Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News • Hacker News Board

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#181

Post by [deleted] » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:19 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #180

kisna72 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am pretty doubtful of your statement as conservative media does a pretty good job of making people believe what the republical party wants them to believe.

That's exactly what it did. It got them to support Trump. For a long time the party has had a fortunate synergy of "red meat" issues that constituents care about and business interests who for some reason think that Hillary Clinton hates Goldman Sachs (but pays her $8000 a minute to hear what she has to say.) Note how "pro business" republicans will pay lip service to the Teslas and Ubers of the world until the local…

[deleted]

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#182

Post by MisterBastahrd » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:23 PM UTC

dba7dba wrote: post #99

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I must have lost track of the law that said that all things must be monolithic in their nature. Facebook is a connector of people that uses news to keep people interested an on the site.

EDIT: No sir, there is no such law that said that all things must be monolithic in their nature. So, distort stories to keep eyeballs of main customers (younger hence more liberal) on Facebook, for the sake of earning more ad dollars? I think the younger customers deserve more than that? Should give more credit to the younger generation no?

It's plainly clear that you didn't read the article, so there's nothing further to discuss.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#183

Post by MisterBastahrd » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:25 PM UTC

michaelbuddy wrote: post #122

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's not what the article said. They had a conservative on staff who was in charge of these feeds, and he wasn't cutting out conservative articles, he was cutting out articles that supported candidates he didn't like. As long as you choose to consume their product, you get the results of their work. Don't like it? Go somewhere else. You should appreciate that as a libertarian. I see no harm in excluding article…

>As long as you choose to consume their product, you get the results of their work. Don't like it? Go somewhere else. Except when you don't know what you aren't seeing. >Those aren't news organizations. Breitbart has teams of reporters and editors, so does Infowars. Breitbart has offices in different locations, such as London and the U.S. Breitbart has it's reporters following the campaign and they get many exclusive…

Who said that HuffPo was a news org? They're an ideological blog. Just like Breitbart is an ideological blog. Having offices doesn't make one a news org.

Why are you making arguments against claims I never made? Also, why do libertarians hate it so much when people use their own basic ideology against them?

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#184

Post by jobadev » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:26 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #177

SFLemonade wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting with a straight face that CNN "News" is fair and balanced? Or perhaps any of the myriad of blatantly politically charged companies out of Silicon Valley? It happens on both sides, and it wouldn't be unreasonable to argue that the left is much more guilty of this than the right. Fox News has become a meme because it is the only mainstream news source that blatantly shows conservative bias. Try point…

> Are you suggesting with a straight face that CNN "News" is fair and balanced? No, it just has slightly weaker right-wing bias than Fox.

That's why they support Hillary.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#185

Post by threatofrain » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:26 PM UTC

throwit992 wrote: post #138

I have no great love of conservative politics, but there's a convincing argument to be made that their ideas and views are routinely suppressed by media outside of explicitly partisan media outlets (i.e. Fox News or talk radio). There are a number of studies that back up this claim. A 2008 study[0] found that 88% of journalists donate to the Democratic party. Jonathan Haidt has shown[1] that non-economics social scie…

But what is the conservative perspective? Have you checked out the party platforms for conservatives for major states like Texas? What are the most oft-used conservative, energy-tapping, get-out-to-vote talking points?

Conservatives are now the minority of this country, but due to bad districting, they have disproportionate electoral power.

And you know, it's not like the GOP needed to be enemies with the scientific community, but that's how they've positioned themselves. The conservative narrative is: scientists lie about global warming, fracking, coal, and other ecological points. Scientists lie about homosexuality. Scientists lie about the efficacy of abstinence, and they lie about condoms.

I think conservatives have been toyed with the GOP repeatedly, and I think it's no coincidence that the GOP is having a crisis, and I think it's both surprising and unsurprising that Donald Trump barely plays the Christian card. The top and only Christian consensus issues are (1) abortion, (2) homosexuality, and (3) sex education in schools. Distracting issues.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#186

Post by basch » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:31 PM UTC

Grishnakh wrote: post #168

throwit992 wrote: post #138

I have no great love of conservative politics, but there's a convincing argument to be made that their ideas and views are routinely suppressed by media outside of explicitly partisan media outlets (i.e. Fox News or talk radio). There are a number of studies that back up this claim. A 2008 study[0] found that 88% of journalists donate to the Democratic party. Jonathan Haidt has shown[1] that non-economics social scie…

What's bad is that it doesn't help reinforce your feeling that your position is correct when the other side is being actively suppressed. I generally agree with many liberal positions, but when I hear about stuff like this it makes me want to reconsider my opinions of conservative positions. It's exactly like the Streisand Effect.

at the same time, how do you feel about creationism and intelligent design being suppressed instead of given equal airtime with competing theories.

what constitutes "fair?" if one group is twice as loud while delivering the same amount of content, is it unfair to turn their volume down by half?

how about something like snopes or myth debunking? does dr oz deserve equal placement to more credible nutrition science? what is worse, attempting to surface more legitimate sources, or letting your site turn into a free for all shouting match?

for anyone downvoting me because they think I approve of censorship if my side wins: quite the contrary. I think from a purely theoretical standpoint, signal to noise is a complicated problem, and the people who reject the idea of filtering or ranking in totality are being unrealistic. allowing the loudest speakers to unabatedly monopolize collective attention is a problem.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#187

Post by basch » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:36 PM UTC

nil_is_me wrote: post #7

It has been blatantly clear something is up with their Trending algorithm when you notice there is a Trending: Hillary Clinton header on top of every single shared Bernie Sanders article. Never once have I seen a Trending: Bernie Sander header.

how can you be sure those results arent specifically targeted at you and your habits?

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#188

Post by jandrese » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:36 PM UTC

wfo wrote: post #164

Gratsby wrote: post #118

This seems like a story built specifically for a segment on Fox News where the newscasters feign shock and horror that their news topics aren't being covered by "mainstream media". Of course trending news is curated. All hell would break loose otherwise. There is no shortage of rabid political content conservative or otherwise on Facebook. A good part of the end user community would rather not deal with it.

An angry conservative who worked at Facebook was shocked and horrified when he was instructed to remove the breitbart 'story' about how Obama is actually a secret Muslim terrorist from Benghazi and is throwing a hissy fit all over the internet. Not necessarily the case, but this is certainly my initial assessment of the situation without learning more.

Yeah, without some concrete examples it's hard to know exactly what is going on here.

That said, Facebook is certainly not coming out of this smelling like roses. The "Top Stories" mode is horrible, and Facebook tries really really hard to force you into it, especially on mobile. IMHO it is going to be the death of them in the long term. When they're yet another Friendster/MySpace/etc... this is what I'm going to point to.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#189

Post by lintiness » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:39 PM UTC

whatthesmack wrote: post #179

popmystack wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the specific case of conservative politics, why does it matter that it's so skewed? I have absolutely no issue with, in this specific case, conservative politics not receiving much attention. I would liken it to not giving "flat earthers", blatant racists, and charlatans air time (excuse the hyperbole, hopefully the point was understood). While I agree that ideological conformity is a problem, I think it's a sympt…

> "flat earthers", blatant racists, and charlatans air time (excuse the hyperbole, hopefully the point was understood). The point was understood, but differently than you intended. These terms seem to be used to reference the folks that would claim to hold the conservative viewpoint, but the terms themselves only further evidence the misunderstood viewpoint non-conservatives may have of conservatives, and that misund…

it's a lot easier exaggerating, belittling, and dismissing the "other" than it is challenging one's own positions.

Re: Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

#190

Post by imgabe » Mon, May 09, 2016, 6:40 PM UTC

throwit992 wrote: post #138

I have no great love of conservative politics, but there's a convincing argument to be made that their ideas and views are routinely suppressed by media outside of explicitly partisan media outlets (i.e. Fox News or talk radio). There are a number of studies that back up this claim. A 2008 study[0] found that 88% of journalists donate to the Democratic party. Jonathan Haidt has shown[1] that non-economics social scie…

Having a certain set of political views does not necessarily imply that one deliberately manipulates or corrupts information to support those views.

Who cares if journalists donate to the Democratic party? Does that mean that they are omitting information or lying? If they are, show evidence of that, not that they donated to a particular party.

Conservative sources like those mentioned in the article have been repeatedly shown to distort the truth or even outright lie when the facts don't fit their agenda. Facebook is right to omit them because they are not reliable sources of information.

The idea that we even need to know if something is "trending" is ridiculous to begin with. How many times has a celebrity been declared dead on Facebook only to find out that it was a hoax? How many times have we been told we have to declare our copyright in a Facebook status or Mark Zuckerburg will personally steal all our photos to reprint for profit? The fact that a bunch of people are sharing something is practically useless in determining whether it is a valuable or true piece of information.