IMPORTANT: My art and I will be at Stem and Vine in Biddeford every Saturday (except 12/12 and 12/19) so come on by and pick up some floral watercolor or nature inspired embroidery.
Meta pulled back on changing their terms of service recently which would have allowed them to take and use any and all published images uploaded by businesses to Threads, Instagram, and Facebook to train AI models. There was no opt out option although there were a bunch of hoops you could jump through to make it known you do want to participate. Continued use was considered consent.
Content creators, news outlets, and businesses protested strongly across the board vowing to leave all 3 apps in droves in Meta did not reconsider.
According to Neiman Lab’s reporting on Nov 5 2026:
“Meta has indefinitely delayed its proposed commercial terms of service, which would have permitted the company to scrape the websites of Meta Business account users.
On Thursday, the company took down the preview link to the proposed terms and published an update to its Business Help Center that reads:
“We recently shared that we were updating the Meta Commercial Terms, Product Catalog Terms, Self-Serve Ad Terms, and Ad Creative Generative AI Terms. These updates are now paused and will not take effect on November 20, 2026. We are continuing to consult with stakeholders and will provide a further update when we have more to share. In the meantime, our existing terms remain in effect.””
On October 21 2026 the BBC reported :
“Meta, the company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp has been hit with its largest fine ever for its business practices.
A judge in New Mexico on Wednesday ordered the company to pay $25bn (£18.6bn) following a two-week trial earlier this year that found it had spent years lying to the public about how it handled Facebook user data.
"The lies extend beyond Facebook's data practices as well," the judge said, adding they went to "the heart of Facebook's core business practices".
Meta's head lawyer CJ Mahoney said the ruling made it "all but impossible to do business in the state of New Mexico". The company intends to appeal, a move Mahoney said will be successful.
The fine is the largest to date against Meta, which has either been fined or agreed to settle several other lawsuits this year, including an $18bn deal with California over child safety.”
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I rebooted this blog with every intention of removing myself from social media because morally I have a very hard time participating in what I believe to be one of the worst things to ever happen to society and our brains but we are tied to it in a way that makes it very hard to run a business or be seen in the world without it.
I will be paying close attention to the man behind the curtain and keeping my ear to the ground for class action lawsuits because what Meta has done is by far the largest breach of trust in corporate history.