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Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

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Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#281

Post by jrockway »

lallysingh wrote: post #164
the-pigeon wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would take this a step further and say that all social media recommendation algorithms should be publicly reviewable. The claim is that this algorithms are neutral. But we know many contain ways for the owner to artificially boost preferred content. And algorithms tend to have the biases of their creators in them. Controlling what people see is an important power and one that should be regulated.

I don't see how this will help. FB et. al. work by shoehorning complex nuances into intentionally crude metrics like "engagement.". If they show the engagement-focused algorithm, that shows they're "just trying to engage users." What would the algorithm show that isn't already apparent?

Most people that want to see the algorithm want that knowledge to use it for their own ends. They are forgetting about the second-order effects where literally everyone will also be doing that, and then they are gaming each other instead of "The Algorithm".

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#282

Post by toss1 »

timdev2 wrote: post #198
toss1 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nonsense Carriers do not have any staff monitoring the content being posted, nevermind the largest such staff in the world Carriers do not have algorithms seeking out what content on what phone call creates the most 'engagement' (which is probably inversely correlated with truth value) and then actively interrupting your other calls to pushing that content into your stream. Again, nevermind that FB has the largest su…

Doesn't that basically round to "outlaw social media"?

I don't see how (although I might not object to some values of your quote).

It seems a straightforward choice:

1) Go forward as a Carrier and delete ALL features with a hint of editing, promotion, or recommendation, i.e., a simple straight chronological feed of other members' posts/feed specifically selected by each user, and maybe a search function.

2) Go forward as a Publisher and select, edit, recommend, promote, annotate etc. as much as they want.

With Option-1 they can avoid all responsibility for content, merely doing takedowns on items for which they get notices. With Option-2, they have the same responsibility of any publisher for their content (e.g., newspapers are still responsible for the 'Letters to The Editor' that they choose to publish, and I'm sure edit out profanities, etc.)

I expect that users would actually strongly prefer Option-1, although actual "engagement" numbers could decline, it might actually be a better advert platform.

It also seems that viral content would still exist, but be more 'natural', i.e., not enhanced by algorithms, since you Alan could see something from Bob and repost it, which would be seen by Chris, who is subscribed to Alan but not Bob, and Chris could repost it to be seen by Debbie, who subscribes to neither Alan nor Bob...

So, I'm curious how you see that this would this kill/outlaw social media?

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#284

Post by testernews »

cududa wrote: post #266
snowwrestler wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook is removing content because that is ground they want to stand on. Removing content feels like censorship, so it lends itself to political grandstanding in their favor. Millions of people get upset and demand that Facebook handle all content neutrally, which is exactly what Facebook wanted everyone to think in the first place. The real issue with Facebook is the editorial decisions they make about promoting s…

I’m sorry but my profession is vaccine hesitancy and persuasion researcher and OP is just wrong. I have n=20,000 polls showing people get disinformation from Facebook that informs their decision to not get vaccinated and hours of focus group recordings also showing this.

You forgot your /s there bud

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#285

Post by gccs »

908B64B197 wrote: post #193
ravenstine wrote: post #117

I actually verified this yesterday on my own FB acount. https://imgur.com/a/5tgkbFL Not sure if it's still happening, but you can test it if you make the post visible to only you and you wait ~5 minutes for that misinformation message to show up. Even if the fact checker had some kind of point, I don't know how labeling an authoritative source as "false information" helps anyone understand anything just because part…

I don't get why they can't add a regex to ok *.gov$ websites. > Nevertheless, the level of carelessness upon which this mechanism seems to have been built upon is an embarrassment. Same mechanism would flag and ban folks who argued that the lab leak hypothesis was a possibility and was worth investigating... Interesting how the media changed their narrative on this one.

1.USA.gov used to be a blind bitly redirect service. It would redirect any bitly URL.

Example: 1.usa.gov/abc would redirct to the same place as bit.ly/abc

With no authorization or whitelist or anything.

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#286

Post by tasogare »

cududa wrote: post #266
snowwrestler wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook is removing content because that is ground they want to stand on. Removing content feels like censorship, so it lends itself to political grandstanding in their favor. Millions of people get upset and demand that Facebook handle all content neutrally, which is exactly what Facebook wanted everyone to think in the first place. The real issue with Facebook is the editorial decisions they make about promoting s…

I’m sorry but my profession is vaccine hesitancy and persuasion researcher and OP is just wrong. I have n=20,000 polls showing people get disinformation from Facebook that informs their decision to not get vaccinated and hours of focus group recordings also showing this.

> my profession is vaccine hesitancy and persuasion researcher

Can't get if this is sarcasm or not. If true, it's scary how fast micro-fields are created and funded once there is a political purpose behind it, so that policies can be rubber-stamped as science. If false, nice troll.

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#287

Post by raisedbyninjas »

crocodiletears wrote: post #235
jdavis703 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we sure government websites won’t contain misinformation? For example, senior government leadership was advising the consumption of bleach as a COVID-19 cure.

Iirc, he was asking a CDC official whether the application of a disinfectant to infected lungs had been investigated. A stupid idea on its face, but at no point did he recommend the consumption of bleach as a cure or a treatment for covid.

Rather than trying to tease out the explicit meaning or jokes or subtext, we could just consider the rise of bleach ingestion at the time. Responsible people with a platform speak responsibly.

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#288

Post by _-david-_ »

jtbayly wrote: post #234
_-david-_ wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>assuming we didn't test for flu at a lesser rate. Do we have any numbers on this? I would imagine a lot of people who went to the doctor or whoever complaining of flu like symptoms would have been tested for covid.

Yes. We have figures for it. In 2017-18, there were 1.21M flu tests over the course of 33 weeks. In 2020-21 there were 1.11M flu tests over 33 weeks. Results: Essentially a 0% positive test rate vs a peak of over 25%. A peak of about 125 cases vs 20,000 cases. 1: https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/54973 2: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/weeklyarchives2020-2021/data/...

Any chance you know about 18-19 and 19-20 as well?

Re: Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”

#289

Post by kevinmgranger »

_-david-_ wrote: post #126
svaha1728 wrote: post #114

Text classification with Transformers is hard. Humans are expensive. My guess is also that the link got flagged because of who shared it, but that's just a guess.

Information can be accurate or fake based on who said it?

The context of a page can provide misleading implications. But "False / Fake" isn't the word I'd use for that, to be fair.
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