Facebook: the new digital pimp

Written By Vaclav Vincalek

When was the last time you heard anything positive about Facebook or Meta or Mr. Zuckerberg? Except the financial reports, which always bring good news. The revenue is up, profit and profit margin are up, and the stock is trending in the right direction.

But the latest - not that great - news comes from the courtroom where Facebook is on trial and accused of accumulating monopoly power. As is typical for these proceedings, the initial case was brought by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 2020 and it finally made it to trial in April, 2025. The caseis about the fact that rather than innovate and fairly compete in the market space, Facebook decided to buy its competitors, Instagram and WhatsApp, which in view of Mr. Zuckerberg could have harmed the prospects of Facebook.

Here are the articles analyzing the trial and tracking the daily activities in the courtroom:


The interesting part in all this - and supported by the evidence presented in the courtroom - is that despite being a money printing company, there was very little innovation done. The only focus, ever, was on making sure that its users stay on the site as long as possible. As far back as 2014, Facebook was testinghow to influence users with negative stories. In 2021, Facebook’s own studyrevealed how bad it was for kids and teenagers - 'Facebook's own research team identified that Instagram followers of the biggest celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Justin Bieber experience more negative feelings.'

Not sure if you can call that 'innovation', but Facebook worked hard to glue everyone to monitors and mobile screens. Money sure was flowing in.

But how do you get even more people to spend more time in the Facebook kingdom? I am glad you asked! Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, released a new ChatBot, The Digital Companion. Based on the report, Mr. Zuckerberg believes it is the future of social media.

You might recall when Meta discussed how you would be able to clone yourself on Instagram - especially when you are Instagram famous - and others will be able to chat with your digital you. With this new Digital Companion, you can chat and some will particularly enjoy the 'romantic role-play'. Who doesn't need a little bit of romance in their lives!

As an example, for the fans of WWE, one chatbot uses the licensed voice of John Cena, and it (definitely not John Cena) was happy to engage in various versions of close encounters with a user who presented themself as a 14-year old girl. Based on the findings from The Wall Street Journal, Meta started adjusting some of the settings. How far they went, you can try for yourself.

Maybe this is the question: How does this align with Meta's vision? Here it is: 'Originally founded in 2004 as Facebook, Meta’s mission is to build the future of human connection and the technology that makes it possible. Our products empower more than 3 billion people around the world to share ideas, offer support and make a difference.'

Now you know. The future of human connection is in humans socializing with technology. They are pretty much open about it.

Yes, crazy. But there are others who don't want to be outdone.

The CEO of Perplexity shared with his audience that they want to build a browser for you, which 'will track everything users do online to sell ‘hyper personalized’ ads'.

Next, the company World, (in)famous for its orbs which scan your retina so you can prove that you are a real human on the Internet, announced the opening of 6 stores in the US. It’s slowly building the AI empire with its own currency.

And finally, under the new fashion statement 'AI First', the CEO of Duolingo announced that rather than hiring contract workers, they will use AI.

The recurrent pattern in all this? For some reason, technology is no longer seen as a thing which will help humans to be and do better. We are told that humans are no longer required and are secondary to tech.

Vaclav Vincalek
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