...the board gets into a conversation about what other companies or industries have navigated similar challenges, where they have to change a narrative that says that they’re a danger to society, extracting large profits, pushing all the negative externalities onto society and not giving back. ... Elliot finally says out loud the one I think everyone’s already thinking about (but not saying): tobacco. That shuts down the conversation. [loc. 3242]
The subtitle is 'A Story of Where I Used to Work', but it's being sold under the strapline 'The explosive memoir that Meta doesn't want you to read' -- with good reason, as this article indicates: "Meta has served a gagging order on Sarah and is attempting to fine her $50,000 for every breach of that order.". I quit Facebook a while back (though I did miss it in the first year of the pandemic, when so much of everyone's social life was online) but if I hadn't, I would have deleted my account well before I'd finished reading this book.
Wynn-Williams survived a shark attack when she was a teenager: there's probably a metaphor about working for Facebook here, but instead it made her want to do something with her life, to make a difference. After working for the New Zealand government's diplomatic service, she identified Facebook as a powerful political force, pitched a global policy role, and was hired. Six years later, she was fired for toxicity and poor performance. Or so say Facebook. The book says something rather different, about a company with a toxic culture, a lack of accountability and a determination to grow at any cost.
I engaged with Careless People on two levels: firstly, as someone who's worked in an environment where unreasonable demands were a daily occurence; secondly, as someone who had suspected Facebook of unethical behaviour, but hadn't realised its extent. I recognise that desire to change things from the inside, the desperate hope that things will improve. I recognise a culture where the employee's personal life is regarded as something less important than work. One horrific passage about the birth of the author's first child:
Dr. Veca reaches over and gently closes my laptop. She says, “It’s a very special thing to give birth to your first child. I don’t think you should be working through it. Sheryl will understand.”
“She won’t,” I say. “Please let me push Send.” [loc. 1457]
To make it worse, 'Sheryl' is COO Sheryl Sandberg, author of Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, which encourages women to assert themselves at home and at work -- though apparently not to any extent that might inconvenience Sandberg personally. Sandberg strikes me as a hellish boss, and Wynn-William's other superiors aren't much better. After the author's second pregnancy, there's a surreally negative performance review on her return from maternity leave, where she's told that colleagues found her 'challenging to engage with': “I mean, you know, I was in hospital, in a coma and near death, but I accept that this did make it hard to engage with me at times.” [loc. 3540].
It may sound as though I care more about the author's personal experiences than about the incredible damage Facebook has done to global culture and politics. Yes and no. I found Wynn-Williams' narrative easy to relate to, though magnitudes worse than anything I have experienced myself. And Facebook's crimes have been documented extensively: supporting the junta in Myanmar (while having one (1) employee -- actually a contractor in Ireland -- who was fluent in Burmese); funding and supporting Trump in the run-up to the 2016 election; supporting the Leave vote in the Brexit referendum; providing data allowing cosmetics advertisers to target girls between 13 and 17 who've posted and then deleted a selfie; misleading Congress about the extent of its (illegal) operations in China; supporting right-wing governments, viewed as less likely to impose restrictions on Facebook's operations in their countries...
Careless People is a gripping read about a company whose actions affect billions of people. It provides an insider's view of Mark Zuckerberg and his singleminded (blinkered?) drive to make his company more and more powerful. That it's also an engaging and often humorous account of one woman's loss of faith in her employer is a bonus. (And yes, she could have left: there's only so long you can keep telling yourself that you have more power to change things from the inside. But given her medical issues and the cost of US healthcare, her desire to keep her health insurance is relateable.) I suspect Wynn-Williams will not be called for interview at any tech company any time soon: but I look forward to the biopic.
...working on policy at Facebook was way less like enacting a chapter from Machiavelli and way more like watching a bunch of fourteen-year-olds who’ve been given superpowers and an ungodly amount of money... [loc. 131]
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