John BattelleVerified account

The whole piece is just begging the question. The crucial point made is that all these problems flow from the ad business & therefore can’t be fixed, but those are unsupported assertions. Why are either true? What would a sub model change? Don’t the decisions come from product?

There can be ad-models with less negative externalities. I don't think subs are magic; I also don't breaking up Facebook would create the change people sometimes hope for--we'd likely get more vicious smaller Facebooks. Its monopoly position allows for some restraints.

I do think there's a range of alternatives to explore; including technical paths that are underexplored. I'm not glib; no one sentence solution. But the current incentive structure for an ad-business at that scale creates the clear pattern we saw—within the dynamics I said above.