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What if it's not the news that's false, but memes and public opinion? A friend's opinion is many more times effective than a random, fake, news article. Are w

What if it's not the news that's false, but memes and public opinion? A friend's opinion is many more times effective than a random, fake, news article. Are we going to start silencing opinion, because it's not factual? Almost nothing comes down to just True and False. It feels like we are stating to go into dangerous territory, where we allow sites like Facebook to determine the truth for us.

gcatalfamo 10y ago
A friend's opinion is many more times effective than a random, fake, news article. But chances are, in all honesty, that the friend's opinion came from reading one of those fake news articles.
- acbabis 10y ago
  I would guess that most image macros containing rhetorical arguments don't come from people who've based their beliefs on bad journalism. They come from people who've already made up their mind and want to reach as many people as possible
  - gcatalfamo 10y ago
    True, and they could've also come from fake news site that leveraged rage-induced clickbaits to earn massively from ads. (which is what happened during this election)
- chinese_donald 10y ago
  How about the story that Russian hackers were in talks with Trump? Even the evidence came down to an IP address from a Russian VPN. Anyone with the basics of technology knows that this doesn't mean that the person resides in Russia (or is even Russian at all). But, it didn't stop the story from circulating around Facebook...and it was all based on false assumptions and a misunderstanding of technology. The problem is that I see more stories like this coming from mainstream media than not. They get clicks, even if they are based on a false premise. Most mainstream media will get their stories blocked if it's all about the truth in reporting. There is no more truth in reporting, only bias. This is what Trump meant when he said that the system is 'rigged'.
entee 10y ago
It's true, this is really hard. That said, there should be some way to counteract things that are explicitly and provably false. Perhaps integrating some sort of fact checking? I don't know, it's dangerous territory, but it's equally dangerous to have explicitly factually false stories running around unchallenged.
annerajb 10y ago
I saw yesterday around 10 post claiming trump won the popular vote and everybody that said otherwise was lying. Today I saw a news article saying how the website where that fake news originated from is a conspiracy blog less than 2 months old run by one person. That was the "news" organization that said Trump won the popular vote.
- jrnichols 10y ago
  And sometimes fact checking your own friends is a futile effort. "Oh, well it could have happened" or something equally dismissive is often the response that I get.
jakewins 10y ago
> What if it's not the news that's false, but memes and public opinion? Uhm, but it's not. The article is about the objectively false content, as in: An article says something happened that objectively did not occur, or claims someone said something that they did not say. > Are we going to start silencing opinion, because it's not factual? And it's not about this either - anyone is free to keep sharing objectively false content on the platform. The change is that FB will no longer pay for content that is made up and does not make it clear that this is the case. > Almost nothing comes down to just True and False Indeed. As I said in another thread the other day - this is a hard problem and the answer is not, as I assume you're insinuating, that my ignorance is as good as your knowledge. Ignorance and lies should not be given equal weight and attention as factual statements and informed commentary by the media. This is a solved problem, the courts make life-or-death decisions on patently subjective issues every hour. Any reputable school of journalism will be happy to give you detailed explanations for how to navigate the real world of truthisms, he-saids and halfway facts, they've been thinking about this for hundreds of years.

gcatalfamo 10y ago

A friend's opinion is many more times effective than a random, fake, news article. But chances are, in all honesty, that the friend's opinion came from reading one of those fake news articles.

acbabis 10y ago
I would guess that most image macros containing rhetorical arguments don't come from people who've based their beliefs on bad journalism. They come from people who've already made up their mind and want to reach as many people as possible
- gcatalfamo 10y ago
  True, and they could've also come from fake news site that leveraged rage-induced clickbaits to earn massively from ads. (which is what happened during this election)
chinese_donald 10y ago
How about the story that Russian hackers were in talks with Trump? Even the evidence came down to an IP address from a Russian VPN. Anyone with the basics of technology knows that this doesn't mean that the person resides in Russia (or is even Russian at all). But, it didn't stop the story from circulating around Facebook...and it was all based on false assumptions and a misunderstanding of technology. The problem is that I see more stories like this coming from mainstream media than not. They get clicks, even if they are based on a false premise. Most mainstream media will get their stories blocked if it's all about the truth in reporting. There is no more truth in reporting, only bias. This is what Trump meant when he said that the system is 'rigged'.

entee 10y ago

It's true, this is really hard. That said, there should be some way to counteract things that are explicitly and provably false. Perhaps integrating some sort of fact checking? I don't know, it's dangerous territory, but it's equally dangerous to have explicitly factually false stories running around unchallenged.

annerajb 10y ago

I saw yesterday around 10 post claiming trump won the popular vote and everybody that said otherwise was lying. Today I saw a news article saying how the website where that fake news originated from is a conspiracy blog less than 2 months old run by one person. That was the "news" organization that said Trump won the popular vote.

jrnichols 10y ago
And sometimes fact checking your own friends is a futile effort. "Oh, well it could have happened" or something equally dismissive is often the response that I get.

jakewins 10y ago

> What if it's not the news that's false, but memes and public opinion? Uhm, but it's not. The article is about the objectively false content, as in: An article says something happened that objectively did not occur, or claims someone said something that they did not say. > Are we going to start silencing opinion, because it's not factual? And it's not about this either - anyone is free to keep sharing objectively false content on the platform. The change is that FB will no longer pay for content that is made up and does not make it clear that this is the case. > Almost nothing comes down to just True and False Indeed. As I said in another thread the other day - this is a hard problem and the answer is not, as I assume you're insinuating, that my ignorance is as good as your knowledge. Ignorance and lies should not be given equal weight and attention as factual statements and informed commentary by the media. This is a solved problem, the courts make life-or-death decisions on patently subjective issues every hour. Any reputable school of journalism will be happy to give you detailed explanations for how to navigate the real world of truthisms, he-saids and halfway facts, they've been thinking about this for hundreds of years.