Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#81

Post by Angostura » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 10:56 AM UTC

welanes wrote: post #50

andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

> They are asserting themselves only as a business and not emotional influencers...The emotional influences that facebook brings in people is very powerful. The same could be said of TV networks, Spotify, Twitter, Google photos. We are the catalyst that turn stories, music, photos into emotional reactions. We control the dials. Facebook makes it incredibly easy to step outside our bubbles. Click the Like button on a…

> My online shopping recommends groceries for me based on my past purchases. If I was to contract scurvy because it keeps recommending donuts instead of orange juice who is ultimately responsible?

If your online shopping kept erroneously labelling the donuts as 'low fat and sugar and high in vitamin C' who would be responsible?

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#82

Post by tmalsburg2 » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 10:57 AM UTC

ivanhoe wrote: post #42

How is this different from news sites? They also earn the most of money from advertisers and the main criteria for those advertisers are page views. We still completely lack a viable internet business model that would strongly encourage the quality and not quantity...

> How is this different from news sites?

I thought that was very clear from reading the article. FB tailors the feed to each user making sure that they don't see things that they may not like. In contrast to that, news sites cater to large segments of the population and they have to in order to be economically successful. The result is that news sites will always present us with some amount of material that is contrary to our personal world view.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#83

Post by zoul » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:01 AM UTC

fleitz wrote: post #39

zoul wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is forced to use Facebook, but the fact is that for a vast number of people it represents the main source of news. Which, if this source can be easily gamed, is a problem. Since how do you “convince others that they are being misled” if the “alternative” media, plenty represented in their news feeds, discredit the traditional, trustworthy media first? There is a great Guardian Long Read about this very topic:…

Isn't it up to the viewer not the publisher to decide what is trustworthy? Perhaps when major media get so many real stories about democracy wrong and the alt media get them right it's time to stop trusting the people getting things wrong and start trusting the people getting things right. Fuck, even the NYT had to recommit itself to journalism their reporting this year was so bad. 'As we reflect on the momentous res…

Isn't it up to the viewer not the publisher to decide what is trustworthy?

In theory, yes. In practice, a lot of people fail badly, to the point major contemporary decisions are now driven by intentionally false or heavily skewed information. That’s a big problem.

Perhaps when major media get so many real stories about democracy wrong and the alt media get them right it's time to stop trusting the people getting things wrong and start trusting the people getting things right.

Here in the Czech Republic the alt media spread lies, hatred and propaganda, with no regard for the society. The state-owned and sane private media aren’t perfect, but are much better.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#84

Post by douche » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:02 AM UTC

tmalsburg2 wrote: post #82

ivanhoe wrote: post #42

How is this different from news sites? They also earn the most of money from advertisers and the main criteria for those advertisers are page views. We still completely lack a viable internet business model that would strongly encourage the quality and not quantity...

> How is this different from news sites? I thought that was very clear from reading the article. FB tailors the feed to each user making sure that they don't see things that they may not like. In contrast to that, news sites cater to large segments of the population and they have to in order to be economically successful. The result is that news sites will always present us with some amount of material that is contra…

> FB tailors the feed to each user making sure that they don't see things that they may not like

To be honest, they do a really terrible job at this. No matter how many times I flag the Kardashian-story-of-the-week as offensive or inappropriate, they keep showing up in the news feed.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#85

Post by raverbashing » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:02 AM UTC

Juliate wrote: post #33

andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

> Simply incredible. It is, but not only for the reason you provide. FB is "inclusive of all perspectives and view points", only when it matches its own US-culture-centered-policy (breast-feeding, nudity is just a very obvious hint).

This. The US-centric bias (which, even worse, seems to reflect the bias of Mark Z.) of FB is ridiculous

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#86

Post by Angostura » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:03 AM UTC

fleitz wrote: post #39

zoul wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is forced to use Facebook, but the fact is that for a vast number of people it represents the main source of news. Which, if this source can be easily gamed, is a problem. Since how do you “convince others that they are being misled” if the “alternative” media, plenty represented in their news feeds, discredit the traditional, trustworthy media first? There is a great Guardian Long Read about this very topic:…

Isn't it up to the viewer not the publisher to decide what is trustworthy? Perhaps when major media get so many real stories about democracy wrong and the alt media get them right it's time to stop trusting the people getting things wrong and start trusting the people getting things right. Fuck, even the NYT had to recommit itself to journalism their reporting this year was so bad. 'As we reflect on the momentous res…

> When you publish articles saying that the support of a candidate is more important than reporting the truth

When did they do that?

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#87

Post by steenreem » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:06 AM UTC

zeroer wrote: post #64

welanes wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are asserting themselves only as a business and not emotional influencers...The emotional influences that facebook brings in people is very powerful. The same could be said of TV networks, Spotify, Twitter, Google photos. We are the catalyst that turn stories, music, photos into emotional reactions. We control the dials. Facebook makes it incredibly easy to step outside our bubbles. Click the Like button on a…

> If I was to contract scurvy because it keeps recommending donuts instead of orange juice who is ultimately responsible? You? Your doctors? Jesus. What kind of world devoid of personal responsibility do you live in?

Himself, that's exactly what he's saying.

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#88

Post by pjc50 » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:19 AM UTC

welanes wrote: post #50

andrewvijay wrote: post #6

> We are not in the business of picking which issues the world should read about. We are in the business of connecting people and ideas — and matching people with the stories they find most meaningful. Our integrity depends on being inclusive of all perspectives and view points, and using ranking to connect people with the stories and sources they find the most meaningful and engaging. Simply incredible. They are ass…

> They are asserting themselves only as a business and not emotional influencers...The emotional influences that facebook brings in people is very powerful. The same could be said of TV networks, Spotify, Twitter, Google photos. We are the catalyst that turn stories, music, photos into emotional reactions. We control the dials. Facebook makes it incredibly easy to step outside our bubbles. Click the Like button on a…

> Page that challenges your beliefs

.. and doesn't insult the reader or insult their intelligence. That's the hard bit. The stuff that goes round on facebook is often both hyper-partisan and low quality, because people are sharing it for group-belonging purposes not for use as facts.

I'm having this trouble with some of the causes that I agree with; how do I say "I see what you're trying to do and we're on the same side, but this junk is not helping?"

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#89

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:19 AM UTC

tmptmp wrote: post #61

I am not a fan of FB but it must be understood that FB is not a news agency. Another thing to consider here is: FB may be wallgardened, but what about the mainstream news organizations that are sold out to various parties? (e.g. Saudi Islamists have many huge investments/shares in many mainstream news organizations) Many mainstream news organizations are worse than FB when it comes to spread lies and propaganda in th…

[deleted]

Re: Facebook’s Walled Wonderland Is Inherently Incompatible with News

#90

Post by DanielBMarkham » Mon, Dec 05, 2016, 11:37 AM UTC

It's interesting when Zuck says that "...We’ve gone from a world of isolated communities to one global community, and we’re all better off for it..." he's exactly wrong. FB has created much more stronger community segmentation.

Were you that weird guy in your village who believe aliens built the pyramids? Before, you'd have to interact with those villagers. They'd have to interact with you. Neither of you would like it, but they might be reminded to be more compassionate to others. You might be reminded that the vast majority of people think you're a nut. Both of these effects are socially worthwhile, yet unpleasant.

But not anymore. Now you can log into Facebook from the comfort of your house and instantly be in a community of ten thousand other people who think aliens built the pyramids. You can share videos, pictures, links, theories, and generally rant about how stupid most people are.

The villagers? Dude. You don't exist anymore. After a few years of that, most of the villagers probably wouldn't even believe people like you exist. After a decade or two the next generation would think of you as being sick, dangerous, and in need of societal intervention.

This is a really, really bad thing we're creating. Yes, you can make a cute and useful app that lets people communicate. But don't rationalize and bullshit your way into thinking that somehow you are changing the world. What you're doing is ignoring centuries of mankind learning how the species gets better over time in favor of making a few bucks with advertising. Dressing it up and trying to sell it like it's nirvana is evil.