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Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

wsj.com

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Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#491

Post by hirako2000 »

corobo wrote: post #144
lapetitejort wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question: have you tried writing first? I communicate with a few people via email every few months. It might start with a forwarded email, or just a quick how-do-you-do, then it deepens into long multi-paragraph replies over the course of days. Being able to sit down to write and rewrite what's been going on without someone watching the little typing bubble means I can get more in-depth with how I've been feel…

I would feel kinda silly asking for someone's email address over a chat messenger, but you are correct there's no attempt my side either. "nobody would go for it" is an assumption on my part I'll make a point to give it a go :)

Let us know how it goes. Our limbic system is more accurate than our perception abilities.

The issue with email is partly a slight inconvenience. Unless you input large content, the UX time overhead is significant enough to prefer IM. EMails has not been designed for frequent back and forth on the same thread even if occasional. From there you loose most people. Email hasn't changed much, from the time we barely had Internet connections, the burden to find a connected client was enough to forgive the UX issue.

Enter email address, autocomplete, type text, click send is enough a deterent for most of us to favor a chat window, type and press enter. And scroll up to see what was communicated prior. Got an image or audio? Drop it in, press enter. You can even record a quick audio message and boom, sent. Email client and protocol simply don't support that. At best you get addons which aren't necessarily supported on the other side.

Openness is the solution, but email protocol doesn't have what is needed for current needs of communication. Corporates building these tools now have the network effect, keeping the crowd in their walled gardens.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#492

Post by hirako2000 »

EamonnMR wrote: post #426
brodouevencode wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It did, but did it ever _have_ to be?

If you where sent into the year 2000 with a mission to prevent the adoption of social media and instead maintain Email's dominance, what would you do?

Build an open messaging protocol and decent clients. Oh wait, some did exactly that.

The problem sadly isn't tech related. It's education. Corporates will market to the masses who are mostly tech ignorant, if not politically and economically ignorant too. So even with alternatives, the power of commercial communication is greater than what non profit are able to afford.

We will have to wait for people to suffer further and further, more will open their eyes to it, until radical resistance settles in people's limbic systems. We are getting close I think, I hope.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#493

Post by hirako2000 »

adolph wrote: post #107
hirako2000 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Precisely. I think it is because the community of squirrels have no ability to retaliate. If we observe the trend, the pull down are proportionate to the strength of the retaliators. Being against say LGBT isn't the same as being anti christian. Hit a particular group of people or ideology, the bans are well automated at this point.

> the community of squirrels have no ability to retaliate Tell that to my garden. (I don't condone messing with wildlife in any way. However, I would like my arugula to grow up not behind bars.)

They can't retaliate against social media platforms. And as to your garden, they aren't retaliating, they simply explore the commons to continue on life. Theirs and also contribute to a well balanced ecosystem for life as a whole to continue.

You are in your right to scare them off, of somewhat fence your goods to keep them at bay. Torturing those animals, or any animal for that matter does nothing to controlling their damage to your previous fruits of labor. Keeping them away is the best investment of time and effort if you don't see their value.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#494

Post by lavabiopsy »

lmm wrote: post #486
lavabiopsy wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you know how to build a bug-free system with content classification rules that are properly implemented for 2 billion people in every conceivable circumstance, I think Facebook (or any other big social media company) would pay you a lot of money to implement that. Like, an unbelievably large sum of money.

That's beside the point. If your classification system isn't good enough to use on celebrities, it's not good enough to use on regular people either - bans are just as annoying for them, even if they have less voice to complain.

I'm not sure what the point here is other than that bans are annoying? Also, I don't think it was suggested to use a classification system with no bans?

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#495

Post by lmm »

lavabiopsy wrote: post #494
lmm wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's beside the point. If your classification system isn't good enough to use on celebrities, it's not good enough to use on regular people either - bans are just as annoying for them, even if they have less voice to complain.

I'm not sure what the point here is other than that bans are annoying? Also, I don't think it was suggested to use a classification system with no bans?

People aren't objecting to the fact that the rules misclassify people sometimes. They're objecting to the two-tier system that lets celebrities avoid bans but doesn't let regular users do so.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#496

Post by otterley »

lavabiopsy wrote: post #473
otterley wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The content should be evaluated according to the same set of the rules that apply to everyone else. If the content classification rules are properly implemented, no amount of button-smashing should result in a different outcome.

If you know how to build a bug-free system with content classification rules that are properly implemented for 2 billion people in every conceivable circumstance, I think Facebook (or any other big social media company) would pay you a lot of money to implement that. Like, an unbelievably large sum of money.

I’m not sure that this is a problem that can be solved solely through software and automation. It’s a business problem. Automation is a means to solve this problem - and the one Facebook uses to save money and operate at scale - but when it comes to making content judgments, people are often better than machines at doing it. “Report” buttons can be an input into the mechanism, but they need not be authoritative.

The problem for Facebook is that adding people is going to be expensive and hurt their bottom line. So they are likely incented to treat these disparities as collateral damage on the road to ever-increasing profits.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#497

Post by lavabiopsy »

lmm wrote: post #495
lavabiopsy wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure what the point here is other than that bans are annoying? Also, I don't think it was suggested to use a classification system with no bans?

People aren't objecting to the fact that the rules misclassify people sometimes. They're objecting to the two-tier system that lets celebrities avoid bans but doesn't let regular users do so.

I think you may have missed something in the post chain? Those are both the same thing in this context.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#498

Post by lavabiopsy »

otterley wrote: post #496
lavabiopsy wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you know how to build a bug-free system with content classification rules that are properly implemented for 2 billion people in every conceivable circumstance, I think Facebook (or any other big social media company) would pay you a lot of money to implement that. Like, an unbelievably large sum of money.

I’m not sure that this is a problem that can be solved solely through software and automation. It’s a business problem. Automation is a means to solve this problem - and the one Facebook uses to save money and operate at scale - but when it comes to making content judgments, people are often better than machines at doing it. “Report” buttons can be an input into the mechanism, but they need not be authoritative. The…

So are you saying you could develop the solution but Facebook won't offer you enough? I don't think it makes a difference whether the system is automated or not.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#499

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

bo1024 wrote: post #433
helen___keller wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It calls up a torrent of hate speech and misinformation with the right hand while trying to clumsily moderate with the left. Not a Facebook employee (or supporter for that matter), but I'm curious if you consider this an issue of Facebook or of social media in general. Not saying it's OK for FB because everyone does it, but you generally see the same dynamic of the "torrent of hate speech and misinformation" on Twi…

Yeah, I generally agree with you. Youtube and Twitter have the same issues, and I think Reddit too. (Does TikTok?) I don't know if the extent is as broad. Or how possible it is to use each platform for its purpose without running into those problems. added: I remember when Facebook switched from showing a chronological timeline to "the algorithm". That turned out to be a monumental paradigm shift.

> (Does TikTok?)

Not yet, but give them time :)

More generally, social media may be an amplification of crazy people, but it doesn't create the crazy people (pick the side you don't agree with for a definition I guess).

Like, all of this stuff is sortof vaguely like what happened when the printing press got invented, and when literacy became more widespread. It's people, rather than technology, driving these changes.

Re: Facebook has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules

#500

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

bo1024 wrote: post #433
helen___keller wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It calls up a torrent of hate speech and misinformation with the right hand while trying to clumsily moderate with the left. Not a Facebook employee (or supporter for that matter), but I'm curious if you consider this an issue of Facebook or of social media in general. Not saying it's OK for FB because everyone does it, but you generally see the same dynamic of the "torrent of hate speech and misinformation" on Twi…

Yeah, I generally agree with you. Youtube and Twitter have the same issues, and I think Reddit too. (Does TikTok?) I don't know if the extent is as broad. Or how possible it is to use each platform for its purpose without running into those problems. added: I remember when Facebook switched from showing a chronological timeline to "the algorithm". That turned out to be a monumental paradigm shift.

> added: I remember when Facebook switched from showing a chronological timeline to "the algorithm". That turned out to be a monumental paradigm shift.

So, assume that 10% of your friends are responsible for 90% of the content. Is it really a better experience to see all of their content in your feed rather than some of their content plus some other people?

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