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

Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

business-review.eu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 381 posts

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#191

Post by _xgw »

CaptSpify wrote: post #185
foobaw wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is valid but what can Facebook do? What steps should the company take to ensure this doesn't happen? Do they have the capability to fix the status quo? Is there an algorithm that can prevent this from happening? We don't know if this is an issue stemmed from lacking reviewers.

They could quite easily just stop filtering news and give the users the tools to filter things for themselves.

Could ordering posts by "most recent" first by default be a part of the solution?

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#192

Post by rdtsc »

cdubzzz wrote: post #38
simlevesque wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent was clearly refering to the early 2017 protests, not those of 1989. It's as if you did not read one of his paragraphs, the one just before what you quoted.

OP said: “Nobody forgot that. (the 1989 protest)”. Thus the implication seems quite clear - rise up and murder a leader if you want to be heard (then and now).

> Thus the implication seems quite clear - rise up and murder a leader if you want to be heard (then and now).

(OP here). The other implication is use the rules of the system first. Yeah the system is rigged, there are lobbyists and special interests, and propaganda at work. But that is preferable to violence in the streets.

> rise up and murder a leader if you want to be heard (then and now).

The point about the violence is that large protests as an effective tool to make the government listen or do anything are not effective in US, but are effective in Romania, for example, and the reason is that there is a collective memory of relatively recent past of what had happened there.

Another point is that the threat of violence has to be implied or imminent. There might be another way to create that belief than killing a leader.

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#193

Post by Steeeve »

I see a lot of anti-facebook sentiment here as if they are some sort of evil censor that prevents people from communicating.

On the contrary, all facebook does is connect people.

What we're seeing here is the result of rising political influence on social media. Every major website is being abused by governments because that's how you get your 'message' (i.e. propoganda) across. Like the major sites of yesterday figuring out how to deal with astroturfing, the major sites of today are figuring it out too. The real problem is that there is no solution yet. For all we know, facebook is correctly dealing with this and this post and article are propoganda.

If a communication mechanism is unavailable during anything major, the logical thing to do is to use a fallback method of communication. If facebook won't let you post video, upload it somewhere else and post a link. How hard is that to figure out?

The INTERNET is an INTERCONNECTED NETWORK of computers. There are free services all over the place. If you can't use one, use a different one. That's how this works.

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#194

Post by rdtsc »

chimen wrote: post #188
rdtsc wrote: post #5

I was joking before and said that it is inevitable that Facebook, Google and Twitter will eventually sell SaaS (Silencing as a Service). But maybe it wasn't a joke after all... It is simply too tempting to not do it. They have information which the Stasis and KGBs of the past would kill for. One thing Romanian government should be careful with is not listening to protesters. That is at least one country where they ha…

> That is at least one country where they have learned to not piss off the people. In 1989 they rose up, caught and killed their corrupt dictator. All in the matter of days. Sorry buddy but Ceausescu was not killed by the people. His trial was a disgrace, was rushed, staged and was brutal by any democratic standard. Ceausescu was killed by those that were already working under his direct command at that time (here's…

> Sorry buddy but Ceausescu was not killed by the people.

Yeah people on the street didn't get to fire at him and his wife, someone else who already had some authority did. There was nothing democratic about it, but there was also not much protesting and rioting following it. People in large supported the capture and execution, no?

Do you feel that if there was a prolonged trial that it would have been a fair trial and it would have somehow ended up better for the country? I am asking honestly as an outsider, I don't know much about it.

> That's more than a month of protests (18 Jan - 26 Feb).

Sorry, I was going by the NYT article which I linked to which said " After five straight days of spirited mass protests..."

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#195

Post by mherdeg »

flexie wrote: post #26

I chose to believe that this is a side-effect of facebook trying to combat fake news with some lame algorithms and an understaffed department of reviewers, not facebook actively trying to please the Romanian authorities. But even so, this shows how utterly unprepared facebook is for its role as a de facto news business. A bunch of engineers thinking they are smarter than they actually are unwillingly facilitate the e…

Huh. Could you elaborate more on the relationship between Facebook editorial policy and the plight of the Rohingya?

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#196

Post by rdtsc »

praneshp wrote: post #92
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d love for those downvoting you to join in on the debate. I’m less familiar with Ghandi but what you say about Malcom X and MLK is consistent with what I know about the situation.

I downvoted your parent comment for misspelling Gandhi[0] (as Ghandi, which they corrected now, well after my comment, without calling it out); doesn't go well with the confident assertion about why the British left India. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahatma_Gandhi

> I downvoted your parent comment for misspelling Gandhi[0]

That's not a valid reason to downvote, unless you're sure they did it purpose as an insult. You could have just pointed out the error.

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#197

Post by taurath »

andrepd wrote: post #179
bad_user wrote: post #64

I'm a Romanian and I can confirm that posts and accounts have been blocked, probably because of being reported by the other side. On the other hand, folks, this is a little reminder that censorship is a doubly edged knife ;-) So next time you call for censoring "fake news", think again, because it's not you who will benefit from it. A couple of years back I was enthusiastic about the rise of social media for informin…

>A couple of years back I was enthusiastic about the rise of social media for informing and coordinating citizens to fight injustice. Now that I'm older and wiser, I can tell you that no evolution or revolution can happen because of Facebook, only regression. Facebook is poison. I'll add to that. The internet is a great tool for coordinating citizens, spreading information, and fighting injustice. Having facebook , o…

The internet just increases the amount of information flow - what one does with it reflects whatever their values are.

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#198

Post by chimen »

rdtsc wrote: post #194
chimen wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is at least one country where they have learned to not piss off the people. In 1989 they rose up, caught and killed their corrupt dictator. All in the matter of days. Sorry buddy but Ceausescu was not killed by the people. His trial was a disgrace, was rushed, staged and was brutal by any democratic standard. Ceausescu was killed by those that were already working under his direct command at that time (here's…

> Sorry buddy but Ceausescu was not killed by the people. Yeah people on the street didn't get to fire at him and his wife, someone else who already had some authority did. There was nothing democratic about it, but there was also not much protesting and rioting following it. People in large supported the capture and execution, no? Do you feel that if there was a prolonged trial that it would have been a fair trial a…

Well, I'm not talking about the people on the street. It was too short and too quick. At a longer trial the whole truth could have emerged and that was something they tried to avoid.

> People in large supported the capture and execution, no?

Yeah they did, with the information they had at that time - mainly the nation television which was also seized and controlled by this mafia that is still in power today.

You cannot kill people because it's a popular demand. I don't regret those days at all, I'm just saying - the general population was fouled into believing all sorts of crazy stuff that weren't true.

In short no, the people didn't ask for Ceausescu to be killed. It just "happened". After a longer trial he would have been killed probably...who knows.

> there was also not much protesting and rioting following it

There wasn't, the "terrorists" threat lasted even after they were executed. We were afraid to go on the streets during this time. People had other things to worry about.

No protests were made regarding the killings of the Ceausescu's but, in 1990, people started a new riot against the new "faces" that were trying to put themselves in power. It was called the mineriada: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_1990_Mineriad

This is what happened to those who tried to protest against the new government at that time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xNiGSE0ybQ

There's a big article (the only interview given by his son Nicu) in which he explains how everything took place and how the population were led to believe there's terrorists killing people: https://www.historia.ro/sectiune/general/articol/singurul-in...

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#199

Post by hrasyid »

mkempe wrote: post #187
bad_user wrote: post #64

I'm a Romanian and I can confirm that posts and accounts have been blocked, probably because of being reported by the other side. On the other hand, folks, this is a little reminder that censorship is a doubly edged knife ;-) So next time you call for censoring "fake news", think again, because it's not you who will benefit from it. A couple of years back I was enthusiastic about the rise of social media for informin…

For now you may think facebook merely facilitates regression. Eventually we'll see them enable repression. The gap is narrow, when one decides to manipulate people by manipulating the news feed they see as well as selling screen space in that "news feed". Here is an example of the unfortunate side effects of manipulation: One month ago a dear friend of mine posted an obit for her mother. Facebook did not include it i…

I don't understand, how is missing your friend's post related to enabling repression?

Re: Facebook users in Romania see content related to street protests reviewed

#200

Post by mkempe »

hrasyid wrote: post #199
mkempe wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For now you may think facebook merely facilitates regression. Eventually we'll see them enable repression. The gap is narrow, when one decides to manipulate people by manipulating the news feed they see as well as selling screen space in that "news feed". Here is an example of the unfortunate side effects of manipulation: One month ago a dear friend of mine posted an obit for her mother. Facebook did not include it i…

I don't understand, how is missing your friend's post related to enabling repression?

It's an example of manipulation. Facebook removed an important item from my "news feed."
Post reply on HN