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I'm scared people are going to keep pushing for social media to implement stronger filters. I believe very strongly that the free flow of information (even whe
by swalsh 10y ago
I'm scared people are going to keep pushing for social media to implement stronger filters.
I believe very strongly that the free flow of information (even when it's just wrong) is critical. Information gives people power, but withholding information takes power away. If a company like Facebook implements the filter, we're giving that power to them and hoping they are ambivalent.
The solution to fake news is for people to learn how to live in this new world. There used to be only a handful of news organizations, but now there are an infant amount of them. This is GOOD, it's democratizing, but it puts a burden on us as citizens, and consumers of information to understand the motivations of the authors.
This is an opportunity we should be happy to have and be scared of technological or manual solutions that threaten it.
- throwaway1892 10y agoAlso any kind of filter is open to abuse
- simion314 10y agoMaybe instead of filtering they can label the items that are not real news, or label the real news as news(I am not from US so the use case I am thinking of is fake medical/scientific news so in this domain would be easier to start with)
- Pokepokalypse 10y agoTruth in advertising, you say?
- norea-armozel 10y agoOr we can stop obsessing over the news and politics as a whole? I know that sounds contrary to common sense but I largely avoid any official news for mental health reasons and just for the fact that 9 times out of 10 I've been right as to their original sources (usually think tanks). Ditch the news from your Facebook or at least treat like you would being handed a pamphlet by a stranger: disregard it and throw it away. If you're really itching to know the facts of something in this modern world then Google is your best friend especially if you want to search academic papers on specific subjects like whether or not gender dysphoric children should be given puberty blockers (read the medical journals, the abstracts aren't as dense as say your average physics one). Or if you want to know if the EROI on solar is worth it, you got the department of energy papers, various consumer review sites, and much more. Basically, go do your own journalism because modern journalism is garbage and it'll never recover. Also accept that being more read doesn't mean you're more informed. Especially being well read in politics is like being well read in the DC New 52 lore. It's neat you put the energy into it but it's just a hobby of little objective value.
- flukus 10y agoFree flow of information isn't going away, it will just move into channels where that information can't be corrected. It will create even greater information bubbles.