First time that I read the article (it’s a few years old).

What stands out to me is the following:

a) the one thing keeping heavy monitization and fully eroding of User privacy within the app at bay is the strong encryption - if Facebook finds a way to get rid of it (or maybe they are contempt with the ways they found to link Metadata to users?), that’s a step they are going to do. b) the moment one sells the company/ownership switches to a publicly traded company, even when you have employees fighting against it, it goes downhill from there. Even if you are competent and have the willpower and dedication and standing to advocate for the right path, you mitigate at best - and only for some time.
c) and finally the big force in all of that: in the article you’ll find Zuckerberg communicating to the WhatsApp that Wallstreet expects growth. Growth that they need to provide by compromising WhatsApps integrity.

Once you are part of the publicy traded world, agency and independency is lost to an extend that is not recoverable. I see it time and time again.