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Snowden: Stop Relying on Facebook for Your News
- Spellman 10y agoRight. People just need to leave their bubbles, read from a variety of sources, and not rely on their friends for news. Obviously easier said than done. But personally that's what RSS feeds are great for. Long ago in 2011, there was a lovely TED talk about the possible bubbles forming. https://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles#t-525514 https://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_b...
- leeleelee 10y agoPeople don't want to leave their bubbles, for the fear of uncovering uncomfortable truths. For example, I have friends who flat out refused to read any of the WikiLeaks e-mails that could potentially reveal something bad about Hillary, her campaign, the DNC, or any entity on the left. That's just how some (probably a lot of) people are. When some people encounter something that challenges your pre-existing beliefs, it's easier to just ignore it and stay in your bubble of comfort. And that mindset, IMO, is not an easy thing to fix.
- empath75 10y agoI'm a liberal who voted for Hillary Clinton, despite basically loathing everything the Clintons stand for, and I read all the wikileaks emails. That said, the torrent of pure bullshit based on those emails that was floating around on both sides was unbelievable. Either she was as pure as the driven snow or a she-demon, with nothing in between. After a certain point, it wasn't even worth the effort to argue about it and I just started unfollowing half of my friends and family.
- mxfh 10y agoThe mail dump was basically a free for all corpus to plug any preconceived narrative up to hamfistedly made up conspiracy you could grep out of this. The rest is more of the normal mode of operation of any human organization: "Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Godfrey_Saxe https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Godfrey_Saxe
- makomk 10y agoPeople don't even seem to care if their news turns out to be fake so long as it confirms their beliefs - the fact that it was believable means there must be some underlying truth to it in their eyes.
- blmlives 10y ago>> People don't want to leave their bubbles, for the fear of uncovering uncomfortable truths That may be the case. But in some cases, people dont want to leave their bubble because eating skittles in someone elses' bubble can mean "looking suspicious" and getting killed for it. That is why I only hang out with my own group and those who understand me, it is too risky out there. And Travon was not the only case, there are hundreds of cases like it which dont get publicized.
- serge2k 10y ago> For example, I have friends who flat out refused to read any of the WikiLeaks e-mails that could potentially reveal something bad about Hillary, her campaign, the DNC, or any entity on the left. That's because of things like the "spirit dinner" bullshit or an email chain discussing drug pricing being reduced to "HILLARY FOUGHT LOWER DRUG PRICES". When every single email is apparently awful evil shit then it's hard to differentiate things that are actually bad. Show me some emails that you actually believe should convince someone not to vote for Clinton. Especially over Trump. Keeping in mind that the screwing around in the Primary isn't enough, and that I'm willing to accept a candidate I don't particularly like all that much.
- mmagin 10y agoYeah, he wrote a good book, and then started Upworthy, which IMHO is just a source of facebook clickbait.
- Spellman 10y agoWell, that's disappointing...
- mzw_mzw 10y agoIt's not just a source of Facebook clickbait, it's one of the worst sources on Earth: nothing but empty outrage baiting and virtue signaling. I guess he watched his own talk and decided it would be more lucrative to switch to the Dark Side.
- gcatalfamo 10y agoDoes Snowden really think that the canonical man on the street is here waiting to be advised on this topic? The people who were influenced the most by fake news are those who probably don't even feel there exists a fake news issue.
- ng-user 10y agoThat last line is the kicker. People are ignorant to the truth and|or simply refuse to believe it for whatever reason.
- krastanov 10y agoSaying "for whatever reason" is giving up on trying to understand what is happening. The reason might be anger, might be disenfranchisement, might even be that "they are stupid". But those things have solutions. Instead of just calling people ignorant and giving up it is much more fruitful to try to find why they disagree and talk to them. I know how frustrating it can be to talk to an "ignorant zealot" (anywhere on the political spectrum), but it is just cheap and sad to give up. leppr's comment above shows how this really matters: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12972521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12972521
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- ar15saveslives 10y agor/politics
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- leppr 10y agoThere are a lot of people just on the verge of being convinced, who consume mainstream media and probably know a little about Snowden and look up to him as an authority figure on the same level as any other "tech/science" personality (Elon Musk, Neil deGrass Tyson, ...), who will be convinced by his position and then influence the more naive/ignorant people around them. Politics is never black and white.
- Spooky23 10y agoMinus regulation or financial disincentive, Facebook is incentivized to push crap at you that you like. They clearly make a mint off of this stuff, so good luck affecting change.
- cdubzzz 10y ago> Facebook itself is addressing the controversy by announcing they plan to ban fake news outlets from their ad network, cutting off the revenue source for these sites. It's funny that the linked article[0], presumably from a "real" news source, very clearly says that Facebook's action will have basically no effect on the issue. [0] http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-facebook-fake-news-20161115-story.html http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-facebook-fake-news-201...
- electic 10y agoThis might not be possible. People who actually swapped feeds with someone who had a different viewpoint decided they did "not like the news" because it didn't validate their very own viewpoint. So the problem isn't how fact checked the news is but more on the voter's views. That might be something very hard to change. [1] [1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/16/facebook-bias-bubble-us-election-conservative-liberal-news-feed https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/16/facebook-bia...
- r00fus 10y agoThe correct answer isn't to "switch feeds". It's to just turn it off. I'm happier, more productive and a better dad when I'm not being a feed-junkie. Maybe I'm an outlier.
- electic 10y agoMe too. I turned it off as well. However, like most, people want to log in and get their views validated. It makes them feel great, feel wanted, and belonging to something bigger. I am not sure Facebook wants this problem to go away.
- empath75 10y agoThere really are an amazing number of people who simply aren't interested in understanding the world as it is. I think a big part of it is fundamentally not understanding how the brain works, and that just because your brain presents a convincing reality to you, that it doesn't necessarily coincide with actual reality. People don't understand that intuition can lead you very, very far astray. So they're building up this concept of the world which seems solid and internally consistent to them, but it's built on sand. And they get annoyed when people start kicking at the sand. Because they're happy in the world that they built. When really what they should be doing is digging out the sand, looking for the bedrock underneath.
- grzm 10y agoHow far do you want to take Cartesian dualism? Who are these "other people"? :)
- randyrand 10y agoI really think this problem is way overblown. Most people follow many different news sources. I personally don't even rely on Facebook for news at all.
- j2bax 10y agoI think you vastly overestimate the general populations ability to actively inform themselves.
- JayHost 10y agoI quit Facebook 1 to 2 years ago. I suppose that's one of the reasons I didn't understand the hatred during the election towards the other side. I don't have a feed of "He's evil" "She's evil". I saw two bad candidates and I understand where people are coming from with their votes. I'd like to see most independents / democratic people unite under a real progressive platform next election and stop the extremist cycle of social issues vs fear mongering.
- duaneb 10y ago> I'd like to see most independents / democratic people unite under a real progressive platform next election and stop the extremist cycle of social issues vs fear mongering. There's virtually zero chance of this happening without another party collapsing first. Hell, even then, independents are harder to herd than cats.
- zanny 10y agoIts impossible to happen under the system as it is established, but you just needed to push for a constitutional amendment and / or state compact like the one to overturn the electoral college to change the voting system to support either proportional (doesn't work when you elect a single seat like the president) or STV (ie runoff voting). The chance of that happening in the next four years? Really low. About as unlikely as it has been since the Internet established itself as a place to talk about how to fix the voting system. But unlikely doesn't mean you don't try, and don't talk about it where you can.
- fixxer 10y agoChanging from electoral college to pop vote also means the nature of campaigning will change. California, for example, has a huge population of Republicans and now their vote would matter. I don't think Trump did any non military focused rallies there. I am in Illinois. I didn't vote in 2008 or 2012 because I knew my vote would have no impact. Give me a popular vote and you might have Romney... Be careful what you wish for.
- ronreiter 10y agoOh please stfu
- canistr 10y agoIf the problem is that Facebook provides an echo-chamber that exacerbates the influence of one particular viewpoint, wouldn't the solution be for Facebook to begin injecting opposing content directly into the newsfeed? You can kind of see this with trending topics. If you don't follow a particular topic but suddenly see it trending in your feed, there's a chance you may random walk into clicking it. If Facebook opens up a global/regional/local newsfeed that isn't highly targeted, then you could potentially start seeing more original content.
- havetocharge 10y agoIt's not the Facebook that provides echo chamber, it's the individuals themselves who create it via their friend selections.
- nogbit 10y agoAnd reinforced with advertising algorithms which keeps everyone at FB employed, it is a FB problem as it is now the Fast Food of news...very unhealthy.
- lbenes 10y agoIt's not just your circle that determines what show up in your feed. The algorithms re-enforce peoples views by putting stories in your feed it thinks you will 'like'. If it thinks you're pro-Trump, you will have more pro-Trump stories even if you have an even mix of Trump/Hillary supporters in your circle. Many times the sensational stories that are most likely to be 'liked' are also the fake ones. There no warning that the story came from an unreliable source.
- gnuvince 10y agoBack in late August when I started my new job, my first purchase with my first paycheck was to get a subscription to Le Devoir, Montreal's independent newspaper. It's amazing how much more informed I feel now: because the content only changes every 24 hours, I have the opportunity to get to the less sexy stories, stories that would be buried on a fast moving website because they don't generate clicks, but which still deal with important local issues. I highly encourage people to research their local newspapers and support one: you get so much out of something that costs the equivalent of a couple Starbucks coffee pet month.
- ochoseis 10y agoThe economist is another good option. They have decent digital versions, including a daily edition that's just enough news for me.
- thebooktocome 10y agoThe Economist carries just as much propaganda as any other political magazine. They're better at hiding it, perhaps.
- supergarfield 10y agoYour definition of propaganda probably is a little to inclusive. In my experience, the Economist very rarely gets the facts wrong (including by omission of major elements). The "letters to the editor" at the beginning of every issue are also almost always critical of previous issues of the magazine, and they don't have a problem with publishing them. What the Economist constantly does is give its opinion on the facts, and that opinion usually sums up to how good free-trade and libertarian policies are. I definitely wouldn't count that as propaganda. You could, but then any newspaper with opinion pieces would be propaganda, which is not what is normally meant by "propaganda".
- ramblerman 10y agoIdd that's called bias, and it would be naive to assume any article ever written doesn't contain some.
- losteverything 10y agoWhat I wonder is how many humans he actually stands or sits next to each day and talks. Not online. Not camera to camera. But human to human / human to HIS mother-father - child
- sambe 10y agoI know it's off-topic to comment on the quality of a submission, but this is the first time I've been truly shocked by a #1 HN story. Normally when there is some discussion about relevance to HN, I can at least say "this is not really for me, but there's no problem with it being here". This is so mundane and obvious that I suspect non-normal voting. If you found this story interesting - why? "On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."
- cdubzzz 10y agoWell this ends up being on topic since the content touches on "fake news". Perhaps this site should be classified as such by whatever voodoo standard Facebook implements.
- ddorian43 10y agoWhile it is obvious, maybe we can discuss how to kill this phenomen (or facebook entirely) ? Or just how to make it better ?
- zer00eyz 10y agoI have a response to this. Though you may not be supprized by it, how many people in your life would be shocked by it. Have you shared your thoughts on this matter with them? Have you changed any minds?
- ogig 10y agoWhere you are shocked, I'm glad. While you and I may have the knowledge, many/most people still thinks Facebook is a good source of information. It is good that more visible voices are saying otherwise, so debate and questioning happens.
- untog 10y agoLike it or not, tech now has a huge, huge place in society. A tweak in Facebook's algorithm could easily decide an election (I'm not saying it has, but it definitely could). For many people on HN, their work has the potential to have social implications in a way that was never the case twenty years ago. I for one am glad to see stories like this posted to HN, as I think engineers that make things like the algorithms that decide news feeds have very valuable input.
- woodchuck64 10y agoOne thing's for certain: Facebook AI research is running deep-layered natural-language ANNs right now on a year of election comments and likes. I think well before four years they'll know exactly how to detect bubbles of alternate political reality and also how to break them up. There will be some interesting decisions facing them before the next election.
- mzw_mzw 10y agoDo you trust them to break up all the alternate reality bubbles, or just the ones they don't like? What's truly dangerous here is that one organization has so much control over what news people see.
- fokov 10y agoIs this really different than TV news? Most people stick to one network (Fox news, NBC, CNN, etc) and not only do they not watch the others but believe they are corrupt, fixed, and lying. The problem is we don't have multiple major news organizations per major area like we used to. Back then there was bias, but it was easier to be called out on it. Now I think many people are fine living in the bubble.
- adventured 10y agoIt's different because Facebook has captured nearly every American adult and they have a Google-like (in search) dominance over social. There's no news platform in US history that has ever come even remotely close to being able to claim that. They're just about worth more than every US media company combined, their reach and financial power are already incredible; four years from now they'll be as profitable as Google is today and their reach will likely have expanded further. I can't see a scenario where Facebook manages to avoid anti-trust action against it in the next four to six years, both in Europe and the US.
- astrodust 10y agoI don't trust them one bit when their profitability is driven by clicks, and clicks are driven by bullshit stories.
- notadoc 10y agoThis article is on a "How to make money blogging" website, not exactly a source I'd turn to for trustworthy anything let alone news about not relying on other news... Anyway, here are some more legitimate sources for the same topic for anyone interested: https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/15/snowden-discusses-facebooks-fake-news-controversy/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/15/snowden-discusses-facebook... https://www.engadget.com/2016/11/15/snowden-we-rely-too-much-on-facebook-for-news/ https://www.engadget.com/2016/11/15/snowden-we-rely-too-much...
- makomk 10y agoThis is the problem with any solution that relies on people checking the reliability of news sources: they don't. Even on here.
- notadoc 10y agoI'm at the point where if it claims to be "news" and it's not on an immediately identifiable brand domain, I would assume it's fake or some variation of content spam. Things in the realm of opinion, insight, tutorial, reviews, etc, can get more leeway.
- krapp 10y agoFair enough. I mean it was Wikileaks that more or less decided this election, but sure... let's all be worried about Facebook's unchecked power, unaccountable methods and unknown motives. After all, it's not as if one of the Presidential candidates, now President, implied that the entirety of American media was controlled directly by the DNC, and thus not to be trusted, while praising and legitimizing Wikileaks by name. There's no possibility of a dangerous political or cultural precedent having been set by having half the country believe in nothing other than what Wikileaks publishes. Facebook is evil, but I don't believe it's the elephant in the room.
- jayess 10y agoI miss the myspace days when we just modified our profiles and chatted with each other. There was no "news feed." Facebook was unbearable before the election, I stopped logging in more than once a week just to check on family. I don't care what anyone's opinion of the day is on the political issue of the day.
- y_u_no_rust 10y agoit drove me off reedit entirely
- matiasow 10y agoI'm posting this on Facebook
- sien 10y agoSo, some actual data on how many US adults get news from various sources: http://www.journalism.org/2016/05/26/news-use-across-social-media-platforms-2016/ http://www.journalism.org/2016/05/26/news-use-across-social-... 38% Never, 18% hardly ever, 26% sometimes, 18% often. Note that none of this excludes people getting news from non-social sources such as going directly to whatever news sites they like. It's not clear that this is really much more of an issue than hearing what Bob in marketing thinks of issue X, Y or Z.
- shiftoutbox 10y agoNo shit ; fuck you whale !
- JacobJans 10y agoI have interacted with several people on Facebook who rely on fake news sources. I pointed out fake news articles several times on one person's Facebook page. She agreed the articles were not true. However, she added "I don't have time to figure out if they're true. People can read your comments." I asked her what she thought of the fact that this particular article, which was blatantly false, was shared 16,000 times. Her response: "That's comforting." I was shocked. And yet, that is the reality we now live in. Many, many people are acting, and thinking, exactly like her.
- dragonwriter 10y agoNote that when confronted about false stories (which were sourced from white aupremacist propaganda) he retweeted, the President-elect, while still a candidate, responded fairly similarly, so, yeah, it's definitely an attitude that is becoming quite normalized.
- nickpsecurity 10y agoIt's that combined with the echo chamber effect of their algorithms. I've watched a diverse group of smart and average people across political spectrum this election. Most of them consistently shared unsubstantiated claims or biased media. As expected, their media was always presenting evidence for their side and agsinst the other. Corporate media always did that for maximizing ratings and ad impressions. However, there's a difference. People often had these discussions face to face with other views visible or at least some consequences for bullshitting. Now, the like-minded naturally group together with Facebook making the others (esp moderates) largely disappear from the feed. Showing them what they wanted to see with convenience of scrolling past opposing beliefs reinforced the echo chambers and false beliefs. That few counterpoints are displayed reinforces it further by creating illusion of false consensus for their side. All the resulting upvotes and shares reinforce the algorithm's effect. I speculate such things are why the divide seemed so much stronger in this election than before. They need to bump into each other more for the necessary conversations to occur. The tech increases isolation instead. The effects will only get worse over time.
- s_q_b 10y agoI have a lot of mixed feelings on this one. Of course one shouldn't rely upon Facebook for the news, just as one shouldn't rely upon Fox News. But people are going to anyway. The problem in this election was that Facebook did exactly what it was designed to do: show people more of what they wanted to see. Unfortunately that creates extreme echo chambers, where blatantly false news ricochets around the site, blindly liked by partisans on each side. So that leaves open the question of what to do. On the one hand, Facebook is a massive media company, and I am not comfortable handing them carte blanche to police and control the speech of their users. On the other, Facebook's current policy of "neutrality" creates an environment that favors political isolation and the spread of outright falsehoods. At the very least, it seems Facebook could do something about purveyors of those falsehoods algorithmically. But even then I have my misgivings about a private corporation, or really anyone, determining the acceptable range of public discourse.
- drvdevd 10y ago> algorithmically Perhaps in the near future, the only "journalists" anyone will trust will be algorithms. Of course, any system can be manipulated. But I think we are dealing with such an unprecedented deluge of information, an increase in population (and therefore motives) and connectedness, that it may be time to consider this. But your comment begs the question: who will be the gatekeepers of these algorithms?
- cconcepts 10y agoI can't remember where I saw this quote last year but it rang terrifyingly true to me: "The people who used to tell me that Wikipedia is unreliable now get their news from viral facebook posts"
- huangc10 10y agoI know it might be an unpopular comment, but I feel like we should just rely less on Facebook in general.
- charred_toast 10y agoI can't believe so many people actually use facebook. It's a time suck, a voyeuristic and narcissistic view into people's lives, a government database, etc...
- NumberCruncher 10y agoI have to point out again that the media is making money by manipulating the masses. If you not pay for it, you are the product. Your time, attention, data, money and also your vote. FB is not better or worse than any other media company. Only more efficient.
- amasad 10y agoFake news, hoaxes and scams existed long before Facebook. People just use Facebook more, things can spread faster, and all in all it amplifies an existing problem. Email forwards (and in their newer reincarnation, at least in the Middle East, Whatsapp forwards) spread false news for as long as I remember using the internet. A part time job for me was to respond and debunk these emails when they landed in my inbox. I even put in the time to explain to people how to spot false information (e.g. if the email ends with "forward this to x number of people or else" is 100% a hoax or a scam). Maybe Facebook -- as our times' Master Switch -- can fix this, and for the first time we'll be happy with centralization.
- CaptSpify 10y agoI used to subconsciously judge email based on the amount of "fw:re:fw:fw:fw" on it. The more fwd:/re: the less I trusted the data. I wonder if this was ever valid signaling, but I also wonder if people trust articles more on FB because, AFAIR, it's hard to tell how many times an article has been re-shared, or "forwarded".
- droopybuns 10y agoI 'quit' Facebook two years ago. I occasionally log back in to see what people are getting out of it- and my outsider observation is that Facebook unintentionally feeds people with borderline personality disorder. (http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/borderline-personality-disorder/basics/symptoms/con-20023204 http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/borderline-per... ) I find it amusing that so many facebook users are identifying Facebook's "fake" news feeds as the source of the election's problems. If Facebook were to honestly tackle that problem, there won't be much Facebook left.
- owly 10y agoNewspeak, Thoughtcrime, Facebook, Saveyourself, Createtime, Deleteaccount.
- joshmn 10y agoThe last 12 months I have visited Snopes more times than not in order to disprove some of the articles my Facebook friends choose to share. It's slightly alarming that people don't think they need to fact check. You know it's bad when the President-elect opens up about his internet fact checking[0]. It sets a dangerous precedent. There are less intelligent people in this world who read deeply into these "articles" and act on them. They choose to take it as fact because it's a website. It's scary. What can we do? Upvotes/downvotes? Won't work at scale, because likes/shares have a connotation of legitimacy. Can we educate the public? We can try, but some people are so far from being able to (or willing to) learn. They'll discard any help, citing propaganda, claiming "xyz source" is trying to influence their thinking; how dare they. Can you tell this exhausts me? [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9IEIP3k_8c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9IEIP3k_8c
- sedachv 10y ago> What can we do? Upvotes/downvotes? Won't work at scale, because likes/shares have a connotation of legitimacy. News verification seems like the perfect application of NLP, AI, and data mining techniques. Can it make any money for anyone? Right now it is much more profitable to make fake news and use data mining to manipulate people: http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/features/2015-11-12/is-the-republican-party-s-killer-data-app-for-real- http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/features/2015-11-12/is-the...
- yosito 10y agoI don't think those technologies are well suited to this problem at all. I was just talking to some Swiss journalists last night. You know what Swiss news organizations are using those technologies for? To make their writing more "engaging", i.e. more sensationalist, not for fact-checking.
- sedachv 10y ago> I don't think those technologies are well suited to this problem at all. How so? Deciding whether news is fake or not seems like a textbook application of natural language classification and search.
- jaronheard 10y agoThe article says this: Snowden’s comments echoed those of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, who said that it’s “extremely unlikely hoaxes changed the outcome of this election in one direction or the other.” But he's NOT echoing Zuckerberg's comments - either in spirit or intent. He's pointing out a bigger problem inherent in relying on Facebook as a single source for news.
- hockley 10y agoMan, I'm going to miss Gwen Ifill.
- usaphp 10y agoWasn't there the simpsons episode when Homer started spreading fake news on the internet to become famous?
- CaptSpify 10y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Computer_Wore_Menace_Shoes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Computer_Wore_Menace_Shoes I believe
- colordrops 10y agoWhy is social media getting all the flak? What about all the fake news on Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, CNN, Fox News, et al?
- yosito 10y agoAll of the organizations you listed employ fact checkers who are responsible for checking articles for accuracy and facts. Sure, they make mistakes from time to time, they're human. Disagreeing with the slant of an article doesn't mean it's fake news.
- colordrops 10y agoHow far can "slant" go before the news is "fake"? "Fake" isn't exactly a scientific definition. It's not like paragraphs of text have a binary value of "true" or "false". Have you seen this? http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/08/washington-post-ran-16-negative-stories-bernie-sanders-16-hours http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/08/washington-post... In fact, "fake" news from these big outlets is even more insidious, because they have agendas from their powerful owners (Bezos in this case), a huge audience, and they have people's (like you) trust, because they supposedly employee fact checkers.
- yosito 10y agoIn my mind fake news and biased news are two different concepts. All news should be taken with skepticism, because every bit of it from every news outlet is subject to potential bias. I'm aware that many news outlets published biased news against Sanders (and Trump and Clinton), and I'm aware that Bezos owns media outlets that may be biased. But organizations that employ fact checkers don't make up news stories out of thin air.
- colordrops 10y agoSo making a political candidate seem like he said and meant things that he didn't isn't "fake"? I'm afraid your definition of what is fake and what is not is arbitrary and vague. And no, you don't get an "A" for effort with supposed fact checkers - all that matters is the final product.
- dmfdmf 10y agoI am more than a little disappointed in Snowden for falling for this gambit. Blaming the "fake news on the internet" for the loss to Trump is just the Left's way to divert attention to their own failures to report fairly or even try to understand his popularity without dismissing or smearing everyone as racists, homo-phobes and misogynists. This latest post-election narrative is a ploy, and if it gains any traction, it will allow the Left to avoid the mea culpa's and soul-searching that they need in order reclaim their shredded credibility. Far more importantly, especially for the denizens of HN, is that this call to regulate and control the news on the internet cannot be used to institute government controls, licensing, "pressure" or threats, etc. as a solution. Private companies cannot practice censorship so Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Breitbart, etc. are all free to establish their own policies on what to carry on their properties. This is far far different from the government becoming the arbiter of what is "fake" or not or what is politically or socially acceptable or not and then using the power of the state to silence you with threats, fines, jail or even death (in some countries) if you anger the gang in power. Keep a close eye on any FCC proposals because now that they have regulatory control over the internet[1] the legal authority is already in place to censor the internet. If they start floating regulations or even "suggestions" that claim we have to vet the "news" for the "public-good" look out[2]. You have been warned. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/technology/net-neutrality-fcc-vote-internet-utility.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/27/technology/net-neutrality-... [2] "The Property Status of Airwaves" by Ayn Rand "Now observe the practical demonstration of the fact that without property rights, no other rights are possible. If censorship and the suppression of free speech ever get established in this country, they will have originated in radio and television" [i.e. via the FCC]. In "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal" http://www.criminalgovernment.com/docs/aynrand.html http://www.criminalgovernment.com/docs/aynrand.html
- BipolarElsa 10y agoThe left "soul searched" about the reasons for its defeat for maybe (at most) 72 hours. They're losing 2020.
- norea-armozel 10y ago"Blaming the "fake news on the internet" for the loss to Trump is just the Left's way to divert attention to their own failures to report fairly or even try to understand his popularity without dismissing or smearing everyone as racists, homo-phobes and misogynists." Uh as for Trump being misogynist, the fact he's okay with groping women without consent that's pretty much a classic case of it if I ever heard it. As for racism, you'll have to admit him declining to rent his properties to African Americans comes with racial bias either or not you like it (this doesn't make him literally KKK/Hitler/Red-Skull but it still makes him a jerk). And as for homophobia, it's misdirected at the man himself but his VP is clearly a homophobe that should've been ejected from the ticket if he was serious about supporting LGBT rights (and he would oppose FADA and support the Equal Rights Amendment). So, he has much to answer for on that front. As for the rest of your statement, Snowden pointing out the issue of the lack of veracity in online news is a huge problem. Overtly fake news is just the tip of the iceberg since many "factual" news outlets have sloppy or no fact checking of articles and often depend on clickbaity headlines to generate views for ad revenue. Oddly enough, this comes part and parcel with the business model these outlets have chosen to operate under rather finding one which could alleviate the need to become Fox News on steroids. "Private companies cannot practice censorship so Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Breitbart, etc. are all free to establish their own policies on what to carry on their properties." This is patently false. Private censorship by definition is still censorship. It just legal censorship. "Keep a close eye on any FCC proposals because now that they have regulatory control over the internet[1] the legal authority is already in place to censor the internet. If they start floating regulations or even "suggestions" that claim we have to vet the "news" for the "public-good" look out[2]. You have been warned." I doubt anyone is going to propose such a system on the FCC board since they're busy with the open set box and zero rating regulations at this moment. Plus, SCOTUS already nuked that option decades ago in a series of cases related to the Fairness Doctrine, so there's no going back even with the most liberal of justices. They'd have to make a good argument for it to stick beyond "cause I said so."
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- sumoboy 10y agoSo basically not much different than reading the national enquirer while standing in line at the grocery store, garbage in garbage out. All about greed and ads. People should be marching the streets, setting cars on fire, "not my facebook" over this.. )
- SeanDav 10y agoThis is a similar warning to "Don't eat the yellow snow". It makes very good sense but probably many will not pay attention until they actually get burned.
- TheSpiceIsLife 10y agoWell all this political talk gives me some ideas. Is it possible, at this stage, for geographically large countries with very large populations to move forward in a coherent way? All of the better places to live, as rated by purchasing power, health, education, what have you, are either geographically small and or have a small population. China, India, Russia, Brazil, USA - all these big places with big pipulations rank poorly in some number of quality of life indicators. Australia, Canada, New Zealand aren't without their problems but seem to suffer a less severe case of the issues. And then there's those Scandinavian countries which rate highly. Why this pattern?
- emmfr 10y agoThe smaller the population, the higher the variance. Large countries are not bad, they are average. The worst countries, like the best, tend to be small.
- TheSpiceIsLife 10y agoGood point, thanks.
- amelius 10y agoIt might still be useful to copy governance structures from these countries, I suppose.
- partycoder 10y agoSome time ago, Facebook was all about FarmVille. A fictional cow was sad and you had to help. Over and over again... in your profile, in your news feed, everywhere. Facebook fixed that problem by moving all game activity to a specialized area. So that's the solution. Facebook needs to split links from user photos and updates. And move the trending pane to that area as well.
- nanospeck 10y agoAnd that's why I visit hackernews more than facebook.
- wallace_f 10y agoThe power Google and Facebook hold to censor and selectively control what people see and hear is terrifying: https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/15/google-and-facebook-ban-fake-news-sites-from-their-advertising-networks/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/15/google-and-facebook-ban-fa... In an important aspect, this is not any different han a library deciding to censor what information they make available. In the past this war has been waged before--As Google will ban news over quality of the information, librarians have banned books over the quality of the information. Once Tom Sawyer is banned, that sets a precedent to ban Catcher in the Rye, then Fahrenheit 451, then Animal Farm. It's a very slippery slope, and it's absolutely terrifying to me. I don't want to live in a world where few have absolute power over the many. If someone can control what you hear and see, they can control what you think. Is Trump's election just a convenient excuse to seize this opportunity? Thank you Snowden, I also am terrified by this.
- lincar 10y agoWatch Fox News if you want to actually know what is going on in the world. Yes, seriously.
- draw_down 10y agoIndeed, instead get your news from the paper of record. You know, the one that joined the administration in selling us all a war that cost trillions of dollars and killed a million people. (And ABC, CBS, the list goes on of course. Not just NYT.)
- icanhackit 10y agoFacebook reminds me of a Dave Chappelle sketch, If The Internet Was A Real Place [1]. But instead of a world filled with porn stores and free CDs, Facebook World is where you have used car salesmen peddling ideology and breaking news, libraries filled with mirrors but no books, where humans lack filters for their compulsion to say something – like a Tourette's syndrome for half formed thoughts. Where they’ll yell shit at you like “Your dog’s ears are wow!” and then finish with a racist tirade. If you want anything positive: happiness, a sense of contentedness, intellectual enlightenment, more time - ditch it. The odd gem shows up there, but even garbage tips and sewers are home to a few wedding rings and gold wristwatches. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91YpZe1SmNg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91YpZe1SmNg
- kuhidarwin 10y agoFake news exist before the emerge of social media such as Facebook and Twitter. It's like spam but harder to locate. I don't think Facebook can attach this issue properly since they have the ability to stop this from the very beginning.
- throwaway101416 10y agoAlright, but who should people rely on? From an article posted earlier today on HN: almost all the media is colluding with Clinton/Dems: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Ook1v2WQc-gJ:https://sharylattkisson.com/newsgate-2016/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Ook1v2... Site is down so giving google cache.
- pg314 10y agoI'm sure there was some back and forth between the media and both campaigns. That's what reporters do, they cultivate their sources. A lot of the allegations in the article seem pretty weak. E.g., the campaign 'planted' stories in the NYT. Could it mean they just had info, and gave it to the NYT? All this "collusion" also didn't stop e.g. the NYT and WaPo to thoroughly report on Clinton's email server.
- throwaway101416 10y agoNYT started reported on wikileaks emails very late in the revelation process. This already shows dishonesty on some level. It also coincided with release of emails that didn't actually matter, thus the narrative was - hey she is just human and yes there is some bad, but nothing that terrible. For example, they didn't report on leaking questions to debate organizers until Donna Brazile got fired. I think people lied on both sides, but I always assumed democrats were better than that. And I used to take my news from New York Times. Now I can't because I know they'll try to present just one side of every issue. Finally, an example of bias is I am yet to see a single positive news story on Trump from NYT. Like they did a story about him hiring lobbyists. All commenters on the site and the story itself tried to say that he is being hypocritical since he promised that he would get rid of lobbyists. They didn't cite his reasons for that decision that he talked about on the 60-minutes interview. The story about him firing all lobbyists was instead merged into the "campaign is in disarray" story. But biggest problem for me is that any tech site I go to, I am constantly bombarded with "Trump is evil" and I never hear his side of the story. I mean half the time the bias is so bad, I actually think I'm reading the onion (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-steak-well-done-disqualified_us_56e8267be4b065e2e3d747ce http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-steak-well-...) If you go to Wired, they currently have an article on the front page that starts with: "Mark Zuckerberg is trying hard to convince voters that Facebook had no nefarious role in this election. But according to President-elect Donald Trump’s digital director Brad Parscale, the social media giant was massively influential—not because it was tipping the scales with fake news, but because it helped generate the bulk of the campaign’s $250 million in online fundraising." This is a) bias as they're not being impartial and b) it is saying that allowing people to post whatever they want is "nefarious". Basically, this one-sided approach is what I think drove people to twitter/facebook for news in the first place.
- aaron695 10y agoIs anyone on HN relying on Facebook for news? Do people outside of typical HN users know who is/take advice from Snowden? This seems a bubble of pointlessness.
- inostia 10y agoSimple answer: don't use social media. I don't understand why this is controversial. If you don't approve of the way they do business, don't use their products. I use no social media accounts and my life is plenty-full of engaging, useful discussion.
- pg314 10y agoI don't use social media either, but that doesn't change the fact that a majority of the other voters do. They will not all of a sudden stop using Facebook.
- throwaway98237 10y agoThe bigger issue is, many of these same folks are not gonna stop buying into "echo chamber" news and gossip just because FB stops publishing it. Sad as it is, this is what Fox News is to a super lesser extent. This is what shooting the sh-t at the bar with your buddies is. We don't need less fake news. We need a more educated and engaged public. Now that we have a president-elect that campaigned on gutting public funding, including Dept. of Education, well, we'll see how that goes.
- starik36 10y ago"We need a more educated and engaged public". Well said. However, the issue here is that pretty much every news outlet straight up shilled for a candidate. CNN, MSNBC, NYT, HuffPo, ABC, CBS for Clinton and Fox News for Trump. How is a non-computer savvy person (your parents, aunts and uncles) that doesn't know how to research things online supposed to form an independent opinion if these news organizations are their only window into the world?
- Ace17 10y agoMore generally, stop reyling on any single platform for your news.
- thewhitetulip 10y agoDo people really rely on facebook for news? I mean, I do not use any FB app other than the webapp that too in a private window with a different user agent. FB spooked me once by suggesting to me a person with whom I interacted totally via github (and probably gmail)
- blablabla123 10y agoHow much media incompetence is needed to rely on Facebook as serious news source? It's very difficult for me to understand this. And no, I'll gonna continue reading all sorts of stuff posted on Facebook, no matter if Edward Snowden or Hillary Clinton call them "News" or not. By the way, don't forget to stop relying on Whatsapp, Snapchat and Chatroulette for your News. Sorry for being so sarcastic but this is just so incredibly stupid. Please make Media (Competence) a subject in all schools world-wide!
- xanderjanz 10y agoSeems like most commenters here didn't read the article. Snowden isn't suggesting you leave facebook because of free flow of fake news. Quite the opposite, he's saying facebook controls the flow of news too much.
- snksnk 10y agoThe problem is not the first mover advantage of Facebook, but that people do not understand logical fallacies, that they erroneously believe that most media is impartial, and that they are unaware of confirmation bias. Logical fallacies should be taught in school: we also start with simple arithmetic before we move to more complex topics. (A course in formal logic seems overkill, it should be an applied course.)
- fdsak 10y agoThe real problem did not start with Facebook and other social media being fake. It was the main stream media that started to generate fake news with the support of their local governments. No one can explain better than [ https://chomsky.info/ https://chomsky.info/ ]. The other issues is international, before this year US elections, US used these so called social media to "export its kind" of democracy to other part of the world, call it Arab Spring and rest of the events in middle east and recently in Turkey. It was perfectly legitimate to use them as under cover agents of democracy. History has taught a lesson to American( sensible ones) who were closing their eyes/or unawre of world events specially and how they affected the people around the glob using "Democracy" "Freedom of speech" "human values" while violating the exact same thing at the same time. Their bigotry has revealed in a strange way, but its too late for lots of people, for Americans and for the rest of the World. What are the alternatives: a). Free media the ways it should be, main stream media is polarized itself already and dictated by high in the Govt. offices. b). Accept that democracy does not work sometimes if its helping hands are already chopped off e.g participation of civil society, feed media etc .. c). Do not spread democracy for the sake of democracy if its more evil than dictatorship.
- tkyjonathan 10y agoignorance is power, apparently.
- collyw 10y agoAfter Brexit and Trump, I realize how much of an echo chamber my Facebook account is.
- paradite 10y agoI hope now people see the rationale for this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11403730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11403730 The first comment nailed it.
- balthamael 10y agoI don't see this as a new problem tbh. It's a function of human nature. We like to think that we are smarter and better than our primitive ancestors but the fact is that we are exactly as dumb or as smart as they were. Only thing that separates us is our knowledge. But we are just as prone to bias, intellectual weakness, selfish dishonesty and irrationality than our dumb ancestors. Most people are followers, we want to be in a group, we want to belong, we want to be led and above else we want to feel good about ourselves. People believe what they want to believe because that is safe, comfortable and easy. The psychology is the same as religion, minus the supernatural. This election showed as much. We are perfectly willing to disregard facts and reason if it suits our narrow benefits or correlates with what we think we know already. It takes great strength of character to put principles and reason above personal comfort and safety and frankly most people lack it. Add to this modern identity politics and you have a recipe for disaster. Our lives are easy. We think that we are advanced but this can all turn to shit in no time because our base natures are still very much intact. Consider the Nazis and the power of group think and in group bias. Completely normal people can be made quite easily to do savage things. Even in this post WW2 world, the Stanford prison experiment showed as much. We really are fragile beings and we have to be vigilant, now more than ever, because we are under the mistaken belief that we today are somehow better, more evolved or new. When it comes down to it then we are nothing but animals, driven by our instincts and all the science, culture and philosophy flies out the window. I think the Jedi and the Sith are a great metaphor for this. We need self control and vigilance to not fall to the dark side, which is often tempting and the path of least resistance and no matter hour high you have risen, you can always fall.
- balthamael 10y agoI don't see this as a new problem tbh. It's a function of human nature. We like to think that we are smarter and better than our primitive ancestors but the fact is that we are exactly as dumb our a smart as they were. Only thing that separates us is out knowledge. But we are just as prone to bias, intellectual weakness, selfish dishonesty and irrationality than our dumb ancestors. Most people are followers, we want to be in a group, we want to belong, we want to be led and above else we want to feel good about ourselves. People believe what they want to believe because that is safe, comfortable and easy. The psychology is the same as religion, minus the supernatural. This election showed as much. We are perfectly willing to disregard facts and reason if it suits our narrow benefits or correlates with what we think we know already. It takes great strength of character to put principles and reason above personal comfort and safety and frankly most people lack it. Add to this modern identity politics and you have a recipe for disaster. Our lives are easy. We think that we are advanced but this can ask turn to shit in no time because our base natures are still very much intact. Consider the Nazis and the power of group think and in group bias. Completely normal people can be made quite easily to do savage things. Even in this post WW2 world, the Stanford prison experiment showed as much. We really are fragile beings and we have to be vigilant, now more than ever, because we are under the mistaken belief that we today are somehow better, more evolved or new. When it comes down to it then we are nothing but animals, driven by our instincts and all the science, culture and philosophy flies out the window. I think the Jedi and the Sith are a great metaphor for this. We need self control and vigilance to not fall to the dark side, which is often tempting and the path of least resistance and no matter hour high you have risen, you can always fall.
- jbverschoor 10y agoI don't want ANY news on my facebook. I wish I could just filter all externally linked posts, posts with > 200 shares or likes. Facebook is pretty useless for me. I use messenger, because it's ubiquitous, but other than that, it's a hybrid of twitter and 9gag.
- zdkl 10y agoNo promoted stories, no algorithmic timeline... Just plain old chronology from the people I actually want to follow. Seems like the facebook we want to use is gone, but good luck migrating your social circle.
- aninhumer 10y agoNot a perfect solution, but if you want that, it may help to "Hide all from [News Site]" for each instance.
- konart 10y ago>Facebook >news Well, this is news to me. I never ever realizes some people use facebook for this, lol. Sharing some articles? Yeah. Some funny or family pictures? Sure. News source? Really?
- cdevs 10y agoHere we are again, take every top tech article and put the word Snowden in front of it.
- ceejay 10y agoI have a different take on this (sort of). I think it's enormously empowering that anyone in the world can be a "publisher" and reach millions of people with stories through the internet. The next phase of this evolution, I think, will be to ensure that we train humanity how to deal with this. I think it could be as simple as working hard to improve everyone's ability to (a) build an argument about something, and (b) to critique someone else's argument about something. Once we (the majority of the general public) know how arguments are constructed and what is required to "prove" or "disprove" them, we'll be a far healthier world.
- Fiahil 10y ago> [..] many people are criticizing social media outlets – namely Facebook – for not doing enough to weed out obviously fake news articles that could have potentially impacted people’s votes. This is a claim that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has been quick to dismiss, [..] I wish Facebook would remove their "trending news" feature. Their algorithm is basically selecting and promoting all the junk it can find, without the slightest vetting. How is it possible that a feature botched like this would: 1) pass the "testing" stage, 2) be ever considered a good idea in the first place. And on top of that, they claim no responsibilities ? Lol.
- alextooter 10y agoDo not blame Facebook because you lose in election.The MSM is far more worse than FB.Use your brain.
- alextooter 10y agoSnowden comment too much about what people doing or thinking,does he has nothing to do in he's own life?
- norea-armozel 10y agoThis is why I just don't bother reading most news articles because even when the news isn't from a fake site you still have many factual errors or context being removed from specific events/quotes/reports/etc that are discussed in any given article. This is an issue larger than just some kid putting up fake news on a site to generate clicks for ad revenue. It's an issue that includes what I would consider established news outlets like the major newspapers and magazines. It's just weird to see how often the news is so bad in terms of fact checking that often I just skip news altogether.
- Pica_soO 10y agoMaybe there should be something like the hacker-news reputation, only derived by the validated truth of the sources you quote and forward. And it should be mandatory on all things you post. And people should have the option to hide "unreliable" narrators - and gain the loss of a falsifieer, by disproving somebody else s story.