How many times have you heard about theStreisand effect? It's that phenomenon whereby attempting to censor information exponentially amplifies its spread. Meta is learning this lesson the hard way. The social media giant is engaged in a legal battle to silence the scandalous book by Sarah Wynn Williams, former director of corporate policy and author of “Careless People,” a memoir that recounts her experiences within the company.
The strategy, as you may have understood, is having the opposite effect: The scandalous book has shot to the top of the bestseller lists and has now attracted the attention of the US Congress, the British Parliament and the European Parliament. The revelations about Meta's alleged collaboration with the Chinese Communist Party, the exploitation of emotionally vulnerable adolescents , company conduct during the arbitration itself they transformed what was supposed to be a domestic dispute into an international case. And the timing couldn't be worse for Zuckerberg.
The gag that amplifies the voice
Wynn-Williams’s lawyers have filed an emergency motion to dismiss the gag order Meta won through an arbitrator. I looked at a copy of the motion, and it argues that the “non-disparagement” agreement she signed when she left the company is unenforceable, and Meta has used it as a legal basis to keep her from speaking out about the scandalous book.
It makes me smile (bitterly) at the naivety of those who still believe that in the digital age you can actually silence someone. It's like trying to hold water with your hands: the more you squeeze, the more it slips through your fingers.
And now?
Scandalous Book: Perfect Timing (or Terrible, Depending on Your Perspective)
Facebook's decade-old commitment to operating in China had already been well documented at the time. Remember when Mark Zuckerberg was learning to speak Mandarin and He was jogging in Tiananmen Square? Whatever Wynn-Williams’s reason for resurrecting this story now, its timing is certainly “perfect,” in some ways.
Members of the United States Congress, the United Kingdom Parliament and the European Union Parliament have asked to speak to Ms Wynn-Williams about the public interest issues raised in her memoir.
Zuckerberg is reorienting his company to align itself politically with the Trump administration and is regular visits to the White House to discuss “American technological leadership.”
If I wanted to put a spoke in the wheels of these conversations, especially now that DeepSeek has redefined the debate over how the United States should approach the AI arms race with China, I would dust off the fact that Zuckerberg was willing to censor on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party. (In what I'm sure is another coincidence of timing, Meta will defend itself next month against the US government that wants to "break it up").
After all (spoiler: I'm about to get into conspiracy theories) Meta is still the company that banned Trump from all his social networks. And, after all, revenge is a dish best served cold.
Between truth and fiction
I’m not exactly a Zuckerberg groupie, but it should not be ignored, especially in light of what has been said above, that many of the criticisms of “Careless People” by former Meta employees focus on details that they claim are distorted, or even completely invented.
Katie Harbath, one of Facebook's early policy leaders (also with a scandalous book of her own on the way) writes Wynn-Williams: “Her book contains fragments of truth, is full of factual inaccuracies, exaggerations and omissions, including things she writes about me and my team’s work on the elections (even though we are never directly named).”
Other former Meta employees also disputed Wynn-Williams' narrative. Dex Hunter Torricke, Facebook's former executive communications manager, disputes her description of a situation she had with Mark Zuckerberg during a work trip to Indonesia. And Gary Briggs, former CMO of Facebook, writes on Threads that Wynn-Williams fabricated details about a karaoke session she attended on Zuckerberg's private jet.
Scandalous Book, The Ultimate Test
Ultimately, “Careless People” is a test of what you think of Meta. For many, the scandalous book only confirms the belief that the company’s leaders are ruthless and immoral capitalists. For others, it is an attack that bends reality to reinforce a self-interested narrative (what? Aside from profits, I mean).
What is certain is that by attempting to silence Wynn-Williams, Meta has only amplified its voice. Meta spokesman, Andy Stone, says the company “has no intention of interfering with anyone’s rights under the law.” That’s a pretty ironic statement, considering the company’s efforts to muzzle its former employee (and, by its own admission, millions of social media users in recent years).
If I had to bet, I’d say we’ll be hearing more about Wynn-Williams now that lawmakers have taken an interest in its story. And Meta may find that the cost of the truth, or at least a disgruntled former employee’s version of the truth, is much higher than she anticipated.
