Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#11

Post by JumpCrisscross » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:46 AM UTC

sgdesign wrote: post #7

One thing I still don’t quite understand is how a system like this one can develop when the people developing it almost certainly are completely opposed to these ideas on a personal political level. I almost feel like it was an excess of idealism and belief in “the free market of ideas” -as well as the idea that Facebook should remain a neutral party at all cost- that led to overcompensating in the wrong direction, a…

> how a system like this one can develop when the people developing it almost certainly are completely opposed to these ideas on a personal political level

Facebook pays well.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#12

Post by JumpCrisscross » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:47 AM UTC

cryptica wrote: post #5

Facebook needs to be nationalized and regulated as a public utility. It's outrageous that this hasn't already happened. How much more election meddling do they need to get away with before everyone understands that this is necessary? At this stage, all remaining Facebook investors are deeply immoral individuals. All the reasonable moral individuals have already cashed out. The government should just screw over the re…

> Facebook needs to be nationalized and regulated as a public utility

It is outrageous that the history and effects of arbitrary nationalisation is so uncommonly understood.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#13

Post by Dansvidania » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:48 AM UTC

People spread misinformation on Facebook. Arguably, it's not Facebook's responsibility to fact-check anything.

Facebook is not a publishing house (at least not the Facebook social media platform as such) and mandating that they fact check and curate their ads and content is tricky business. It requires a legal definition of truth, which is a matter complex enough to justify the existence of the whole judiciary system.

Expecting that a condensation of such a system be applied to the publishing of information on any platform is wishful thinking at best.

Edit: Corrected typos

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#14

Post by albertTJames » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:49 AM UTC

Mercer/Bannon/Trump and co. are super spreaders of misinformation. They happen to also use facebook, but I dont remember any issues of "fake news" in elections pre-2016/brexit. So no, its not inherent to the platform, only to the bad actors on it.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#15

Post by unmdplyr » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:50 AM UTC

im3w1l wrote: post #6

arkitaip wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The algorithm is designed to propagate misinformation like crazy because that's what drives engagement and improves Facebook's metrics.

Come on, you know it's not true that it's designed to propagate misinformation. The algorithm can't even tell whether it's misinformation or not.

I think it's possible. I know for certain there are techniques to identify "click-baity" text snippets. My partner is currently working on a data model now and she has already had some reasonable success. Imagine what a company that hires several 10s or even 100s of data scientists can achieve?

From there on, it's just a matter of highlighting these successful matches constantly in your feeds.

I wouldn't put it past that.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#16

Post by ElectronShak » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:50 AM UTC

arkitaip wrote: post #4

unmdplyr wrote: post #2

> When a Utah county accidentally sent out 13,000 absentee ballots without a signature line, the NewsGuard Red-rated site LawEnforcementToday.com called this a "cheat-by-mail scheme." This isn't a Facebook problem as such. It's just sensationalistic journalism. Just that Facebook as a platform helps amplfiy it. Just my 2 cents.

The algorithm is designed to propagate misinformation like crazy because that's what drives engagement and improves Facebook's metrics.

More accurately, algorithm simply responds to initial user engagement on the article. It is not designed to "propagate misinformation".

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#17

Post by SideburnsOfDoom » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:51 AM UTC

Dansvidania wrote: post #13

People spread misinformation on Facebook. Arguably, it's not Facebook's responsibility to fact-check anything. Facebook is not a publishing house (at least not the Facebook social media platform as such) and mandating that they fact check and curate their ads and content is tricky business. It requires a legal definition of truth, which is a matter complex enough to justify the existence of the whole judiciary system…

> People spread misinformation on Facebook.

That is misinformation. Most of it is pushed by Facebook's paying customers, not the users.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#18

Post by throwaway7281 » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:51 AM UTC

harwoodleon wrote: post #9

It’s baked into the business model. Attention is the main material of the business, however it is gotten. It can’t change. Facebook couldn’t afford for it to change.

That's the money line. Easy to understand, if you understand it.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#19

Post by JumpCrisscross » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:52 AM UTC

im3w1l wrote: post #6

arkitaip wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The algorithm is designed to propagate misinformation like crazy because that's what drives engagement and improves Facebook's metrics.

Come on, you know it's not true that it's designed to propagate misinformation. The algorithm can't even tell whether it's misinformation or not.

> it's not true that it's designed to propagate misinformation

That was hyperbole on OP’s part.

The algorithm is designed to incentivise the creation and dissemination of attention-grabbing content without considering truthfulness. That simply and directly incentivises misinformation propagation. The fact that politically-disinterested troll groups routinely get incentivised to produce misinformation for clicks is Exhibit A to how deeply Facebook promotes these mechanisms.

Facebook and its employees turn a blind eye to these second-order effects because they are massively profitable. That’s as close to “designed to” as one can get without literally coding for it.

Re: Facebook Is a 'Super Spreader' of Election Misinformation

#20

Post by JumpCrisscross » Fri, Oct 30, 2020, 9:54 AM UTC

Dansvidania wrote: post #13

People spread misinformation on Facebook. Arguably, it's not Facebook's responsibility to fact-check anything. Facebook is not a publishing house (at least not the Facebook social media platform as such) and mandating that they fact check and curate their ads and content is tricky business. It requires a legal definition of truth, which is a matter complex enough to justify the existence of the whole judiciary system…

> Facebook is not a publishing house

Social media is a sufficiently different form of media that it will require its own form of regulation. Pointing to the publisher-editor delineation is anachronistic. Publishers never had the reach, insidiousness and information velocity that Facebook does.