in its place.

That at least is the optimists view. The demonstration of crapitalism [1] shows that if part of the selection function is missing (in this case privacy) then everyone loses.

I really liked your notion of advocating the status quo as a trap.

[1] Crapitalism is when some definition of "quality" is taken out of the product selection mix, allowing simply "functionality" followed by "price" as the selecting mechanisms. This leads to inexpensive products which do what they say for a very short period of time. Ultimately resulting in higher replacement costs (which sadly benefits the manufacturer).

[bpatrianakos]

My ethical standards for companies vary from company to company. I mentioned Mozilla in my other comment. If they had done this I would hold them to a higher standard because of what they stand for. Facebook has a totally different mindset as a company. Their priorities are what make me hold them to such a "low" standard.

I also try to put myself in the company's shoes. If I were them, this issue just wouldn't be my priority. It's a nice to have, not a must have and if I had to make the choice between what's best for the company (which also means most of its users) I'd make the choice to disappoint some people.

What I want from my world and what I expect from Facebook are two different things. I'm all for privacy and I want Facebook to respect that. But I also can't expect the world to cater to my every want no matter how morally just I believe my requests are. Taking my opinion on what I think we should expect from Facebook and turning it into a referendum on my morals, lack of morals, or cynicism is not only drawing false assumptions but severely exaggerating things. I can be in favor of using Tor to access Facebook and Facebook's right to refuse me access to it because of it at the same time. Things aren't so cut and dry.

[baddox]

I believe that the truth values of ethical sentences are subjective (actually, I believe that ethical sentences don't have truth values, but that's a longer story), so while I certainly have ethical preferences for how individuals and organizations should behave, I only approve of "enforcing" my preferences through my own social/commercial choices, rather than utilizing external violence (like government regulation) to enforce my ethical preferences.

[dragonwriter]

Government literally does nothing but enforce ethical preferences (all action decisions, government or otherwise, must be based on value preferences), so this is equivalent to saying you don't support the existence of government.

[baddox]

That's correct. I don't support the existence of government.