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Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#201

Post by efsavage »

amelius wrote: post #180
untog wrote: post #35

I very much hope this isn't just words. The core problem, IMO, is that content that makes us angry, anxious or jealous is a much better driver of clicks than content that makes us happy. I'm sure Facebook knows this. If they really mean it, they'll accept that they will make less money as a result of this change. It would be the right decision in the long term, but the short term will hurt.

> content that makes us angry, anxious or jealous is a much better driver of clicks than content that makes us happy Especially considering there's only a "like" button and not a "dislike" button. It's frustrating!

There are more options now, including angry and sad reactions.

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#202

Post by dbuder »

jp555 wrote: post #195
xefer wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people are aware that the list of interests directing Facebook ads are easily visible and editable? Settings | Ads | Your Interests It's really interesting to see the full scope of the interests FB has gathered over time. Some of them are pretty hilarious. They have a seemingly huge ontology of every subject you could think of. If you methodically go through an remove every interest, the ads suddenly become…

Generally people only consider ads that “don’t mean much to me” as ads. If they do mean something to someone they suddenly cease being ads to that person. It’s a weird thing.

I don't believe you. Sounds like some marketing theory.

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#203

Post by Demoneeri »

I don't understand, here is my news feed right now: - A beautiful video from Patrick Seabase (person that I follow) - A post from a friend asking a question I don't know the answer to, but already 8 comments. - A post from The Economist (that I follow). This article is not relevant to my interest but sometime they are. - A post about about a comment that one of my friend left on another post (this the kind of post I don't want to see) - A friend posted a video of something funny happening in my home town. - A post from my mayor telling us that the snow removing in the street is nearly done. - A post from CityLab relevant to me.

So on and so forth. If your feed is irrelevant, it's your fault...

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#204

Post by macNchz »

xefer wrote: post #193
jp555 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are clicks the majority of revenue for FB? An ad unit that fills a users screen for a few second as they scroll throughout the day every day is super super valuable to brand advertising. I think that’s ~$450 billion of the total ~$500 billion total annual global ad spend. To me browsing the fb feed is a lot like like flipping through tv channels used to be. Brand advertising loved that too. I’d think the More people…

How many people are aware that the list of interests directing Facebook ads are easily visible and editable? Settings | Ads | Your Interests It's really interesting to see the full scope of the interests FB has gathered over time. Some of them are pretty hilarious. They have a seemingly huge ontology of every subject you could think of. If you methodically go through an remove every interest, the ads suddenly become…

I found Facebook’s idea of what my hobbies are to be particularly amusing: https://m.imgur.com/nWCWn63

It’s unclear where they got those from, or why those are even allowed to be considered hobbies.

I don’t use Facebook much these days, but I’ve had an account for nearly 13 years, I use Instagram regularly and they surely have lots of tracking pixel data on me...so I was suprised at how poorly they’d inferred my interests (the other categories were less farcical but not especially accurate).

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#205

Post by wu-ikkyu »

thinkloop wrote: post #114
wu-ikkyu wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Facebook has zero real power over your life >ALL THEY DO IS HOST YOUR FRIENDS' PHOTOS. These two obviously false statements completely undermine your otherwise valid point about personal responsibility.

Power is very different from influence. Facebook does a great job of encouraging people to choose to visit, but they have no power to force anyone to do so. The second comment is hyperbolic for sure, I used that device to try and swing the conversation closer to the other side where I think it needs to be.

>Power is very different from influence

Influence is a function of power, it's in the very definition of the word:

1. the ability to do something or act in a particular way, especially as a faculty or quality.

2. the capacity or ability to direct or influence the behavior of others or the course of events.

Does FB not have the ability to influence behavior?

Even if you choose not to visit FB (I don't), that doesn't mean FB has no influence over your life, especially when many/most of your friends and billions of others are plugged into it. Unless you live on Mars.

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#206

Post by nicoburns »

thinkloop wrote: post #74
archiepeach wrote: post #45

Good intentions or not, we must remember that history has proven time and time again, when any entity has far too much unchecked power, it is inevitably exploited by bad actors. A user base of two billion users without any real accountability is a scary thing. The only people policing Facebook are Facebook. We would never agree to a having a single dictator who answers to no one, why should Facebook be treated any di…

Because unlike a dictator Facebook has zero real power over your life? It's a site of puppies and horoscopes, you think we should be dealing with them like we do Kim Jong Un? How have we moved so far on the personal responsibility scale. Why aren't people partly responsible for not making better use of their time? Facebook is an "evil echo chamber", "wasting people's lives", "catering to business", etc - ALL THEY DO…

Facebook had a huge effect on the most recent elections in both the US and the UK. To say that it has no power over your life is pretty naive.

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#207

Post by rspeer »

eckza wrote: post #189
rspeer wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this sarcasm, or are you referring to Algolia?

It’s not! I just use the search bar on the bottom of HN. I can always find what I’m looking for.

I never even knew that was there!

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#208

Post by luckydata »

It's remarkable how closely the evolutions of the facebook "the product" track the evolutions of facebook "the founder". Zuckerberg starts his professional life as a college bro making tools for college bros, then a few steps later he's married and has kids and it's all about family and true connection, less about broadcasting to the world.

Re: Facebook Overhauls News Feed to Focus on What Friends and Family Share

#210

Post by hitgeek »

eckza wrote: post #80
hitgeek wrote: post #34

I looked through my newsfeed this week for the first time in several months. I thought the amount of trash posts and videos (which caused me to leave Facebook) had greatly declined, but wasn’t sure why. If it’s related to this change, it’s a good start. While I’m skeptical of Facebook, I appreciate their attempt to improve if it’s genuine.

What's your criteria for "genuine"?

from the article: “We want to make sure that our products are not just fun, but are good for people,” Mr. Zuckerberg said. “We need to refocus the system.”

genuine for me, is making changes that are good for people, even if they are bad for advertisers.

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