Facebook raises its game in Washington by forming its own PAC

[harvey007]

Source: The Hill

Facebook, the global social networking giant, is setting up a political action committee to become a new power player in Washington.

The company acknowledged its intentions on Monday, confirming to The Hill that it had filed the necessary paperwork and was poised to become a serious player in federal politics.

Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/184041-facebook-raises-its-game-in-washington-with-pac

[JCMach1]

1. Now we know why Congress was going after Google...

the Google and FB war, it's on.

[TheEuclideanOne]

2. Twitter Too!

In fact, they have announced that their candidate will be making his 140-character long speech announcing his candidacy to run, within the next few days.

[OneGrassRoot]

3. LOL!

:applause:

[ixion]

4. rofl

nice one. :) :rofl: :woohoo:

[ixion]

5. FB will be whittling away at privacy laws

in the name of "staying open and connected"

Facebook’s lobbying spending has totaled $550,000 for fiscal 2011, a significant boost over the $350,000 spent in 2010 and the $200,000 in 2009. That figure should climb as Facebook and other Web firms are expected to lobby against potentially onerous new privacy regulations — such as a ban on any targeted online advertising without users’ consent.

Consumer privacy is a hot topic on Capitol Hill these days, and Facebook has been criticized in the past for what some believe is a cavalier attitude toward the issue. Zuckerberg argues consumers have shown a strong preference for sharing more information and he is simply trying to create tools to enable that. As recently as this week, the firm rolled out a host of changes to profiles and how information is shared by users, drawing mostly praise from the online community, in contrast to previous site changes.

[MilesColtrane]

6. Making sure they maximize the IPO.

Real time product feedback from a pool of almost a billion people is the holy grail for companies.

The only things standing in the way of Facebook eventually delivering this would be privacy laws.

The company wants to be seen as proactive in preventing anything that could impinge on its business plan before it offers stocks to investors.

[dgibby]

8. Zuckerberg is full of it

if my friends and family are representative of most FB users. Lots of complaints about the new features, and lots opting out of them, too, especially the "news" feed. Very irritating.

[Broderick]

11. Praise?

I guess when I got on to check my profile, my wall was full of complaints.

[pam4water]

7. I'm so sick of corps treating people as commodities.

[librechik]

9. Is facebook Liberal or Conservative?

if we donate to their PAC, what will the money be used for? Promoting Facebook, for sure, but what policies do they promote in DC?

[KamaAina]

10. Silicon Valley politics are difficult to describe in conventional terms

overall, the tech industry is more liberal than corporate America in general. But remember, it also gave us NutMeg Whitman. :eyes:

It's mostly about who will help them make more $$$$$. Google, for instrance, has been donating to repukes of late, though it's been solidly Blue in the past. :(