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Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

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Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#21

Post by zoul »

aikah wrote: post #17
andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

> Facebook simply kills democracy for their own benefit. Give me a break. It's not Facebook's job to tell the truth from the lies. They provide a social network, for profit. They are not a charity or a non profit. They sell ads. If "news filtering" aligns with their bottom-line they'll do it, if it doesn't, they won't, that's business. Now to anybody who thinks he can control the internet and what people read/think/d…

Nobody is forced to use Facebook, but the fact is that for a vast number of people it represents the main source of news. Which, if this source can be easily gamed, is a problem. Since how do you “convince others that they are being misled” if the “alternative” media, plenty represented in their news feeds, discredit the traditional, trustworthy media first? There is a great Guardian Long Read about this very topic:

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/jul/12/how-technology...

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#22

Post by anabis »

jerluc wrote: post #12
anabis wrote: post #4

I think people are being unreasonably demanding of FaceBook. Fake-news, I can see the problem. However snobbishly trolling with risque art and historical pictures, and slamming FB because the overworked mods were not sophisticated enough to recognize them seems like bullying to me.

How can you find yourself at all sympathetic toward Facebook in this context? This is not about saying Facebook's moderators are doing terribly, the whole point here is to point out the fact that Facebook has a major conflict of interest when it comes to the issue of fake news, and they've avoided admitting that fact entirely.

As I said, I agree with stomping out fake-news.

But its like death with thousand cuts. I think the users should drop the demand for art and historical stuff.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#23

Post by andrewvijay »

aikah wrote: post #17
andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

> Facebook simply kills democracy for their own benefit. Give me a break. It's not Facebook's job to tell the truth from the lies. They provide a social network, for profit. They are not a charity or a non profit. They sell ads. If "news filtering" aligns with their bottom-line they'll do it, if it doesn't, they won't, that's business. Now to anybody who thinks he can control the internet and what people read/think/d…

>It's not Facebook's job to tell the truth from the lies.

No its not. They need to show all articles to the people that form bubbles is the point here.

> They provide a social network, for profit.

yes, but their influence on the world politics and emotions cannot be ignored simply because they are a for profit company. Business is simply not an excuse to separate people in bubbles. >Nobody is forced to use their platform

Do you really think that everyone decides on how they should use facebook before they do? No. People are not blaming FB for everything. Only about forming bubbles that can bring about significant social changes for humans.

I'm not really worried about Trump but for anyone dying or suffering because of his decisions, FB has a huge part in that. There's no denying in that.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#24

Post by camillomiller »

mozumder wrote: post #8
andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

It's not just Facebook, but also Twitter and Reddit. The Republican guy that shot the pizza place in DC today was driven by a conspiracy theory marketed on Reddit. These social-media sites are literally dangerous.

Well, what's dangerous is that those sites operate in country where getting a gun is so damn easy

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#25

Post by andrewvijay »

grzm wrote: post #19
zdkl wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the bigger question as far as I've come to think of it: is a for profit company compatible with the role facebook is filling?

And if it's not for profit, it will still need income. Where will that income come from?

I simply dont know answers to all these questions!!

And quite frankly their top executives have to be worried about that. Not us.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#26

Post by fsloth »

anabis wrote: post #4

I think people are being unreasonably demanding of FaceBook. Fake-news, I can see the problem. However snobbishly trolling with risque art and historical pictures, and slamming FB because the overworked mods were not sophisticated enough to recognize them seems like bullying to me.

"I think people are being unreasonably demanding of FaceBook."

Considering the amount of influence Facebook imposes on it's users I don't think so. It's very difficult even for the best of men to be constantly aware of ones cognitive biases. If facebook only shared friend's posts, I would have to agree. But the fact that it intertwines this reality based, emotionally meaningful data with effectively biased noise it gives that biased noise a terrible force. That noise will start to bounce around in ones social circles like in an echo chamber, thus giving it even more credibility.

"However snobbishly trolling with risque art and historical pictures, and slamming FB because the overworked mods were not sophisticated enough to recognize them seems like bullying to me."

FB feeds false signals from unvetted third parties, while censoring input from trusted parties.

Once again, if Facebook was a bulletin board, I would agree. But it's something far more insidious. The problem is that the whole point of Facebook is to convince users that any data they see from third party sources is meaningful and important - to create add based revenue. It creates this effect by utilizing ones friend network. Thus it twists something precious and important into a cognitive attack vector.

The problem is - this is not made explicit - and the more ignorant users are of this effect the better it is for their business.

I'm not saying they are evil geniuses. They just want to sell adds. It's probably the way it is through constant application of A/B testing. The metrics drive the interface to be ever more convincing. It's a system to create ever more convincing messages from unsolicited third parties.

The censoring then actively intercepts messages from vetted parties, adding insult to injury.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#27

Post by grzm »

andrewvijay wrote: post #25
grzm wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if it's not for profit, it will still need income. Where will that income come from?

I simply dont know answers to all these questions!! And quite frankly their top executives have to be worried about that. Not us.

And they obviously are. Facebook has been trying to address these issues, and has made missteps on the way. They wouldn't have issued the statements they have if they weren't concerned about it. I'd be really surprised if they're happy with the current situation and are going to just stop working on it.

Maybe they're not working fast enough or in the way you want them to. But it's helpful to recognize that they're human, too. The issues of free speech and privacy and business and how they inter-relate are not solved issues, and things that we've grappled with as societies for at least a couple hundred years. Coupled with the novelty of online communities, it's not something I expect them to figure out overnight.

It's good that you admit that you don't have answers to these questions. I don't either. Which is why I'm very slow to make statements like Facebook simply kills democracy for their own benefit. It just doesn't recognize the reality of the situation as I understand it.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#28

Post by elorant »

andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

Ignorance is killing democracy. And that’s not Facebook’s problem. It’s an educational problem. Our education system is failing to instill critical thinking into young people. So they go out in the world and become adults who are easily duped into this idea or that because they lack the skills and the mindset to evaluate opposing viewpoints. Sure the Internet has made things worse, and that’s a bit shocking for those of us who a couple of decades ago hoped that free information would help the world move forward, but it’s hardly the root of the problem.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#29

Post by moomin »

The broader point is that this analysis applies not just to Facebook, but Twitter and Reddit as well. Engagement is a revenue driver and veracity isn't.

What's worse, the same applies to regular news as well as aggregators. It always has to a certain extent, but improving technology, changing social attitudes and razor-thin margins have weaponised this.

But we're not even finished there: the US and the UK are geographically sorting their populations by political affiliation. Want to see a political bubble? Look outside.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#30

Post by philovivero »

camillomiller wrote: post #24
mozumder wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just Facebook, but also Twitter and Reddit. The Republican guy that shot the pizza place in DC today was driven by a conspiracy theory marketed on Reddit. These social-media sites are literally dangerous.

Well, what's dangerous is that those sites operate in country where getting a gun is so damn easy

Did you know in France they allow people to rent trucks?

A lot of people don't share your irrational fear of guns.

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