Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#501

Post by sbarre » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:28 PM UTC

jimbob45 wrote: post #393

alittletooraph wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you but this is an incredibly hard problem to solve. How are you going to get your friend to engage with videos that are in direct opposition to her world views? Recommendations are based on what she actually clicks on, how long she actually watches the videos, etc. And from the business perspective, they're trying to reduce the likelihood that your friend abandons their platform and goes to another one…

It's easy to solve. FB gets to either be a platform for content or a curator for content. They can't be both because that would be a conflict of interest.

Then what's the business model? Who pays for all of it?

I'm not defending a specific approach or solution, but just pointing out that at this point, FB is a huge entrenched business that makes a lot of money on the status quo, and so convincing them to change "for the better" is barking up the wrong tree until "for the better" means "more profitable".

Splitting the platform and curation means the platform needs a revenue stream. If the curator pays the platform, then all you're doing is shifting the conflict up a notch, not solving it.

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#502

Post by donohoe » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:29 PM UTC

Do you work at Facebook? This is reprehensible.

  In essence, Facebook is under fire for making 
  the world more divided. Many of its own experts 
  appeared to agree—and to believe Facebook could 
  mitigate many of the problems. 
  The company chose not to.

Unless you are actively pushing to change it from the inside, you should leave now. Take a reasonable amount of time to find a new job and leave.

Otherwise you're complicit.

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#503

Post by monadic2 » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:31 PM UTC

munificent wrote: post #461

fpgaminer wrote: post #299

You know what the internet needs? User agents. We've got this idea stuck in our heads that only the website itself is allowed to curate content. Only Facebook gets to decide which Facebook posts to show us. What if, instead, you had a personal AI that read every Facebook post and then decided what to show you. Trained on your own preferences, under your control, with whatever settings you like. Instead of being tuned…

The fundamental flaw is this: The primary content no user wants to see any every user agent would filter out is ads . Since ads are the primary way sites stay in business, they are obligated to fight against user agents or other intermediary systems. The ultimate problem is that Facebook doesn't want to show you good, enriching content from your friends and family. They want to show you ads. The good content is just…

> Since ads are the primary way sites stay in business

Flaw? It seems that the point would be to force FB to transact with currency rather than a bait-and-switch tactic. The site would also be more usable if they were forced to change business model.

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#504

Post by tfandango » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:33 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #453

lmilcin wrote: post #98

The problem really is platforms that give people content to please them. An algorithm selects content that you are likely to agree with or that you have shown previous interest. This only causes people to get reinforced in their beliefs and this leads to polarization. For example, when I browse videos on Youtube I will only get democratic content (even though I am from Poland). Seems as soon as you click on couple en…

Sorry for the self-reference outside of a moderation context, but I wrote what turned into an entire essay about this last night: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23308098 . It's about how this plays out specifically on HN. Short version: it's because this place is less divisive that it feels more divisive. HN is probably the least divisive community of its size and scope on the internet (if there are others, I'd…

This is why I like HN. I am always challenged with different points of view on here, and in a non-argumentative way. It's just a rational discussion. Often I will see something on FB or Twitter that is outrageous to me (by design), but when I look it up on HN and find some discussion on the details, truth is often more sane than it seems...

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#505

Post by nickff » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:34 PM UTC

babesh wrote: post #492

nickff wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding of the MAX issues is that the issues were not really shortcuts, though they might look that way in hindsight (because every mistake looks that way in hindsight). From my non-aviation perspective, it looks like they basically pieced together a bunch of complex systems, with each team making a number of (different) assumptions about each system. The systems themselves were influenced by FAA requirement…

There is no FAA requirement to maintain the old certificate. Boeing and it’s customers wanted to do that for cost savings. It is supposedly costly in time and money to acquire a new rating but it has been done obviously. The airlines wanted a single pool of interchangeable pilots flying in name interchangeable planes (their existing 737s and the 737 MAX). Supposedly one of the airlines threatened to take new business…

Perhaps my previous post was vague, but I meant 'FAA requirements [of commonality, required to] maintain the current certificate'.

The FAA may be in the right or in the wrong, but it has made certifying new designs almost prohibitively expensive and time-consuming; for evidence of this, simply look at the Cessna 172 (still in production on a 60-year old certificate), and what happened when Bombardier tried to put a new airliner into production.

You're definitely right that the airlines wanted interchangeable type ratings for crew, but the issue slightly more complicated than you're painting it.

I never argued the old certificate forced the issues, the certification system just strongly incentivized 'upgrading' the 737. This was one of many causes.

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#506

Post by janekm » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:34 PM UTC

fpgaminer wrote: post #299

You know what the internet needs? User agents. We've got this idea stuck in our heads that only the website itself is allowed to curate content. Only Facebook gets to decide which Facebook posts to show us. What if, instead, you had a personal AI that read every Facebook post and then decided what to show you. Trained on your own preferences, under your control, with whatever settings you like. Instead of being tuned…

Sounds pretty similar to the concept of “software agents” which was popular in the mid ‘90s: http://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/people/michael.wooldridge/pubs/iee-re...

Part of the concept was that the agents would actually roam onto servers on the internet on your behalf raising complicated questions around how to sandbox the agent code (came in useful for VPSs and AWS-style lambdas in the end).

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#507

Post by pdonis » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:34 PM UTC

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #424

pdonis wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> unless you can get people to value trying to figure out what's true and updating on evidence itself What evidence could you give to disprove the belief that abortion is murder? The belief is not a claim about evidence; it's a claim about priorities, as the GP said. Or, if you like, about what actions count as belonging to what categories.

A more interesting question is why is abortion consistently used as a tribal issue in US politics. Of course there is an underlying difference of opinion, and of course it matters to those on both sides. But it matters because the media have done an exceptionally good job of herding people into different camps - by focusing on a small and standardised collection of divisive issues and amplifying the rhetoric around t…

> A more interesting question is why is abortion consistently used as a tribal issue in US politics.

I think a factor here is that the US pushes the boundaries of what it really takes to have a free country with a diverse population more than other countries do.

Other countries--or at least other developed countries--have a more homogeneous population than the US has, and also do not have the same tradition of skepticism about and distrust of government that the US has. Also other countries do not have quite the same Constitutional provision for the free exercise of religion that the US has.

A less homogeneous population means there is a wider range of traditions that people are brought up with. That creates a lack of common ground about a lot of things. For example, I'm not aware of any other developed country that has a significant population of young earth creationists.

A tradition of skepticism about and distrust of government means that people are less willing to accept a legal rule that conflicts with their personal convictions, and more willing to complain about it publicly (or indeed to take even more drastic action). Note that this applies to both sides of the abortion debate: to extreme pro-lifers who feel that any abortion at all is wrong, and to extreme pro-choicers who feel that any restriction on abortion at all is wrong. Current US law and jurisprudence is actually not close to either of those extremes, so both extremes have plenty of reason, in their view, to complain.

The Constitutional protection of free exercise of religion means that "personal convictions", if they are backed by a religious tradition, carry a lot more weight. This is most obvious in the US on the anti-abortion side of the debate.

> Does someone benefit from these divisions

I think someone taking political advantage of divisions within the population can happen in any country, but it might well be true that the US, for the reasons I described above, presents more opportunities for it to happen.

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#508

Post by monadic2 » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:34 PM UTC

arihant wrote: post #484

a1369209993 wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The primary content no user wants to see any every user agent would filter out is ads. Not that you're wrong, but: that's the fucking point ! Advertising delenda est.

Pay for Facebook then. 1.5% of total YouTube users subscribe for YT Premium. I love how the smartest minds will ignore the most primitive economics. Ads work. For everyone. Except deluded.

Compare how much money google can make off ads in a month to $15. You’re paying for way, way, way more than just removing ads and it’s obvious

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#509

Post by throwlaplace » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:34 PM UTC

knzhou wrote: post #457

The degree to which “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” is in effect here is remarkable. If Facebook literally removes anything, then HN is outraged because it’s censorship, paternalism, all that. But if Facebook does not adopt an actively paternalistic attitude where it shows people content that they deem is “good for them” , then that’s outrageous too. Both complaints predictably rocket to the top of HN. Which…

you know what i don't understand? how many people chafe at the idea that violent video games create violent people? when i was a kid that was the hot-button tech issue. no one puts any stock in that right? because it's an inversion of causality - violent people gravitate towards violent video games. and before video games we had parental advisory on rap albums. no one put any stock in that either. how is fb different? why isn't the onus on the consumer?

Re: Facebook executives shut down efforts to make the site less divisive

#510

Post by deegles » Tue, May 26, 2020, 9:35 PM UTC

tdhoot wrote: post #305

pkilgore wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine an average level of civility in a society `C`. Lets say users of your product, due to your product, operate at `0.5 C`. Is changing the product so they operate at a higher `0.75 C` or back to `C` "paternalistic"? Why? I can see the argument for moving `C` to `1.5 C` as paternalistic. But when you're already actively affecting `C` in one way, why do we moralize about moving it the other way? What makes down OK…

Paternalistic is thinking you are in a position to define C and measure it.

Refusing to measure something doesn't make it not exist.