My hold at the library came up, so I finally got to read Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams’s memoir about her time at Facebook.
You should read it.
No matter how bad you might think Facebook/Meta and its leadership might be, it’s almost certainly worse. Even if you know all of the pieces – all of the events discussed in the book were covered by the press in various forms before her memoir dropped – her presentation really pulls it all together.
Wynn-Williams doesn’t come off real great either herself, mind you. Early on, I found myself reacting with combinations of “…how did you expect this to play out?” and “this is both psychotically abusive and incredibly compromising, you should’ve walked. I literally would’ve walked out right here, and I know, ’cause I’ve done it.” (Tho’ to be fair, there have been a couple of times when I didn’t. But mostly, I have.) The recountings alternated between funny and hard to read, but in a way most people would mostly find funny – I think.
That was before it actually got to any of the worst parts, though, the parts where it went from a combination of entertainingly naive, occasionally pathetic, and often appalling to frankly revolting and rather deeply grim but still compelling as the… honestly, as the evil… crystallised.
But, well.
No matter how badly Wynn-Williams might come across in this memoir, Facebook comes off much, much worse.
So much worse.
So you should read it. No one other than Meta have contested the contents. Even they refer to the contents as “out of date” and “previously reported,” which worlds away from “lies” – although they do insist some of her accusations of behaviour by upper-level executives are “false.”
That’s probably about the sexual harassment, but I think we all know better.
More, Zuckerberg tried very hard to silence her and stop the book’s publication. He did manage to stop her – via binding arbitration – from promoting her work. That includes stating “orally, in writing, or otherwise any disparaging, critical or otherwise detrimental comments to any person or entity concerning [Meta], its officers, directors, or employees.”
The book came out anyway, because the publisher was in the UK, and said they didn’t care what an American arbitrator had to say.
And that’s one of the reasons you should read it.
Because if you think there is anything redeemable within Meta… based on the uncontested facts of this book… you are wrong.
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annathepiper
