Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe I’m overly pessimistic about how people collectively behave. But seriously, imagine an article posted on Facebook stating that Planned Parenthood sells body parts of aborted fetuses (or something similarly likely to elicit reactions). Obviously, that's either factual or it’s not. Yet I'm certain that if Facebook users had the ability to vote on whether the story is true of false, they would vote based on person…
> Obviously, that's either factual or it’s not. Sure, but unless people actually work at PP or carry out their own individual on-site investigation, their knowledge of the fact is going to be based on what third-party sources they trust (including those acting as fact checkers), which is tightly correlated with viewpoint. > Facebook users had the ability to vote on whether the story is true of false, they would vote…
But that's true of nearly everything.
On anything controversial, users will generally vote based on what they like to believe, and such a system of ranking news stories or posters of news stories would never be reliable.