Enterprise

Facebook CEO doesn’t care about fake political ads, employees say

Employees express displeasure

Published

October 30, 2019

Luigi Leonardo

Image source: Anthony Quintano

Do you still get your news from Facebook? Amidst all the baby photos and memes, the social media network remains one of the most voluminous content aggregators today. Unfortunately, since its launch all those years ago, Facebook’s credibility has consistently been called into question. Can you rely on everything you see on Facebook?

Of course, Facebook’s open framework allows just about anyone to share anything, even it’s untrue. Who remembers the whole debacle with fake news from years ago? Authenticity is still a sensitive issue in today’s social media networks. Inauthentic content can notoriously steer political conversations, especially during elections.

Unfortunately, despite the inherent risk, Facebook itself doesn’t seem to care. The social network’s founder, Mark Zuckerberg, has issued a conclusive statement on his site’s policy regarding content freedom.

For context, the US is on the cusp of its next presidential elections. Incumbent President Donald Trump is awaiting the winner of a heated Democratic race. Currently, the Democratic party includes former Vice President Joe Biden, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and Senator Bernie Sanders.

Earlier this month, Trump’s reelection campaign released a 30-second video ad. The video allegedly depicts Biden bribing Ukraine a total of US$ 1 billion in aid if the latter drops a current investigation against his son. Various news sources, like CNN, have refused to broadcast the “demonstrably false” content. Facebook, however, ran the ad, regardless.

In retaliation, Warren, one of Biden’s competitors, ran a demonstrably false ad of her own: a video proclaiming that Zuckerberg and Facebook support Trump’s reelection. Unlike Trump’s ad, however, Facebook refused to run the ad, showing a blatant contrast in approaches.

Amidst all the controversy, Zuckerberg issued a revealing speech at Georgetown University. In his speech, he doubles down on his website’s allegedly rigid campaign against disinformation. “We’ve found a different strategy works best: focusing on the authenticity of the speaker, rather than the content itself,” he said. “I don’t think it’s right for a private company to censor politicians or the news in a democracy.”

The defensive call to action was unsatisfactory for a lot of people, especially his own coworkers. Soon after the speech, Facebook’s own employees issued an internal letter addressed to the company’s leaders. Instead of dwelling on the value of free speech, the letter focuses the discussion on sponsored content. “Free speech and paid speech are not the same thing,” the letter said.

According to the letter, paid misinformation “increases distrust [on Facebook] by allowing similar paid and organic content to sit side-by-side” and “undoes integrity product work.” The disgruntled employees suggest a more rigorous screening of political ads (like those for corporate ads), louder visual separation from other content, and restricted targeting.

“This is still our company,” the letter concludes.

Years after the brouhaha against fake news, Facebook is still in the same mire. How can we trust Facebook content?

Enterprise

Sony teams up with 13 companies for sustainable global supply chain

Sustainability through introduction of renewable plastics

Published

February 9, 2026

GadgetMatch

Sony, along with several companies, have established the world’s first global supply chain for the production of renewable plastics that can be used in Sony’s high-performance audiovisual products.

The supply chain consists of 14 companies across five countries and regions. The various plastic materials manufacture through this supply are slated for use in Sony’s products that will launch worldwide.

High-performance products such as audiovisual equipment involve a wide variety of plastics. The result is a complex supply chain that makes it difficult to visualize and manage the entire flow.

Additionally, plastic components that require high performance in terms of flame resistance and optical properties cannot be fully replaced with plastics from material recycling.

To address these challenges, these 14 companies have collaborated to visualize the existing supply chain for Sony’s products:

Sony Corporation
Mitsubishi Corporation
ADEKA CORPORATION
CHIMEI Corporation
ENEOS Corporation
Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corporation
Hanwha Impact Corporation
Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd.
Mitsui Chemicals, Inc.
Neste Corporation
Qingdao Haier New Material Development Co.
Ltd., SK Geo Centric Co., Ltd.
Toray Industries, Inc.
Toray Advanced Materials Korea Inc.

Sustainability through renewable plastics

The new supply chain created will enable the production of multiple types of renewable plastics from biomass resources with a mass balance approach.

This allows Sony to proactively source raw materials for its products with quality, as well as properties equivalent to virgin fossil-based plastics.

Defining the supply chain also helps the companies track and document GHG (Greenhouse Gas) emissions data in a verifiable way.

This allows participating companies to leverage the data to advance efforts to reduce their carbon footprint going forward.

Sony’s initiative with a wide range of global partners is part of the “Creating NEW from reNEWable materials” jointly launched by the electronics giant and Mitsubishi.

It aims to achieve zero usage of virgin fossil-based plastics through the introduction of renewable plastics.

Enterprise

realme is reportedly going back to being an OPPO sub-brand

All scheduled phones will still launch on time, though.

Published

January 9, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

A popular story among Chinese smartphone brands is whenever a sub-brand spinning off into its own independent entity. A less common one is when an independent entity suddenly merges back into the main entity. And yet, that’s the story we have today. realme is reportedly going back to being a sub-brand of OPPO.

If you don’t remember realme’s time as a sub-brand, then it’s hardly your fault. It’s been a long while since realme was considered a sub-brand. In 2018, the brand spun off on its own to form one of the most popular names in the Chinese smartphone space.

Today, via Leiphone, realme will return to OPPO as a sub-brand. Current realme CEO Sky Li will still retain his responsibilities heading the brand. Plus, all products on the current release schedule will still come out as planned.

However, starting this year, realme will start reintegrating back into OPPO, particularly through the latter’s after-sales programs. OnePlus will also follow the same structure going forward.

Currently, realme has not officially announced the move. That said, we also don’t know how the brand will address the reported change. It’s possible that the shift is just internal and has no effect on how the brand faces the public. For now, only time will tell.

Enterprise

Samsung warns that tech prices might increase this year

And it’s all because of AI.

Published

January 8, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

The big story late last year was the skyrocketing prices of chips. Analysts are predicting that the demand for RAM will cause the entire industry to experience hikes this year. Some users, especially in the PC building scene, are already feeling the burn. PCs won’t be the only victims, though. Xiaomi is already expecting hikes across the board. Now, Samsung is adding its voice to the growing list of warnings about price increases.

During CES 2026, Wonjiun Lee, Samsung’s global marketing chief, confirmed that the memory shortages are, in fact, real (via Bloomberg). Moreover, the company is now evaluating whether more price hikes are needed this year for its products. Though Lee expressed regret over pushing the prices to consumers, the state of the industry might force the company’s hand.

Samsung’s opinion has a lot of weight. While other brands have also voiced out their opinions lately, Samsung itself is a producer of chips. If a chip supplier is already warning users of prices affecting them, the effect will likely cascade even more when it comes to device manufacturers.

The ongoing shortage of chips is a result of the overwhelming demand from companies looking to build and bolster AI-based servers. The business-to-business demand is notably different from how regular consumers, who will soon find it hard to buy their own devices, see it.

At the very least, Samsung has not confirmed any price increases yet. However, all eyes are on the next Galaxy Unpacked, when Samsung will launch its newest Galaxy products. Will prices increase or stay the same?