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Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

washingtontimes.com

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Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#141

Post by randyrand »

buro9 wrote: post #76
nostromo wrote: post #15

It's interesting how media outlets are spinning this news. People that read conservative media are left thinking that Facebook has admitted bias. People that read liberal media are left thinking the opposite. Washington Times: "Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives" LA Times: "Facebook investigation reveals no evidence of bias against conservative topics, company says" NY Times: "F…

Is bias illegal? Should it be? Whatever the answer the political class would like to apply to Facebook, should it not also be applied to the traditional mass-media?

Don't be ridiculous. No one is arguing to get rid of free speech. And no one is saying FB should be banned from censoring. But people are saying they dont like FB censoring. And FB is trying to reassure they dont. Why you ask? Isnt this a double standard, you ask?

FB as primarily a communication platform is not traditional mass media. And as such people have different expectations. I don't really want my communications platform censoring posts, etc. wheras I may be okay with my news outlet showing bias.

FB and WaPo serve different functions, and people have different expectations. That's all.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#143

Post by rhino369 »

thisargisARGH23 wrote: post #17

"But with nearly two-thirds of Facebook users saying they get at least some of their news from the online platform, conservatives said any chance of bias could skew political conversations." I really don't understand this whole situation? How is this happening? If the argument is "We don't like how you're skewing news about our kind", how is this not seen as pure hypocrisy and laughed out of the room? Can you imagine…

A key difference between Fox News and Facebook is that Fox commentators are pretty much advertising their bias. Bill Oreilly is clearly stating his personal opinions.

Facebook is stating it's politically neutral but it wasn't.

Another thing to considers is that Facebook is a monopoly in the social networking business. There are probably half a dozen news networks on a cable plan, plus nearly infinitely online news outlets.

If you don't like Fox news, there is CNN, MSNBC, Bloomberg, etc. Facebook has no direct alternative.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#144

Post by wwweston »

bpodgursky wrote: post #102
mmanfrin wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Studies have found that state run media in democratic nations are the least biased. NPR, BBC.

If you genuinely think NPR is the least biased news source available in the US, you have more serious problems.

How would you describe NPR's bias?

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#145

Post by Terr_ »

jameshart wrote: post #128
siegecraft wrote: post #46

If Facebook et al are going to replace the dying traditional print and broadcast media, maybe they need to be subject to the equal-time rule as well? Pushing "Don't forget to vote!" reminders only to Facebook users who are likely to vote in favor of facebook-friendly policies and candidates is one interesting anecdote I've seen. I take it with a grain of salt but it's nevertheless illustrative of the power that can b…

What equal-time rule are the traditional print and broadcast media in the US subject to?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairness_Doctrine (defunct)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal-time_rule

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#146

Post by protomyth »

bpodgursky wrote: post #118
kbenson wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what's an example of a less biased news source, and why do you think it's less biased?

I find the CSMonitor to be a good source for review articles (not breaking news, but breaking news is rarely that informative IMO): http://www.csmonitor.com/ I read the Economist and while I won't call it unbiased, it's honest and usually presents both sides. For day-of news it's tougher but direct Reuters pieces usually have minimal interpretation and are pretty good.

but the Reuters' headline writer has a hate on for Israel. "Palestinian Dies in Ramming Attack" was one such title.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#147

Post by noobermin »

vidarh wrote: post #80
unlinker wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think they'd recognise their own bias? That would be like saying "we can't do journalism properly", because proper journalism is unbiased.

There is no such thing as unbiased journalism. Without bias, what you have is cacophony of competing interpretations of events. Even reporting "just the facts" consists of making judgement calls that introduce bias with respect to which facts you report, and what you accept as fact. I'd rather have reports from sources that don't try to pretend to be unbiased.

cspan is probably the closest thing to unbiased journalism, it's great, but no, it isn't a money maker and is only entertaining to those truly seeking the raw content. I agree that for reporters, the least they can do is acknowledge their own bias. If anything, that acknowledgement goes far towards mitigating said bias.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#148

Post by chimeracoder »

ChrisArgyle wrote: post #113
nostromo wrote: post #15

It's interesting how media outlets are spinning this news. People that read conservative media are left thinking that Facebook has admitted bias. People that read liberal media are left thinking the opposite. Washington Times: "Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives" LA Times: "Facebook investigation reveals no evidence of bias against conservative topics, company says" NY Times: "F…

Honestly this is more likely due to the actual outcome being too complex for a headline. "Facebook denies systematic bias but admits their current process allows bad actors to apply bias and takes remediating steps" Doesn't work. Although WSJ came kinda close.

> "Facebook denies systematic bias but admits their current process allows bad actors to apply bias and takes remediating steps"

If their system allows bad actors to apply bias, that's literally a systematic bias. Unless they're claiming all of their 'bad actors' are symmetrically distributed along every relevant axis[0], that's the same thing as saying that there is a systematic bias.

There is no reason to believe that any 'bad actors' are perfectly representative of the population at large and cancel each other out, and plenty of reasons to suspect otherwise, even based solely on our prior beliefs about Facebook employees (before this story broke).

[0] I say 'every' axis, because even though we're talking about a one-dimensional spectrum (liberal/conservative), in reality, there are many different dimensions along which bias could be introduced.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#149

Post by noobermin »

wry_discontent wrote: post #82

Why am I supposed to care? Facebook isn't a news source. They're a software company. They're under no obligation to be fair and balanced.

You're probably right. This again is a demonstration of how much facebook is now a public utility more than it is a software company at least in people's minds.

Re: Facebook admits rogue employees may have shown bias against conservatives

#150

Post by gnaritas »

nametakenobv wrote: post #133
gnaritas wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook is a delivery channel. They do not produce editorial content so they are not allowed to have bias That's simply not true; they're allowed to do anything they want.

Yeah, I'm sure there is a congressional probe because they're allowed to do anything they want. I'm sure Mark Zuckerberg felt that he had to adress this himself because clearly they can do anything they want.

There's a congressional probe because congress is a political body putting on a show, nothing more. Facebook is a private company, they have no legal obligation to be unbiased. They may have business reasons for wanting to appear unbiased, so Zuck is simply managing the company image. Websites are not broadcast stations and don't fall under the same rules as television, calling them a delivery channel is meaningless, there's no such thing in the law.
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