Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

buzzfeednews.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 71 posts

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#21

Post by jdthedisciple »

adrianN wrote: post #14
lmm wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have judges and legal systems because we need to resolve disputes. But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

The problem fact checkers are trying to solve is that most people don't have the resources to do the fact checking themselves, so that malicious actors can sway public opinion with wrong or misleading information. That is extremely dangerous in democracies.

You don't solve the problem, you just defer it to the fact-checkers. Who fact-checks the fact-checkers and ensures they are not themselves used to sway public opinion?

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#22

Post by jdthedisciple »

Hermitian909 wrote: post #18
jdthedisciple wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To use that logic, we should also not have judges or a legal system Nobody wants or needs the media - even less social media - as proxy-judges of the information. Everbody just wants the information and judge it for themselves. That is because most of the time, fact-control becomes opinion-control and we see exactly this happening just before our eyes. Thus people on either side of the political spectrum will suppo…

> Everbody just wants the information and judge it for themselves People may say they want this, but manifestly do not. There is too much information. To illustrate: many people I know cared a great deal about whether the country was lied to about WMDs when we went to Iraq. As far as I know, zero of them have read the report by the Senate Intelligence Committee[0] but all were very glad to have the report summarized…

> That act of summarizing, of picking out which information is and is not important, is itself an act of journalism.

Exactly, I'm totally with you. That is the essence of journalism I would even say. But that is where the job of the journalist ends, no sprinkling in of their own presuppositions.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#23

Post by reilly3000 »

teddyh wrote: post #13

Any “fact-checker” which is mandatory, is a censor in all but name.

Facebook created the censorship, fact checkers merely research claims and publish their analysis. Never before Facebook did a fact checker have any bearing on content distribution outside of their own news organization.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#24

Post by lmm »

adrianN wrote: post #14
lmm wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have judges and legal systems because we need to resolve disputes. But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

The problem fact checkers are trying to solve is that most people don't have the resources to do the fact checking themselves, so that malicious actors can sway public opinion with wrong or misleading information. That is extremely dangerous in democracies.

Right, but fact checkers can't help with that problem unless there's some countermeasure that prevents the fact checkers themselves from being malicious actors. (I don't think many fact checkers are malicious in the sense of being cacklingly evil, but they are usually highly partisan, which ends up having much the same effect). And if you do have such a measure, it would probably be more effective to apply it directly to the news sources themselves rather than to the fact checkers.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#25

Post by josefx »

lmm wrote: post #12
smt88 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difficulty of objective fact-checking doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. To use that logic, we should also not have judges or a legal system. Most people would agree an imperfect attempt with lots of transparency is better than no attempt at all. The first thing you learn in journalism is that you can't be 100% objective, even if you're 100% truthful. Let's say you're reporting on Obama's birth certificate, and you…

We have judges and legal systems because we need to resolve disputes. But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

> Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

Not sure I would trust high end newspapers either, in Germany we had a small scandal with Claas Relotius who received over a dozen awards for outstanding journalism. Most of his articles where more fiction than fact. The newspapers publishing his articles outright ignored any complaints by his victims and even the papers claiming to have "world class" fact checkers didn't bother to review the output of high profile authors. It seems that to journalists anything is fine as long as it captures the attention of their target audience.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#27

Post by angelzen »

We live in an information oversupply era. Refuting information is just as important as creating information was in older eras. Unfortunately funding comes primarily from political operations. The incentives are aligned to refute one side of the aisle, while leaving the other side propagating cockamamie bullshit unchecked. The end result is cockamamie bullshit. 'Fact checking' or not, the morass will deepen.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#28

Post by ajkjk »

teddyh wrote: post #13

Any “fact-checker” which is mandatory, is a censor in all but name.

Certainly not. Censorship is suppressing views. Fact-checking is identifying false information. They are only the same if you are only putting out false information. Then the fact-checking looks like censorship.

You will say, well, the fact-checkers tend to get political. Nevertheless, they're still fundamentally different than censors.

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#29

Post by MrPatan »

adrianN wrote: post #14
lmm wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have judges and legal systems because we need to resolve disputes. But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

The problem fact checkers are trying to solve is that most people don't have the resources to do the fact checking themselves, so that malicious actors can sway public opinion with wrong or misleading information. That is extremely dangerous in democracies.

Wouldn't it be extremely dangerous to democracy if malicious actors were to take over fact-checkers? How would you know they already haven't?

Re: I Was a Facebook Fact-Checker (2019)

#30

Post by lmm »

smt88 wrote: post #16
lmm wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have judges and legal systems because we need to resolve disputes. But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites.

> But what is the problem that fact-checkers exist to solve? Their brief is essentially the same as any other journalist, and I've generally found that the high end of newspapers/magazines are more credible than the majority of fact-checking sites. First, fact-checkers don't just publish fact-checks. They also work behind the scenes at the "high end" newspapers that you mention. Second, websites like Snopes originall…

> Also, sometimes there just isn't a story to a fact-check. The reader just wants to see a check of all the facts in a political speech or a debate. A series of 100 bullet points is not a compelling article, but it might be a perfectly fine fact-check.

Why? What's the difference? Analysis of a political speech or debate is definitely the kind of thing I expect from newspapers or equivalent, and it's not like changing the name makes it easier to read.

Post reply on HN