Looks good, but I'm so biased against Egobook and Puckerberg that I have zero objectivity about them.

Cheers,

Mencken's Ghost

'The Facebook Dilemma' Review: A Message That Can't Be Ignored

An unrelenting 'Frontline' documentary wants you to know that Facebook is not your friend.

By

John Anderson

The Wall Street Journal, Oct. 25, 2018 3:35 p.m. ET

The overarching theme of "The Facebook Dilemma"—an aggressive, indignant, illuminating two-nighter presented by "Frontline"—is the blissfully amoral way a social-media site has morphed into a sociopolitical evil. But what viewers will also come away with is a sense of something else—something entirely relevant to the situation: That Mark Zuckerberg is the worst company spokesman in the history of corporate America. If he told you the sky was blue, you'd wonder what his agenda was.

And it's Mr. Zuckerberg's innate sense of shiftiness that perfectly reflects his company as profiled by a "Frontline" team that includes reporters Anya Bourg and Dana Priest, and James Jacoby, the film's director, writer, producer and on-air presence. Mr. Jacoby goes in with all the hard questions and has enlisted a group of eight former senior Facebook staffers to address his concerns—ranging from hate speech to Russian election interference to Facebook's alleged complicity in the genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar to its weaponization by the likes of Philippine strongman Rodrigo Duterte.

He was also "given"—he makes this clear a couple of times—five members of Facebook's upper management to answer his questions. That they come off like deer in Mr. Jacoby's headlights is revealing in itself: Their answers are mealy-mouthed at best, and the defensive posture they assume, and their evident fear, indicates a company unable to cope with, or confront, the corruption that has accompanied its absolute power in the social-media marketplace.

There's not a lot of TV that's genuinely "must see," but "The Facebook Dilemma" qualifies. Part 1, which airs Monday night, concerns itself with the warnings that arose, very early on, about the dangers Facebook posed to democratic institutions. Tuesday's Part 2 deals with the company's response, or lack thereof, to charges that it has enabled "fake news" and the disruption of electoral politics. It's no small thing that the program clarifies vital issues raised about Facebook—algorithms, for instance—so obscure to so many. Or that it so concisely tells its very disturbing story.

The Facebook Dilemma,

Monday at 9 p.m., Tuesday at 10 p.m., PBS