“Tech and Liberty – Stratechery by Ben Thompson”

Makes the point that the problem with political ads on Facebook is the targeting not ads themselves.

@baldur I'm having trouble with this latest post. I feel like I can't agree with him but there are some things to think about, certainly.

@jack Yeah, I'm actually in the same position. His whole take leans heavily in a certain 'rah-rah American Freedoms' direction that I don't find particularly appealing.

The main point that I can get completely behind is that most of the damage done by Facebook ads comes from the targeting and that's what regulations should target. I'm a bit meh on the rest.

@baldur Right. The "at least tell the same lies to everyone" made some sort of twisted sense :).

@SuperMoof AFAIK the FTC tries not to get involved in regulating falsehoods in political advertising, those ads pretty much get away with lying in any medium.

And even if they did care, FTC fines are generally low enough for Facebook just to account for them as the cost of doing business.