Many companies in big tech make insane profits from the surveillance-advertising complex. Is Meta especially bad in this regard? Google, Apple, etc. all do their own tracking and advertising, not to mention TikTok, Reddit, etc.<p>Everyone has their price, I guess. History won't remember any individual FAANG peon anyway, but for that peon, that salary could mean early retirement, a good life for their kids and grandkids, and maybe even generational wealth. I wouldn't do it personally, but it's a tradeoff many would accept.<p>Seems like the "wrong side" of history is winning anyway, and likely the big US antitrust efforts will all be shut down soon, so today's ethics will probably just seem like a fringe has-been in a decade or so. For any individual developer, they can choose to be a Stallman-like figure and crusade against all the woes of commercialization... and probably get nowhere... or they and their family and their kids can all be rich and live comfortably, regardless of where history goes. It's the old "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" mentality, I guess. Not a hard choice for many.<p>Most of the world doesn't really care about this stuff. They struggle just to put food on the table. For immigrants coming from worse regimes or weaker economies, especially, FAANG money can be transformative. For every upstanding, ethical developer who refuses a job, there will be 10,000 waiting in line after them.