The chief executive of one of the world’s largest cloud computing companies has expressed concern over Facebook’s “addictive” qualities, saying they need to be reigned in “as much as possible”.
In an on-air interview with CNBC at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland last week, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said social media giants such as Facebook should be regulated “exactly the same way” as the cigarette industry.
“Here’s a product, cigarettes. They’re addictive. You know they’re not good for you. Maybe there is all kinds of different forces trying to get you to do certain things. There’s a lot of parallels,” he said.
“I think that for sure technology has addictive qualities that we have to address, and that product designers are working to make those products more addictive. We need to reign that back as much as possible.”
Beinhoff isn’t the only industry big shot to call out Facebook of late, with media mogul Rupert Murdoch voicing his disapproval of Facebook’s fresh changes to the way publishers appear in its News Feed.
