{"id":44201,"date":"2026-03-27T08:30:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T13:30:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=44201"},"modified":"2026-03-27T08:30:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T13:30:06","slug":"slash-and-burn-social-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2026\/03\/27\/slash-and-burn-social-media\/","title":{"rendered":"Slash-and-burn Social Media"},"content":{"rendered":"

There’s a form of farming called Slash-and-burn agriculture<\/em>,<\/span><\/p>\n

Slash-and-burn agriculture<\/b> is a form of shifting cultivation<\/a> in agriculture<\/a> that involves the cutting and burning of plants in a forest<\/a> or woodland<\/a> to create a field<\/a> called a swidden<\/b>. The process begins with cutting down the trees and woody plants<\/a> in a given area. The downed vegetation<\/a>, or “slash”, is left out to dry, usually right before the rainiest part of the year. The biomass<\/a> is then burned, resulting in a nutrient<\/a>-rich layer of ash<\/a> which increases soil fertility<\/a> and temporarily eliminates weeds<\/a> and pests<\/a>. After about three to five years, the plot’s productivity<\/a> decreases due to depletion of nutrients along with weed and pest invasion, causing farmers to abandon the plot and move to a new area. The time it takes for a swidden to recover depends on the location and can be as little as five years to more than twenty years, after which the plot can be slashed and burned again, repeating the cycle.\u00a0[Wikipedia<\/strong><\/a>]<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As I was reading about the loss Meta Platforms<\/strong><\/em>, parent to Facebook<\/strong><\/em>, just suffered in court, it occurred to me that Meta<\/strong> <\/em>is practicing Slash-and-burn Social Media<\/em>. They, or ‘Z’ (for Meta<\/strong> <\/em>boss Mark Zuckerberg) if you prefer, came into a field that had never experienced anything quite like this sort of social media, attracted a crop of users and advertisers, and then abused the former in order to satisfy the latter in a frenzied reaping of profit through a number of morally dubious schemes involving user information, most notably the Cambridge Analytica<\/strong> <\/em>scandal<\/a>. Now this<\/em> comes along:<\/p>\n

A jury ruled Tuesday that Meta must pay the state $375 million for failing to adhere to New Mexico\u2019s laws related to unfair practices. The state\u2019s lawyers alleged that Meta misled residents about the safety of its apps with respect to child sexploitation and related harms.\u00a0[CNBC<\/strong><\/a>]<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And<\/p>\n

A New Mexico jury found Tuesday that the parent company of Facebook and Instagram knowingly hid what it knew about child exploitation on its social media platforms, prioritizing profits over safety. [WBUR<\/strong><\/a>]<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The fine is peanuts, but having ruined the trust necessary to successfully running an immense social media institution, they tried to move on into other institutions: Instagram<\/strong> <\/em>and, in a noteworthy blunder, threw away billions of dollars on the failed metaverse<\/strong> <\/em><\/a>development. This jury decision brings into sharp relief the jagged edges of Zuckerberg’s broken morality, and is a symbol of just how much money that broken morality will cost Facebook<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

We’re truly in the era of enormous power and enormous greed. This may not end until power plants literally go up in flames, depriving unlimited ambitions of the power needed to chase those dreams.<\/p>\n

I wonder if ‘Z’ will try to buy up the Sahara desert to host solar panels galore? Microsoft <\/em><\/strong>and others are trying to go nuclear by partnering with Three Mile Island<\/strong> <\/em><\/a>, in the case of Microsoft<\/strong><\/em>, to power their artificial intelligence (AI) efforts. ‘Z’ has ambitions in the AI sector, so he has to keep up, now doesn’t he?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There’s a form of farming called Slash-and-burn agriculture, Slash-and-burn agriculture is a form of shifting cultivation in agriculture that involves the cutting and burning of plants in a forest or woodland to create a field called a swidden. The process begins with cutting down the trees and woody plants in \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44201"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44203,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44201\/revisions\/44203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}