New Zealand shooting highlights Facebook's effect on attention-seeking culture
In the wake of a shooting at two New Zealand mosques on Friday, Roger McNamee, an investor and mentor to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, said that while the social media company did not create the attention-seeking culture that exists today, it has played a role in its growth.
“Facebook didn’t create that culture, but it has promoted it extraordinarily effectively to create this whole community of influencers, this whole world of influencers,” McNamee said during an interview on “Mornings with Maria.” “Obviously that can apply for ill as well as good.”
On Friday, a man killed nearly 50 people at two mosques in Christchurch, a city on the east coast of the country's South Island, and livestreamed the rampage on Facebook. The social media giant, which also owns Instagram, eventually took down the video and also deleted the account that the video was posted on.
“This is a tragedy, and in my mind the Facebook angle of it pales by comparison to the fact of the thing,” McNamee said. “To my mind, the culture that we’ve created of getting attention at any cost is obviously a factor here.”