At Wired, tech writer Steven Levy describes the trouble that Facebook and Instagram’s parent company Meta is taking to deep-six an exposé, Careless People (Flatiron 2025) by Sarah Wynn Williams, their former Director of Public Policy.

From the Publisher:

From trips on private jets and encounters with world leaders to shocking accounts of misogyny and double standards behind the scenes, this searing memoir exposes both the personal and the political fallout when unfettered power and a rotten company culture take hold. In a gripping and often absurd narrative where a few people carelessly hold the world in their hands, this eye-opening memoir reveals what really goes on among the global elite.

Perhaps predictably, as Levy tells it,

Meta—the company that promotes itself as an avatar of free speech—has successfully convinced an arbitrator to silence author Sarah Wynn-Williams, who was a director in charge of connecting Meta’s executives with global leaders. The ruling, relying on an NDA signed after Wynn-Williams was fired, demands she stop promoting the book, do everything in her power to stop its publication, and retract all comments “disparaging, critical or otherwise detrimental” about Meta. That’s pretty much the whole book. Wynn-Williams, who has registered as a whistleblower with the SEC, did not attend the hearing and doesn’t seem inclined to respect it. As I write this, Careless People is now the third-best-selling book on Amazon.

The arbitrator’s Meta-friendly “emergency” ruling was the climax of an intense campaign against the book that erupted once the company got a look at it. Even as I turned the pages of Careless People, my inbox was fattening with dispatches from Meta. “Her book is a mix of old claims and false accusations about our executives,” a company spokesperson says. They characterize her firing as the result of “poor performance and toxic behavior.” They call her “a disgruntled activist trying to sell books.” Meanwhile on social media, current and former employees posted comments defending the maligned executives.

“Meta Tries to Bury a Tell-All Book,” March 14, 2025

No doubt thanks in part to Meta’s efforts to stifle the book, here is its ranking at Amazon as of 9:40 am PST today:

• Best Sellers Rank: #3 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #1 in Scientist Biographies
  • #1 in Politics & Social Sciences (Books)
  • #1 in Industries (Books)

Not many news stories have a moral but this is an exception: The reading public is not governed by White House-directed Facebook mods.