Social Network (6)
Emily kept talking.
“The poorer the country, the more severe Facenote’s harmful impact becomes.”
Unlike developed countries, where public media such as television and newspapers still carried real weight, more than half the people in developing countries got their news through Facenote.
“Do you know about the Rohingya massacre in Myanmar last year?”
“Yes.”
The Rohingya were a Muslim minority living in Myanmar, a Buddhist country.
“It started with an article claiming that a Rohingya man had raped a Burmese woman. That article spread through Facenote.”
The Burmese who saw it were enraged, and hatred toward the Rohingya flared like a wildfire. It ended in ethnic slaughter.
“Wasn’t it later exposed as fake news?”
“That’s right. It was fake news.”
None of it had happened in the first place.
Facenote eventually deleted the article, but only after ten thousand people had died and a million had been left displaced.
Something similar had happened in Ethiopia, too.
Those who were exposed to extremist content came to hate one another, and as government forces clashed with Tigrayan rebels, Ethiopia was plunged into civil war, with more than ten thousand already dead.
“Weren’t the massacres and civil war caused by long-standing political, cultural, and religious conflict?”
“They were. The problem is that Facenote is helping fuel those conflicts.”
Everyone looked at Facenote, but everyone saw something different.
Algorithms had bias. Once they tipped in one direction, they amplified it without end.
Objective, rational opinions vanished, and extremist arguments rose to the mainstream.
Trish could see why Emily had been willing to risk herself by coming forward.
If Facenote were left alone, things would only become more uncontrollable from here. Someone had to put on the brakes.
She wanted to use the press to stop all of this.
If she reported it, it would certainly make a splash. But would that be enough?
From everything she had heard so far, it was clear this wasn’t something that could end with a simple exposé.
“This is serious enough that politicians should step in, investigate the truth, and come up with countermeasures. Have you considered bringing it to Congress?”
Emily gave a sneer.
“Congress? The House? The Senate? Or do you mean the Democrats? The Republicans?”
“Well…”
“Have you ever been to Washington? The area around the Capitol is packed with lobbyists from the moment you get to the entrance. There’s a saying that half the people staying in the nearby hotels are lobbyists.”
Lobbying was legal in the United States.
Big Tech companies showered Washington with astronomical sums every year, steering policy away from anything that would run against their interests.
“Last year alone, Facenote spent forty million dollars in Washington. If your article goes out, they’ll probably throw even more money around. Do you really think politicians will step up and fix the problem anyway?”
“……”
Emily took out a USB drive and held it out to her.
“These are materials from Facenote’s internal social media team. They include internal reports, research data, and more.”
Instead of taking it at once, Trish asked her, “Are you really sure about this?”
Anyone could raise suspicions. What mattered was the evidence to prove them.
Once these materials were made public, Facenote would begin hunting for the whistleblower. In the worst case, Emily could even be sued for stealing company information.
But…
Emily’s face was set with resolve. “It doesn’t matter. Someone has to stop Facenote.”
Her will seemed unshakable.
Carefully, Trish said to her, “Actually, there’s already a place investigating this issue before your tip even came in.”
That made Emily look mildly surprised.
“Where?”
“Continue Capital. Would you like to look at this?”
Trish pulled a document envelope from her bag and held it out to her.
“What is this?”
“Continue Capital’s internal report, written before you came forward.”
As Emily skimmed through it, she was stunned.
It was pointing out the exact same problems she had just raised.
“The person who wrote the report is Continue Capital’s co-CEO. According to him, the only way to fix this isn’t to stop at media coverage. It has to lead to a congressional hearing.”
“That’s…”
Emily knew Continue Capital’s reputation well enough.
“If a congressional hearing does happen, can you testify?”
“Do you really think there’ll be a hearing?”
Trish thought of Han Miru.
The other side was Facenote, one of the Big Five American tech giants. She couldn’t even imagine what method he could possibly use to force a congressional hearing.
And yet…
“Yes. If it’s him, I’m sure he can make it happen.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Emily nodded.
“All right. I’ll do it.”
Continue Capital had shorted Facenote not because of Emily’s tip, but entirely because of its own judgment.
That was why, before the short sale, we had already prepared an internal report, and Joseph was still gathering related materials.
To avoid giving anyone the wrong idea, I needed to show that I was investigating Facenote on my own as well.
And when that happened, the one thing I needed was…
Yeah. I’d have to do it the old-fashioned way and go see it for myself.
The important materials for a listed company were all written in numbers and made public to everyone.
Just by reading the financial statements and IPO documents, you could get a clear look at the company’s most important information.
But a company wasn’t trapped inside paperwork. It existed somewhere in the real world.
And when that was the case, the best thing to do was go there in person.
Among analysts, some even preferred company visits to sitting in the office and staring at data.
Their argument was that only by seeing it with their own eyes and hearing it with their own ears could you truly grasp a company’s essential value.
It had been the same back when I worked at DA Securities.
In my early days there, I mainly stayed in the office, but later I followed Senior Dongho around on company visits like a dutiful apprentice.
We would visit two or three companies a week and write our reports afterward.
Going there in person definitely let you see things you couldn’t learn from documents alone.
Whether the office was cleaned properly, whether any machines in the factory had been left idle, what expressions the employees wore as they worked—things like that.
In the case of smaller companies, just meeting management face-to-face could reveal a great deal about the business.
That was why analysts were still running around on foot in the twenty-first century.
It was also why it was so hard to write a sell report.
An analyst who wrote one could end up blacklisted not only by that company, but by others as well, and then company visits would be refused all over the place.
Once, after I’d written a sell report and gone to visit, the CEO cursed me out and threw me out the door.
I remember being so pissed off that I lowered my target price even further.
Anyway, I requested a company visit at Facenote.
By Facenote’s standards, there was a separate department for dealing with IBs and investment firms, and they actively promoted the company to analysts.
I thought I might have to wait a few days, but thanks to my reputation as a Continue Capital co-CEO, a meeting was arranged immediately.
As expected, being famous made life easier.
I got in the car and headed to Facenote.
Facenote’s headquarters were in San Jose.
I told the employee at the entrance the purpose of my visit and received a visitor badge.
A little while later, one of their staff appeared in front of me.
He was a white man in his late thirties.
“Are you the CEO of Continue Capital?”
“That’s right.”
“I’m Jarold Hank, the PR director. It’s a pleasure.”
He was one of the people who occasionally appeared in Facenote’s promotional videos to explain this and that.
I hadn’t expected the PR director himself to come meet me.
“Hello. I’m Han Miru.”
He said with a cheerful expression, “I had no idea the co-CEO would be someone this young. You requested a company visit—was there anything in particular you wanted to see?”
“No. This is my first time at Facenote, so I wanted to take a look around. I was also curious about your new headquarters.”
“Haha! I see. Then I’ll show you around myself.”
When the internet first emerged, many experts predicted that offices would disappear. But even in the twenty-first century, offices were still important.
People became more creative when they interacted with a variety of others than when they were alone.
That was why Big Tech companies were pouring the vast fortunes they had accumulated into building extravagant new headquarters, all in the name of improving efficiency.
Facenote’s new campus was the size of eight football fields laid side by side. On the roof, they had built a garden of over thirty thousand square meters and a 1.8-kilometer walking path.
As I walked around at a leisurely pace, I said, “It’s spacious and very clean.”
Director Hank smiled. “We’ve only been in the new building for nine months. Employee satisfaction is extremely high.”
Facenote had been founded in the early days by Mike Goldenberg, together with his friends in a Harvard dormitory.
After that, they rented a house nearby and worked there for several months before the company grew big enough to settle in Silicon Valley.
By then, CEO Goldenberg had already thrown all his colleagues out of the company.
And the new headquarters, which had begun construction three years ago, was finally completed at the start of this year, bringing together all the employees who had been scattered across different buildings.
He showed me the cafeteria, the lounge, the gym, and more, one after another.
Employees of all different races sat together talking or lay around resting. Most of them looked to be in their twenties through forties.
As you’d expect from an IT company, the atmosphere was free and easygoing.
Director Hank said proudly, “I’d say Facenote’s in-house welfare facilities are the best in the world.”
Not only were there shuttle buses for commuting, but all the drinks and food in the cafeteria were free.
They also ran exercise programs and educational programs for employees, and even had a massage room.
If you were tired during work, you could rest whenever you wanted, go for a walk, or even sleep in the nap room.
Listening to all that made it sound like a dream job where you could just lounge around and get paid, but it wasn’t quite that simple.
Companies weren’t charities.
Those benefits were designed to push employees to work longer and harder.
Just as companies fought one another in the market, employees did the same. Whether you showed up and worked, rested, came in late, or left exactly on time was your own business—but if you didn’t produce results, you were out immediately.
For the record, California was an at-will employment state.
It had its pros and cons, but it was also one of the reasons Silicon Valley had grown so explosively.
As I walked around with his friendly explanation, it almost felt like I was on a tour.
In fact, even ordinary visitors could tour the place in advance if they applied, not just analysts. They couldn’t enter the core facilities, of course, and could only follow a set route, but still.
Given the size of the campus, even a cursory look took about an hour.
He stopped in front of the café and asked, “What would you like to drink?”
“Is it free for me too?”
“Of course.”
“Then I’ll have an iced Americano.”
I took coffee, he took orange juice, and the two of us headed to the meeting room.
We sat down.
“So, what do you think of Facenote so far?”
“It’s so good that I’m actually surprised. It’s enough to make me want to work here.”
That made him burst out laughing.
“Haha! So what brings you here today?”
“I had a few questions about Facenote.”
He took a sip of orange juice and said, “I’ve heard a lot about Continue Capital. Mostly that you publish a lot of sell reports. You’re not here for that reason, are you?”
There was an edge to the question.
I answered honestly.
“That’s right. I’m actually working on a sell report.”
“Cough!”
Apparently shocked, he spat the orange juice he’d been drinking back into the cup in a rush.
“W-What do you mean by that?”
“Exactly what I said. I think Facenote has a number of serious problems.”
“……”
He looked flustered.
Even if an analyst had a negative outlook on a company, they usually didn’t say it this bluntly.
That was because they’d never get a proper response that way.
But I was different.
No matter what answer came back, I already knew the truth.
And then, at that very moment, there was a knock, and someone walked into the meeting room.
A white man in his mid-thirties.
Blond curly hair. A long, narrow face.
I recognized him at a glance.
“……”
Why the hell are you here?