5 ms·

Conservatives Are Now Getting Angry About Google's Fact-Checking Module

17 points by Osiris 9y ago

everdev 9y ago
Good intentions, poor execution. Fact checking is probably best done by a third party of the user's choosing. It's rare that a statement cannot be reasonbly argued from multiple angles. We simply have to pick the sources we trust and picking them for us is probably not the best solution. I understand the desire to prevent fake stories, but probably much better to tie credibility to individuals so there's more at stake for them personally.
- calciphus 9y ago
  Would a fact checking engine that allows you to use incorrect information as its source be better or worse than nothing at all?
  - everdev 9y ago
    In many instances there are many sides to a story. The point is, how do we know Google is unbiased? I don't think it's possible to completely remove bias. Even AI shows bias and if course humans do. Point is, I'd like to see the fact checking that I trust the most not the fact checking that someone else trusts the most. Google might have the best one for me, but I don't feel like it'll be the best for everyone.
MichaelGG 9y ago
I'm not a conservative (the very name implies that even if a conservative wins, all they get is to keep from losing). But it's clear Google has massive biases (at least in publicly visible representatives) and their fact checking (which I've only seen once or twice) has gone to biased sites like Politifact.
- beeftime 9y ago
  James Damore please log off
gnicholas 9y ago
This was on the front page of HN and then vanished. Does anyone know how/why they would happen without it showing as flagged?
- grzm 9y ago
  As I understand it, there are primarily four things that cause a submission to fall in ranking: flags can affect ranking before enough accumulate that '[flagged]' appears; the "overheated discussion detector" which I believe looks at rate of comments and votes can, when triggered, cause down weighting, though given the paucity of both for this submission I suspect it's unlikely; a mod can down-weight it if they feel it's not appropriate for the front page; it's a natural result of its motion relative to the action on other stories. The first three are active, which is likely what you're getting at. From the outside, hard to say which are contributing in any given case.
  - gnicholas 9y ago
    Thanks. I wasn’t aware that a story could be down-weighted as a result of being flagged, without it showing as “flagged”. I’m in the process of building a tool that will detect which stories have been torpedoed (for any reason) so that people don’t miss out on discussions that are popular but deemed inappropriate for HN. It seems a lot of these stories are political in nature.
    - ocfx 9y ago
      Well it's more because the title implies sweeping generalizations about conservatives. I think most people, when proven wrong by a fact checker, would be slightly irritated. It's a bait article, not really meant to foster discussion.
    - grzm 9y ago
      I do understand and sympathize with the motivation, I'm not sure if that's in keeping with what the mods are hoping to accomplish on HN. The guidelines are quite clear on what's appropriate: > "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Ideological or political battle or talking points. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic." While the question of what is politics or (even what is appropriate) for HN can be thorny and not always clearly demarcated, actively working against what the mods and the community as a whole are working towards might very well help weaken the fragile strengths HN currently enjoys. It's tough, because I think there are a lot of important topics that need discussing; however, not every forum is well-suited for such discussions. What makes HN valuable for a lot of members is, in part, that there is some curation by mods and members going on. While you mention only showing content so "people don't miss out on discussions", encouraging discussion on the topics can all-too-easily spill over into other threads. I also think it's questionable whether people are really missing out: many political threads continue to be active even when falling off of the front page. I'd love for people to be able to discuss everything reasonably, calmly, and rationally, giving everyone the benefit of the doubt and engaging in good faith. A lot of the social cues and reinforcements that encourage this off-line aren't present on HN by its very nature. If this type of discussion is truly what you want, there are plenty of places online where one can find it. Members sometimes mention they value the opinions of those on HN in particular, that they aren't necessarily present on other fora. One of the reasons for that, in part, is that many on HN are here because of the forum it currently is. Changing that environment can all too easily change the fauna that populate it. Anyway, that's likely more than what you were expecting :) (and Pascal† would likely have something to say about it, too). And you may very well disagree. I encourage you to use HN search to find what 'dang and 'sctb have commented on the subject. They have a lot of experience viewing what happens on HN, what their goals are when "tending the garden", and how they go about doing that, and both because it's interesting, and whether what you're looking to do works with or against those goals. † https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/04/28/shorter-letter/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/04/28/shorter-letter/
lykr0n 9y ago
Good idea in theory, but needs to be applied equally. I've seen just as much bullshit on Gizmodo (and sister sites) and BuzzFeed as I have on FoxNews, and other like sites. It does seem a bit weird that they are only trialing it on right leaning sources. Coupled with the stuff the Damore lawsuit is bringing out, it makes me take a second look. There also needs to be a distinction between reporting, and editorials. Every side is guilty of mixing in editorials masquerading as reporting along side reporting. It's extremely hard to tell the two apart. WashingtonPost; I need to look in the URL to see which category the content falls under. I think an effective method would having something along the lines of the following for each site: - This is a reliable source - This is generally a reliable source - This is sometimes reliable source - This is not generally a reliable source - This is not a reliable source - This is satire - This is opinion
benmmurphy 9y ago
some of the daily caller complaints seem to be google trying to text match the fact checking to an article and matching too liberally. i guess they are trying to do this because the url in the fact check site pointing to the original article sometimes becomes dead and maybe also because the same incorrect claim gets copy and pasted into other articles. but i'm surprised they didn't go for the simpler version of just matching by the URL to start off with. i guess if you have cool text processing / AI tools at hand then you have to use them. also, its quite possible that conservative sites aren't getting an unbalanced number of fact checks. the daily callers methodology was probably looking through a bunch of emails and tweets pointing them to fact checks on their property. they probably checked other sites by just putting random terms into a search engine. they shouldn't be surprised one of these techniques is going to generate more hits than the other :/ i'm also not sure how google could have provided this in a more fair way (ignoring the bad text matching). like a lot of the fact checking sites (snopes, polifact, etc) are considered biased by conservative sites. so there doesn't seem to be a way to provide third party fact checking without being attacked for bias.
supreme_sublime 9y ago
> Paranoid conservatives have increasingly become certain Google is trying to silence them, citing its firing of engineers who allegedly created hostile work environments and a largely illusory panic about YouTube censorship. >largely illusory panic The link that is cited here is one talking about a Prager University video on the "1 in 5 women are raped" claim. Prager U is suing Google for 1st amendment violations. The article talks about how it isn't likely to get Google in much legal trouble because they are a private company. However it doesn't make much comment on if the "panic" is "illusory" or not. The examples given seem to indicate Google is actively censoring certain people they don't like. [The Linked Article] > The complaint filed in California federal court includes charts of restricted videos compared to unrestricted videos on "similar topics." For example, Prager's video titled "Are 1 in 5 women in college raped?" is on lockdown, while a Real Time With Bill Maher video about The Hunting Ground; an interview with former Vice President Joe Biden on how to end the campus rape crisis; and Lady Gaga singing about rape all can be seen by YouTube users. > As to the meat of the thing good conservatives are supposed to get angry about: Is Google flagging more right-leaning sites for review than left-leaning ones? Probably. But, uh, that’s also probably because a massive segment of the conservative media, particularly newer digital ventures like the Caller, are completely fine with brazen distortion and aren’t interested in the same journalistic standards as most parts of the mainstream media. Hilarious that the links in this segment are to MotherJones and NewRepublic. Hardly unbiased sources, and none of the links are any kind of support for what is being talked about in this paragraph. I notice that a lot in these kinds of pieces, they think that putting links to other articles will somehow make them seem more well supported. When you actually follow the links they are nonsensical or throw you down a rabbit hole of checking event characterization. This whole article is weird, the author admits that Google isn't doing a good job at their attempt at fact checking, but who cares? The people complaining are people we don't like!

17 points by Osiris 9y ago

Good intentions, poor execution. Fact checking is probably best done by a third party of the user's choosing. It's rare that a statement cannot be reasonbly argued from multiple angles. We simply have to pick the sources we trust and picking them for us is probably not the best solution. I understand the desire to prevent fake stories, but probably much better to tie credibility to individuals so there's more at stake for them personally.

calciphus 9y ago
Would a fact checking engine that allows you to use incorrect information as its source be better or worse than nothing at all?
- everdev 9y ago
  In many instances there are many sides to a story. The point is, how do we know Google is unbiased? I don't think it's possible to completely remove bias. Even AI shows bias and if course humans do. Point is, I'd like to see the fact checking that I trust the most not the fact checking that someone else trusts the most. Google might have the best one for me, but I don't feel like it'll be the best for everyone.

MichaelGG 9y ago

I'm not a conservative (the very name implies that even if a conservative wins, all they get is to keep from losing). But it's clear Google has massive biases (at least in publicly visible representatives) and their fact checking (which I've only seen once or twice) has gone to biased sites like Politifact.

beeftime 9y ago
James Damore please log off

gnicholas 9y ago

This was on the front page of HN and then vanished. Does anyone know how/why they would happen without it showing as flagged?

grzm 9y ago
As I understand it, there are primarily four things that cause a submission to fall in ranking: flags can affect ranking before enough accumulate that '[flagged]' appears; the "overheated discussion detector" which I believe looks at rate of comments and votes can, when triggered, cause down weighting, though given the paucity of both for this submission I suspect it's unlikely; a mod can down-weight it if they feel it's not appropriate for the front page; it's a natural result of its motion relative to the action on other stories. The first three are active, which is likely what you're getting at. From the outside, hard to say which are contributing in any given case.
- gnicholas 9y ago
  Thanks. I wasn’t aware that a story could be down-weighted as a result of being flagged, without it showing as “flagged”. I’m in the process of building a tool that will detect which stories have been torpedoed (for any reason) so that people don’t miss out on discussions that are popular but deemed inappropriate for HN. It seems a lot of these stories are political in nature.
  - ocfx 9y ago
    Well it's more because the title implies sweeping generalizations about conservatives. I think most people, when proven wrong by a fact checker, would be slightly irritated. It's a bait article, not really meant to foster discussion.
  - grzm 9y ago
    I do understand and sympathize with the motivation, I'm not sure if that's in keeping with what the mods are hoping to accomplish on HN. The guidelines are quite clear on what's appropriate: > "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Ideological or political battle or talking points. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic." While the question of what is politics or (even what is appropriate) for HN can be thorny and not always clearly demarcated, actively working against what the mods and the community as a whole are working towards might very well help weaken the fragile strengths HN currently enjoys. It's tough, because I think there are a lot of important topics that need discussing; however, not every forum is well-suited for such discussions. What makes HN valuable for a lot of members is, in part, that there is some curation by mods and members going on. While you mention only showing content so "people don't miss out on discussions", encouraging discussion on the topics can all-too-easily spill over into other threads. I also think it's questionable whether people are really missing out: many political threads continue to be active even when falling off of the front page. I'd love for people to be able to discuss everything reasonably, calmly, and rationally, giving everyone the benefit of the doubt and engaging in good faith. A lot of the social cues and reinforcements that encourage this off-line aren't present on HN by its very nature. If this type of discussion is truly what you want, there are plenty of places online where one can find it. Members sometimes mention they value the opinions of those on HN in particular, that they aren't necessarily present on other fora. One of the reasons for that, in part, is that many on HN are here because of the forum it currently is. Changing that environment can all too easily change the fauna that populate it. Anyway, that's likely more than what you were expecting :) (and Pascal† would likely have something to say about it, too). And you may very well disagree. I encourage you to use HN search to find what 'dang and 'sctb have commented on the subject. They have a lot of experience viewing what happens on HN, what their goals are when "tending the garden", and how they go about doing that, and both because it's interesting, and whether what you're looking to do works with or against those goals. † https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/04/28/shorter-letter/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/04/28/shorter-letter/

lykr0n 9y ago

Good idea in theory, but needs to be applied equally. I've seen just as much bullshit on Gizmodo (and sister sites) and BuzzFeed as I have on FoxNews, and other like sites. It does seem a bit weird that they are only trialing it on right leaning sources. Coupled with the stuff the Damore lawsuit is bringing out, it makes me take a second look. There also needs to be a distinction between reporting, and editorials. Every side is guilty of mixing in editorials masquerading as reporting along side reporting. It's extremely hard to tell the two apart. WashingtonPost; I need to look in the URL to see which category the content falls under. I think an effective method would having something along the lines of the following for each site: - This is a reliable source - This is generally a reliable source - This is sometimes reliable source - This is not generally a reliable source - This is not a reliable source - This is satire - This is opinion

benmmurphy 9y ago

some of the daily caller complaints seem to be google trying to text match the fact checking to an article and matching too liberally. i guess they are trying to do this because the url in the fact check site pointing to the original article sometimes becomes dead and maybe also because the same incorrect claim gets copy and pasted into other articles. but i'm surprised they didn't go for the simpler version of just matching by the URL to start off with. i guess if you have cool text processing / AI tools at hand then you have to use them. also, its quite possible that conservative sites aren't getting an unbalanced number of fact checks. the daily callers methodology was probably looking through a bunch of emails and tweets pointing them to fact checks on their property. they probably checked other sites by just putting random terms into a search engine. they shouldn't be surprised one of these techniques is going to generate more hits than the other :/ i'm also not sure how google could have provided this in a more fair way (ignoring the bad text matching). like a lot of the fact checking sites (snopes, polifact, etc) are considered biased by conservative sites. so there doesn't seem to be a way to provide third party fact checking without being attacked for bias.

supreme_sublime 9y ago

> Paranoid conservatives have increasingly become certain Google is trying to silence them, citing its firing of engineers who allegedly created hostile work environments and a largely illusory panic about YouTube censorship. >largely illusory panic The link that is cited here is one talking about a Prager University video on the "1 in 5 women are raped" claim. Prager U is suing Google for 1st amendment violations. The article talks about how it isn't likely to get Google in much legal trouble because they are a private company. However it doesn't make much comment on if the "panic" is "illusory" or not. The examples given seem to indicate Google is actively censoring certain people they don't like. [The Linked Article] > The complaint filed in California federal court includes charts of restricted videos compared to unrestricted videos on "similar topics." For example, Prager's video titled "Are 1 in 5 women in college raped?" is on lockdown, while a Real Time With Bill Maher video about The Hunting Ground; an interview with former Vice President Joe Biden on how to end the campus rape crisis; and Lady Gaga singing about rape all can be seen by YouTube users. > As to the meat of the thing good conservatives are supposed to get angry about: Is Google flagging more right-leaning sites for review than left-leaning ones? Probably. But, uh, that’s also probably because a massive segment of the conservative media, particularly newer digital ventures like the Caller, are completely fine with brazen distortion and aren’t interested in the same journalistic standards as most parts of the mainstream media. Hilarious that the links in this segment are to MotherJones and NewRepublic. Hardly unbiased sources, and none of the links are any kind of support for what is being talked about in this paragraph. I notice that a lot in these kinds of pieces, they think that putting links to other articles will somehow make them seem more well supported. When you actually follow the links they are nonsensical or throw you down a rabbit hole of checking event characterization. This whole article is weird, the author admits that Google isn't doing a good job at their attempt at fact checking, but who cares? The people complaining are people we don't like!