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Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

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Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#141

Post by turndown »

nemetroid wrote: post #132
turndown wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The radio station mentioned was the inciting element in a genocide. Surely it does not take a large amount of analysis to understand that the underlying mechanism, dissemminating lies or propoganda on a widely used, easily accessed medium, applies directly to OP...

The link is just an example of how some speech is bad. The point of the original comment was that badness should be determined by laws, and not by the moderation policies of private companies. I don’t see how the linked article forms an argument for or against that position.

The link provides a clear example of where this policy fails: false statements about the Tutsi & other ethnic groups lead to a genocide. None of this was illegal within the definition of free speech in Rwanda - as far as I am aware - thus providing an example where only moderating content on its basis of legality fails.

As a cherry on top, the link also mentions that the radio station was actually endorsed by the government and provided equipment to them. Should the law be the best basis for moderation when the morality of those writing the laws cannot be spoken for?

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#142

Post by [deleted] »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #80
greatwhitenorth wrote: post #41

Unless something is illegal, Facebook or any website should allow the content. There will always be people who don't like a person or a viewpoint. It's a slippery slope to start moderating content that is not illegal.

> It's a slippery slope to start moderating content that is not illegal. It's nothing of the sort. Moderation is critical, or it would degenerate into garbage. Dan does an excellent job on this site, for example.

[deleted]

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#143

Post by greatwhitenorth »

runarberg wrote: post #102
bagacrap wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't "slippery slope" considered a logical fallacy? Until fb deletes something and by doing so clearly causes harm to society, let's not assume that any-moderation-whatsoever is evil.

The Cambridge Analytica scandal already proved to be harmful for democracy. False (and illegally financed) advertising on facebook is also believed to have influenced the brexit election enough to swing the vote. The current (lack of/bad) moderation is already causing harm to society.

There is no scandal if you read Boz's (FB's VP) post on Cambridge Analytica. Of course, very few people are going to believe it since it came from Facebook itself. It's mainstream media vs Facebook on who gets the eyeballs.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#144

Post by greatwhitenorth »

runarberg wrote: post #97
chrisco255 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how you moderate your feed on Facebook: if you don't like someone and what they have to say, unfriend them. Problem solved.

My personal feed is not the issue here. The issue is how reactionary material keeps popping up in the feed of people who are susceptible into rallying behind it. The target area is so vast the you are bound to influence a lot of people. And the nature of the material only belonging to personal feeds makes scrutinizing by third parties impossible. All of this culminates into a really dangerous propaganda machine, espe…

Assume that Facebook is based in Alabama and 90% of its employees are conservative Christians. The employees could think its criminally negligent to allow FB posts on abortion and LGBT. You think only you're right, they think only they're right.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#145

Post by greatwhitenorth »

edmundsauto wrote: post #134
runarberg wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most platforms do some kind of moderation, and when a platform is as pervasive as facebook, it becomes essential. We’ve already seen how a lack of moderation on facebook influenced the 2016 election. So it is not hard to argue that facebook’s negligence is already causing significant harm to our democracy.

I'm still not 100% clear on how the 2016 election was influenced on facebook. Both American parties say the Russians interfered in order to help the other side. Liberal FB employees are upset about Trump, while conservatives think they are being censored on the platform. Can you point me to any clear, neutral, unequivocal research that illustrates the effect, including impact? Did it swing the election to Trump, or t…

Read this post by the Facebook VP - https://www.facebook.com/boz/posts/10111288357877121

As much as I hate Trump, many people are salty that he won and want to put a blame on something. That's it.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#146

Post by runarberg »

foogazi wrote: post #127
runarberg wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal feed is not the issue here. The issue is how reactionary material keeps popping up in the feed of people who are susceptible into rallying behind it. The target area is so vast the you are bound to influence a lot of people. And the nature of the material only belonging to personal feeds makes scrutinizing by third parties impossible. All of this culminates into a really dangerous propaganda machine, espe…

> My personal feed is not the issue here. The issue is how reactionary material keeps popping up in the feed of people who are susceptible into rallying behind it. Wait, how do we know you are not susceptible to rallying behind the content in your feed? Has the content in your feed been approved? Only cat videos and family pictures?

Sorry, I should have been more accurate: “No single user’s personal feed is at issue here”.

Sure if everyone would magically know whom to block and what to ignore, then we wouldn’t have an issue. But that’s not the case here is it? If a large number of people get constant posts with reactionary content without any scrutiny or fact checks we wouldn’t know any better then to get behind it. That is kind of how propaganda works. And that is exactly what is going on in the personal feed of millions of facebook users.

All we’re asking is that facebook will lower prominence of false or hateful content, add fact checks with lying content and counter reactionary content with scrutiny. Facebook is being grossly negligent by allowing the current state to continue, and—given how pervasive the platform is—facebook is currently harmful for our democracy.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#147

Post by greatwhitenorth »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #80
greatwhitenorth wrote: post #41

Unless something is illegal, Facebook or any website should allow the content. There will always be people who don't like a person or a viewpoint. It's a slippery slope to start moderating content that is not illegal.

> It's a slippery slope to start moderating content that is not illegal. It's nothing of the sort. Moderation is critical, or it would degenerate into garbage. Dan does an excellent job on this site, for example.

Why would anyone allow spam in a website? It's nonsensical to assume I meant that.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#148

Post by chrisco255 »

Barrin92 wrote: post #89
chrisco255 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, same goes for books. You know how many people have been indoctrinated and persuaded by books? Let's burn those while we're at it.

People tend to bring this up as some sort of forceful counter-example, but the printing press contributed significantly to religious sectarianism in Europe, fuelling the religious wars of the 16th and 17th century which killed over a third of the German population. Books might not have been burned, but about 50.000 'witches' did. A rapid increase in the dissemination of information in systems that have no mechanism t…

Witch burning pre-dates the printing press. Might want to look up the 13th century some time. Didn't know there were any anti-printing press advocates left out there. I thought y'all died off during the Enlightenment? As far as sectarianism goes, the Catholic hegemony was never going to last forever. And Europe was plagued with sectarian violence for thousands of years. Free exchange of information is the one thing that eventually got them to come together.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#149

Post by runarberg »

greatwhitenorth wrote: post #144
runarberg wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal feed is not the issue here. The issue is how reactionary material keeps popping up in the feed of people who are susceptible into rallying behind it. The target area is so vast the you are bound to influence a lot of people. And the nature of the material only belonging to personal feeds makes scrutinizing by third parties impossible. All of this culminates into a really dangerous propaganda machine, espe…

Assume that Facebook is based in Alabama and 90% of its employees are conservative Christians. The employees could think its criminally negligent to allow FB posts on abortion and LGBT. You think only you're right, they think only they're right.

I see your point, but I don’t think its entirely accurate. First of all, LGBTQ+ rights are human rights, speaking against those is kind of sick and anyone does so is wrong and should be scrutinized. In a world where facebook doesn’t see that, then it is our duty to protest them and hopefully get them shut down for spreading hate speech.

But that is only a shallow—albeit correct—take. A deeper take is that you must consider the quality of the content and the pervasiveness of the lie its spreading. A anti abortion content that just states “I believe every fetus has the right to life” is not not as harmful as content that calls every person that has had an abortion a “murderer” or spreads some falsehoods about what the act of abortion entails. In this flip reality facebook would have the full right to add fact checks on content that would say something like: “There are no negative consequences to abortions”, or “If you think you are straight, you can fix that by calling...”.

Re: Zuckerberg: I just shared the following note with our employees

#150

Post by jkaplowitz »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #76
jkaplowitz wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of freedom of speech policies and preferences, including US criminal law, make exceptions for speech that is likely to incite imminent violence. Look up the "true threat" doctrine. I'm not surprised that HN sentiment has a similar exception.

People were also upset at FB for not censoring Trump's post about mail-in voting. What imminent violence was it about to cause?

I can't speak to that one. I wouldn't want that one censored.
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