I’m so happy I can believe everything I read on the Internet again. Thanks Facebook!!
Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
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Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#32The upcoming US elections may prove to be a watershed moment for modern democracies in general. There is a widely held belief in academic cycles that mass voter manipulation through social media has managed to trump all other kinds of propaganda, causing people to become electoral zombies. This belief is based on flimsy evidence and on a mountain of bias. I hope facebook and the other media do everything by the book…
They spent over $100,000 on ads during the 2016 campaign. You can't deny that the voters were manipulated! /s
Plus hundreds of people working full-time with a budget of at least $1.25M/month (which goes further in a country where the average income is around a sixth of the US).
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4380504/The-Speci...
The big boost, of course, was the email hacking and successful use of their media outlets like RT & Wikileaks to successfully spin nothing into the impression of a scandal, which people are still credulously recirculating.
You can still argue that this was not significant compared to campaign spending or the larger PAC/media battle, but you don’t need to be donating your PR services to a foreign intelligence operation.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#33The upcoming US elections may prove to be a watershed moment for modern democracies in general. There is a widely held belief in academic cycles that mass voter manipulation through social media has managed to trump all other kinds of propaganda, causing people to become electoral zombies. This belief is based on flimsy evidence and on a mountain of bias. I hope facebook and the other media do everything by the book…
I'm not sure what this comment has to do with the article. This is about targeted ads telling people they could vote by text message or that their polling place isn't safe. What does that have to do with "mass delusions" and "academic cycles"?
The connection seems reasonable enough to me: the social media platforms take it upon themselves to arbitrate truth - and fine, that's their prerogative.
The falsehoods at issue for this very moment are about election day logistics, but the longer term narrative of "fake news fools mindless voters into making bad decisions" has also repeatedly been on these same radars in the same efforts of these same companies.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#34"On the issue of fake news, Facebook has held off on a total ban, instead limiting the spread of articles marked as false by vetted fact-checkers. However, that approach can leave fact-checkers overwhelmed and able to tackle only the most viral hoaxes." Does anyone else find this concerning? Even the smallest bias held by fact-checkers can dramatically skew things towards one side e.g. only "fact-check" articles that…
What if one "side" traffics in far more falsehoods than the other "side"? An unbiased approach will fact-check them far more often.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#35This is something that seriously needs to be clamped down on. It is outright fraud, plain and simple. And since it's being done with the intention of disenfranchising people, it is extremely evil.
Fraud requires financial gain. This is just lying. People are allowed to lie in this way, and you should not believe everything you read, particularly if it sounds very appealing, gets your emotions fired up, or seems to offer benefit without requiring any payment or responsibility.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#36The upcoming US elections may prove to be a watershed moment for modern democracies in general. There is a widely held belief in academic cycles that mass voter manipulation through social media has managed to trump all other kinds of propaganda, causing people to become electoral zombies. This belief is based on flimsy evidence and on a mountain of bias. I hope facebook and the other media do everything by the book…
The academics are wrong, the problem is tribalism. Facts don't matter, thought doesn't matter, even ideology doesn't matter. It's just about tribes at this point for a decent chunk of the population.
Now, social media is an excellent platform for whipping up further tribalism. But it's not so straightforward as "a few cambridge analytica ad buys -> electoral zombies".
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#37"On the issue of fake news, Facebook has held off on a total ban, instead limiting the spread of articles marked as false by vetted fact-checkers. However, that approach can leave fact-checkers overwhelmed and able to tackle only the most viral hoaxes." Does anyone else find this concerning? Even the smallest bias held by fact-checkers can dramatically skew things towards one side e.g. only "fact-check" articles that…
You find it concerning because it's easy to abuse. The fact-checkers get to decide what is "true", and other Facebook users are unlikely to listen to you if you try and convince them that the fact-checkers are wrong.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#38"On the issue of fake news, Facebook has held off on a total ban, instead limiting the spread of articles marked as false by vetted fact-checkers. However, that approach can leave fact-checkers overwhelmed and able to tackle only the most viral hoaxes." Does anyone else find this concerning? Even the smallest bias held by fact-checkers can dramatically skew things towards one side e.g. only "fact-check" articles that…
Trying to overcompensate for bias is how we got into this mess in the first place. Rather than picking a set of biases and viewpoints and presenting that, news orgs and silicon valley have decided that $thing_i_agree_with and $the_opposite_view deserve equal reach/airtime.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#39"On the issue of fake news, Facebook has held off on a total ban, instead limiting the spread of articles marked as false by vetted fact-checkers. However, that approach can leave fact-checkers overwhelmed and able to tackle only the most viral hoaxes." Does anyone else find this concerning? Even the smallest bias held by fact-checkers can dramatically skew things towards one side e.g. only "fact-check" articles that…
Yes I think the cons of this outweigh the pros. Ultimately, people will stop getting their information on FB if it becomes too obvious it is being skewed unfairly.
Re: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections
#40I really don't think you should remove information (or even be able to sue someone, except for defamation) for it being false, because it gives people the false impression that if information is printed or allowed on Facebook that it's probably accurate. We need to give everyone the impression that whatever they read might be false, because it actually might be false. Maybe that will make people think critically about what they read.