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"It seems like citizens are no longer awake and fighting for the bill of rights" Nothing in the bill of rights applies here. You don't have freedom of speech o

"It seems like citizens are no longer awake and fighting for the bill of rights" Nothing in the bill of rights applies here. You don't have freedom of speech on Facebook - They make the rules and decide what is allowed and not allowed. It's a company, not the US Government. If enough of their users are upset that fake news like "The Pope endorses Donald Trump" (a real example) is surfacing constantly on their news feeds, it is in Facebook's best interest as a company to try to remedy the situation. They make money when people are actively using their site - and if the "Fake News Epidemic" is causing people to stop using Facebook, they'll try to stop it. Nobody is making anybody use Facebook - it does seem kind of silly to me, but clearly they see value in this (or not doing this was losing them money). What we really need to do is stop treating large corporations like they are a government entity and getting upset when they start restricting "free speech" - they have no obligation to allow people to post anything they want, and can manipulate your timeline as much as they want because you signed their ToS.

r2dnb 10y ago
I just posted on an another thread that the problem here is that Facebook positionning / PR is to be say that they are a neutral agent. "Share what you want with your friends / family etc." This is why this case is different. If I use ExxonMobilBook, I kind of know what to expect of Greenpeace related stories. Given their size, extra-precaution needs to be taken. They either need to rollback, or make their agenda more appearent.
- tyleraldrich 10y ago
  "They either need to rollback, or make their agenda more appearent." That is an opinion. They, in reality, don't need to do anything, nor do they owe you anything. Just because their positioning/PR makes them seem neutral, that doesn't mean they are required to be. They don't need to take precaution, and I will eat my shoe if this decision is what causes Facebook to lose users. Fact of the matter is, 99.9% of users don't care, .09% are cool with facebook doing this, and .01% (you) want them to roll back.
  - dabockster 10y ago
    > 99.9% of users don't care More like 99.9% of users don't know enough about the situation to warrant an opinion. I mean, if you asked random passerby on the street about Facebook's neutrality in terms of freedom of speech, I guarantee you that 99.9% of them will respond with something along the lines of "I don't know, I just use it to share funny cat videos with my friends lmao xD" or "If you don't like it you don't have to click on it".
  - vivekd 10y ago
    To be fair, facebook can, if it wants, put full blown nazi propaganda on their network and delete anything anti-nazi. Of course just because it's legal for a company to do that doesn't mean it's ethical and okay and we should just accept it. Similarly, while it's perfectly legal or facebook to select news stories to try and politically influence it's users, that would be highly unethical. To be fair to facebook though, reddit has been actively caught doing this repeatedly so I don't know why everyone is harping on facebook instead of reddit.

r2dnb 10y ago

I just posted on an another thread that the problem here is that Facebook positionning / PR is to be say that they are a neutral agent. "Share what you want with your friends / family etc." This is why this case is different. If I use ExxonMobilBook, I kind of know what to expect of Greenpeace related stories. Given their size, extra-precaution needs to be taken. They either need to rollback, or make their agenda more appearent.

tyleraldrich 10y ago
"They either need to rollback, or make their agenda more appearent." That is an opinion. They, in reality, don't need to do anything, nor do they owe you anything. Just because their positioning/PR makes them seem neutral, that doesn't mean they are required to be. They don't need to take precaution, and I will eat my shoe if this decision is what causes Facebook to lose users. Fact of the matter is, 99.9% of users don't care, .09% are cool with facebook doing this, and .01% (you) want them to roll back.
- dabockster 10y ago
  > 99.9% of users don't care More like 99.9% of users don't know enough about the situation to warrant an opinion. I mean, if you asked random passerby on the street about Facebook's neutrality in terms of freedom of speech, I guarantee you that 99.9% of them will respond with something along the lines of "I don't know, I just use it to share funny cat videos with my friends lmao xD" or "If you don't like it you don't have to click on it".
- vivekd 10y ago
  To be fair, facebook can, if it wants, put full blown nazi propaganda on their network and delete anything anti-nazi. Of course just because it's legal for a company to do that doesn't mean it's ethical and okay and we should just accept it. Similarly, while it's perfectly legal or facebook to select news stories to try and politically influence it's users, that would be highly unethical. To be fair to facebook though, reddit has been actively caught doing this repeatedly so I don't know why everyone is harping on facebook instead of reddit.