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Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

theguardian.com

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Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#31

Post by smoe »

jabroni_salad wrote: post #13

I'm not completely sure this is just political people. Up until recently I only got ads for kickstarter doodads and airtable, but then it suddenly switched to gun stuff. I don't browse any firearm or political communities, haven't bought stuff, don't watch firearm youtube videos, haven't even been window shopping. There were 5 million new gun owners last year. I think the ad networks just view it as a highly probable…

Could be similar as when the covid lockdowns, mass layoffs and advertisment budget cuts started, I suddenly got bombarded (where it passed the ad blocker) with ads on how to rapidly become a millionaire by investing in stuff from home and similarly sketchy products/services.

I think could really be a risen interest in the gun topic within that demo and/or other companies not targeting them as much currently in the US while other see oportunity to sell more in this moment?

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#33

Post by skronch »

r00fus wrote: post #21
jdan wrote: post #10

Shouldn't it be "advertisers are targeting rightwing Facebook users with..."? I was under the impression that it was the advertiser who chooses the target audience.

The biggest myth out there is that FB is somehow detached from the ads they permit on their website because of "it's the algorithm" or "we're just a platform". It's obviously complete BS.

The people who build FB's ads platform have their performance judged by metrics like revenue, eCPM, and internal relevance scores.

Building capabilities to add arbitrary human-defined rules into those optimization functions only makes their jobs more difficult and is a drag on hitting team targets. I'm curious why you think they're incentivized to do so.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#34

Post by notacoward »

smt88 wrote: post #3

> "A few months into maintaining my Trump online identities, I started feeling that I needed to buy guns. I knew it was irrational and impractical given my lack of training and urban lifestyle. Nonetheless I was convinced I needed them. When I told my girlfriend, her perplexed response made me realize how deeply my mind had been manipulated by my pro-Trump Facebook feeds." Exactly the kind of effect Facebook is selli…

I see these waves of ads for particular categories often on Facebook. Low-alcohol or non-alcoholic cocktails are still going strong, though they've been eclipsed by ads for a very particular kind of faux-athletic shoe (pretty sure they're exactly the same shoe even though it's a dozen companies). I have to admit, after a while I sometimes do get a bit curious. The frequency itself makes some part of my brain think this must be A Thing, and that I must pursue The Thing, even though my rational brain knows it's entirely otherwise. It's a powerful effect. Whether intentionally or not, I think Facebook's ad-selection algorithms create these "category waves" even across multiple products and vendors because they do work. Therefore it's not surprising that such a wave related to the most controllable of minds is the biggest of all.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#35

Post by tnt128 »

First of all, fb ad policy explicitly doesn’t allow selling fire arms.

https://m.facebook.com/policies/ads/prohibited_content/weapo...

If you are selling related stuff(belts, holster, vest, gun case etc), be prepared to have your fb ad account banned often(as the algo will likely (mis)-categorize you into selling weapons).

Advertisers in this space generally are very good at 1) cloaking, 2) renting or purchasing ad accounts.

both are against fb policy.

But in the end, as long as there is a positive ROI, and there is a way to circumventing the system, people will continue to do that. I don’t see how that’s fbs fault.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#36

Post by yao420 »

pageandrew wrote: post #27
davmar wrote: post #15

Yep, here's one for an AR-15 chamber lock that I got a couple weeks ago: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=364409318216958 I was shocked. What's suburban dad doing getting out of his SUV in a mall parking lot with an AR-15??? Full disclosure: I'm not on the right wing or even remotely close.

What makes you think the guy in the ad is a "suburban dad"? These companies sell to police, private security companies, military, and yes civilians. That segment of the ad looks like its targeted to more of a private security/police application.

Not a chance. Cops and security don’t generally carry ar-15’s and those that do certainly are using locks. The site also doesn’t mention a single law enforcement client which is something they would be bragging about.

Maybe it’s because I’m a Texan but suburban dads are probably the largest gun owning demographic. Ive so many engineers show up to the range with a $4k ar-15 and shoot a couple hundred bucks in ammo. At least before covid shot prices through the roof.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#37

Post by Blikkentrekker »

jmalicki wrote: post #16
seany wrote: post #7

It's a weird thing since I have to imaging people that might buy that kind of thing already have it, or would be searching for it on other forums ( I have ).

Couldn't you say the same for, say washing machines? You: I just bought a washing machine on Amazon Amazon: "Here are some ads for more washing machines, in case you're an enthusiastic collector!"

Perhaps the ads cannot discriminate between those that merely looked at washing machines, and those that actually bought one.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#38

Post by yao420 »

opwieurposiu wrote: post #20
jabroni_salad wrote: post #13

I'm not completely sure this is just political people. Up until recently I only got ads for kickstarter doodads and airtable, but then it suddenly switched to gun stuff. I don't browse any firearm or political communities, haven't bought stuff, don't watch firearm youtube videos, haven't even been window shopping. There were 5 million new gun owners last year. I think the ad networks just view it as a highly probable…

When I was working in the machine shop business around 2016 another shop owner called our shop asking if we had any work to sub out. I was surprised because his shop was running at max capacity the year before, making gun parts. Apparently when a republican becomes president the gun parts market dries up; when a democrat wins, the market booms. I think the arms retailers are having a boom right now and have plenty of…

While historically that has been somewhat true, 2020 saw an extreme rise in gun sales due to covid, mass protests, and tons of growth in both right and left wing militias.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#39

Post by dlbucci »

tnt128 wrote: post #35

First of all, fb ad policy explicitly doesn’t allow selling fire arms. https://m.facebook.com/policies/ads/prohibited_content/weapo... If you are selling related stuff(belts, holster, vest, gun case etc), be prepared to have your fb ad account banned often(as the algo will likely (mis)-categorize you into selling weapons). Advertisers in this space generally are very good at 1) cloaking, 2) renting or purchasing ad a…

Maybe they could address the whole "there is a way to circumventing the system" thing? I mean, they own the system, so they should probably be responsible for any circumvention.

Re: Facebook is bombarding rightwing users with combat gear ads. See for yourself

#40

Post by notacoward »

filoleg wrote: post #28
temp667 wrote: post #23

Why does facebook do this rather than let third party advertisers advertise? I thought they got most of their money from third party advertisers, not selling their own products. Note - gun sales are very strong in the US. Antifa / BLM / Armed protestors.

>Why does facebook do this rather than let third party advertisers advertise? I think that's exactly what FB is doing, to be honest. They are simply letting third party advertisers advertise. Historically, dem president in power has always been an indicator of increased spending on guns (because hardcore gun people become afraid that the dems will make guns more difficult to purchase, so they stock up). And increase…

> They are simply letting third party advertisers advertise.

I don't think it's quite that simple. Facebook controls the juxtaposition of ads with content, and with each other. This can reinforce the power of the individual ads, or attenuate it. In this case, it's pretty clearly creating a "caravan" of ads because that's more effective than letting each stand alone.

Disclaimer: I used to work at Facebook, but I was in storage. It gave me no particular insight into how the ad system works. This is just based on general knowledge of how human psychology and ML work.

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