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I'm livid about the abundant existence and spread of 'fake news' and the inability people have to fact-check, but, I also want to play devil's advocate here. 1

by AdamSC1 10y ago

I'm livid about the abundant existence and spread of 'fake news' and the inability people have to fact-check, but, I also want to play devil's advocate here. 1) This data set mostly relies on a data-set called the "BS Detector" which describes itself as "[a] hastily assembled...proof of concept...[that] searches all links on a given webpage for references to unreliable sources, checking against a manually compiled list of domains...[to] address the proliferation of fake news". While I agree with their choices in sites, the concept of manual curation deciding the legitimacy of news is horrifying and something that we hoped the internet would move us away from. 2) We run into this problem where we want places like Facebook to censor 'fake news'. But, I imagine most of us can agree that as autonomous moral agents, we'd never want out access to information censored. Rather we'd want the tools to make an informed decision ourselves. In accepting that, you'd have to extend that same right of autonomy to other individuals no matter how 'wrong' you think they may be. A) We can't manually curate legitimacy list. As that leads to more abuse, and let's face it people who read fake news wouldn't trust your list anyway. B) We can't let tech companies filter out websites based on their interpretation that leads to more bias especially politically. C) We can't let crowd-sourced intelligence do it without being locked into the tyranny of the majority, which as we've seen, spreads fake news. In a time when traditional news agencies are hurting for views, lost in the digital noise and often slower to respond to breaking news than niche outlets, we can't simply give them the benefit of the doubt either. (That would also enshrine them as some sort of news aristocracy which emerging outlets and voices couldn't compete with). It seems rather than try and interpret the news as fake based on the piece/site itself, we need to take a step back and look and how on the consumption platform (browser, news channel, social media) you can display relevant facts to people. [Unsubstantiated claim warning] I imagine most credible journalists have at one time another cited an irrefutable fact. A raw figure from a report, a percent by which a poll was won, or the weight of the Eiffel Tower. It seems that with data sets like WikiData and Firebase (old dump, not the new mobile platform) we would be able to locate claims of fact within the writings of journalists and outlets and compare those against the irrefutable fact. If a journalist or outlet has a number of facts that are incorrectly stated well outside a margin of error, a little pop-up displays those to the user letting them decide how to interpret that. I know we want to label things as 'Fake' or 'Manipulative' media, and I do think it should be a criminal offense to knowingly publish false information outside the protections of entertainment/satire/art etc. But, no matter how we spin it, categorizing media is more destructive than it is helpful. We need to find ways to put the educated decision back in the hands of moral agents who are struggling to find facts in an overwhelming sea of noise.

inimino 10y ago
> it should be a criminal offense to knowingly publish false information outside the protections of entertainment/satire/art etc. That is a rather dangerous idea.
- AdamSC1 10y ago
  I can see elements of danger if improperly used, but, from my point of view it is no more dangerous than libel laws or any other law which requires explicitly "knowing" what one is doing. A law like that is dangerous only if the burden of proof is on the journalist. Which in our modern society should never be the case. I admit, sadly there seems to many cases now where innocent until proven guilty isn't as strongly held. It is tremendously hard to prove that someone 'knew' the information they were publishing was false (outside of an explicit confession or conversation) and it absolutely should be hard. But, such a law may make people who are in it for the money at least give pause. I can't think of a case where if it isn't fiction, satire, humor, commentary etc etc, and you know it to be false information that you choose to spread as fact, that you aren't doing so with malicious intent to harm others or to personally benefit from the exploitation of others? The social contract of society exists primarily for protection from such actions, and its tool of protection is the law. If there are cases you can think of where that wouldn't be malicious or exploitative I'm really interested. While I still hold true on the idea that the most important thing with fake news is to empower people to make their own autonomous and informed decisions, I'd quite like to be wrong about criminalizing the spread of false information - as I am a fan of as few laws as possible to get the job done (as long as the job is done well.)
  - inimino 10y ago
    I think before seriously proposing a new law, you should think deeply and long about, at least: - how exactly the law will be phrased - how exactly the law will be enforced - what the penalties shall be - all the ways you can reasonably anticipate that the law may be misused, whether obvious or subtle After all that thinking is finished, do a review of the history of laws that are similar to the one that you have proposed and see where and when such laws have existed and how they have worked out in practice. If, after doing all of that, you still support your original proposal, I will be very much taken aback.

by AdamSC1 10y ago

inimino 10y ago

> it should be a criminal offense to knowingly publish false information outside the protections of entertainment/satire/art etc. That is a rather dangerous idea.

AdamSC1 10y ago
I can see elements of danger if improperly used, but, from my point of view it is no more dangerous than libel laws or any other law which requires explicitly "knowing" what one is doing. A law like that is dangerous only if the burden of proof is on the journalist. Which in our modern society should never be the case. I admit, sadly there seems to many cases now where innocent until proven guilty isn't as strongly held. It is tremendously hard to prove that someone 'knew' the information they were publishing was false (outside of an explicit confession or conversation) and it absolutely should be hard. But, such a law may make people who are in it for the money at least give pause. I can't think of a case where if it isn't fiction, satire, humor, commentary etc etc, and you know it to be false information that you choose to spread as fact, that you aren't doing so with malicious intent to harm others or to personally benefit from the exploitation of others? The social contract of society exists primarily for protection from such actions, and its tool of protection is the law. If there are cases you can think of where that wouldn't be malicious or exploitative I'm really interested. While I still hold true on the idea that the most important thing with fake news is to empower people to make their own autonomous and informed decisions, I'd quite like to be wrong about criminalizing the spread of false information - as I am a fan of as few laws as possible to get the job done (as long as the job is done well.)
- inimino 10y ago
  I think before seriously proposing a new law, you should think deeply and long about, at least: - how exactly the law will be phrased - how exactly the law will be enforced - what the penalties shall be - all the ways you can reasonably anticipate that the law may be misused, whether obvious or subtle After all that thinking is finished, do a review of the history of laws that are similar to the one that you have proposed and see where and when such laws have existed and how they have worked out in practice. If, after doing all of that, you still support your original proposal, I will be very much taken aback.