4 ms·

I 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 som

by sambe 10y ago

I 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 ago
Well 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 ago
While it is obvious, maybe we can discuss how to kill this phenomen (or facebook entirely) ? Or just how to make it better ?
zer00eyz 10y ago
I 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 ago
Where 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 ago
Like 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.
- sambe 10y ago
  Right, sure. I'm absolutely not surprised that people want to talk about the role of Facebook in society, or fake news, or the algorithms used. And much of that has been covered recently in other front-page articles. Some of them have been interesting to me, some haven't, I definitely won't complain if there are more of them. However, this particular article doesn't provide any interesting commentary on Facebook algorithms, its role in society or fake news. It's borderline content-free and I find that puzzling. Snowden says we should be wary of getting our news from a single source. Did this add something to any of the subjects you mention?
npiazza83 10y ago
Facebook sponsored a hackathon to solve this issue and a team of college students found a somewhat trivial answer in just 36 hours. That's pretty cool.. and related to the topic of this news article... Its worth discussing I guess? But the article itself is pretty paltry. http://www.businessinsider.com/students-solve-facebooks-fake-news-problem-in-36-hours-2016-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/students-solve-facebooks-fake...
bitJericho 10y ago
Snowden is an American hero. Anything he has to say is interesting to me.

by sambe 10y ago

cdubzzz 10y ago

Well 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 ago

While it is obvious, maybe we can discuss how to kill this phenomen (or facebook entirely) ? Or just how to make it better ?

zer00eyz 10y ago

I 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 ago

Where 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 ago

Like 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.

sambe 10y ago
Right, sure. I'm absolutely not surprised that people want to talk about the role of Facebook in society, or fake news, or the algorithms used. And much of that has been covered recently in other front-page articles. Some of them have been interesting to me, some haven't, I definitely won't complain if there are more of them. However, this particular article doesn't provide any interesting commentary on Facebook algorithms, its role in society or fake news. It's borderline content-free and I find that puzzling. Snowden says we should be wary of getting our news from a single source. Did this add something to any of the subjects you mention?

npiazza83 10y ago

Facebook sponsored a hackathon to solve this issue and a team of college students found a somewhat trivial answer in just 36 hours. That's pretty cool.. and related to the topic of this news article... Its worth discussing I guess? But the article itself is pretty paltry. http://www.businessinsider.com/students-solve-facebooks-fake-news-problem-in-36-hours-2016-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/students-solve-facebooks-fake...

bitJericho 10y ago

Snowden is an American hero. Anything he has to say is interesting to me.