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Facebook’s algorithm change has spurred an angry, Fox News-dominated News Feed

237 points by sethbannon 8y ago

tmaly 8y ago
I have started to use FB for only humor and private groups about side projects. I got tired of all the politics and news. If it bleeds it leads keeps the mind steeped in negativity.
- 1337biz 8y ago
  I am using FB the same way. The only thing left making it useful are the groups and the event calendar function. Meetup still seems mostly driven by tech or some super niche topics while FB carters to a broad audience.
  - tmaly 8y ago
    I would prefer a more niche product that would take the best of FB groups and meetup together. Its nice to have focused discussion, but it is also good to actually get together face to face.
untog 8y ago
Worth reading the entire article, it's a great, if depressing read. I seriously wonder Facebook is up to the challenge here - they made algorithmic changes to make the news feed a better place and it very obviously failed. And yet they haven't changed a thing in reaction. Was anyone even looking? It all feels incredibly reactionary: make a change to answer your critics and then forget all about it until it becomes an issue again.
- cal5k 8y ago
  Perhaps Facebook’s algorithms aren’t the issue. Maybe WE are the problem :)
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
revskill 8y ago
Long time ago, my facebook newsfeed was full of my friends' sharing, it's been very useful place for us to keep friends update. But now, it's a different place. It's a place for ads, for livestream, for real "social" stuffs, but most of them is useless to me for what i use facebook for.
- jaabe 8y ago
  The Facebook news feed is dead to anyone but trolls, at least in my anecdotal experience. Facebook is only useful for its yellow pages function. Unfortunately that alone is enough to keep my social circle on Facebook. It’s just really hard to break away, because social circles consists of people with different social circles, and not everyone is going to replace Facebook with the samething, and then everyone is still on Facebook. Maybe e-mail could be the core of the next generation yellow pages? It’s the only thing everyone has.
  - kthejoker2 8y ago
    Excuse me, do you mean white pages? I don't use Facebook for finding businesses.
    - jaabe 8y ago
      I guess I do, in Denmark they came in the same book called the yellow pages (de gule sider). I guess that was because we’re a tiny nation, but now that you mention it the “people” pages were indeed white.
  - chongli 8y ago
    Email was killed by spam (and lack of ease of use) long ago. Now it's mostly used by business.
  - nradov 8y ago
    My Facebook news feed is fine. I actively unfollow (hide all from) almost all shared third-party content (including news) so that I mostly only see original content from my friends and family.
qrbLPHiKpiux 8y ago
> livestream Watching very closely to see how they handle this.
hgjwq 8y ago
If the top sites were nytimes, new yorker and bbc you would be very happy right? ;)
- matt4077 8y ago
  Those three are not the “left-wing equivalent” of Fox. See, for example, the media bias chart: https://www.adfontesmedia.com https://www.adfontesmedia.com Left equivalents of Fox are Daily Kos et al.
  - JMTQp8lwXL 8y ago
    Can we talk about how Fox News is literally at the intersection of the Yellow, Orange, and Red rectangles? For context: - Yellow: Fair interpretation of the news - Orange: Extreme/unfair interpretation of the news - Red: Nonsense damaging to the public discourse
    - dumitrupetrov 8y ago
      And that's what said other rival left leaning Media outlet's. Nice. Because you 'obviously' know what's better for those people, that's what your TV said, 'fox news is bad'.
  - burfog 8y ago
    It looks like that chart just assumes that the median news is neutral. This is not a valid assumption. What is "Neutral" anyway? When news sources are compared against public opinion in the USA, Fox is just a tiny bit left of center now. This should make it obvious why Fox is the most popular news channel. If Fox were really "Hyper-Partisan Right" bordering on "Most Extreme Right", then it couldn't possibly be as popular as it is.
IgorPartola 8y ago
That’s why I no longer participate in Facebook other than their marketplace. I also turn off retweets on Twitter. I want to see what my friends have to say, not what they share. Shared content is either garbage, propaganda, or news which I get elsewhere.
NicoJuicy 8y ago
Hey Mr. Zuckerberg, Send me back my friends list, it's how facebook originated. And if you continue down this road. It's how someone else might take over. It's just common sense. With friendly regards, A facebook reader ( not a user anymore, since i don't post anything on it)
JakeWesorick 8y ago
I'd love to see companies that use an algorithm to create "feeds" also release a full explanation on how the algorithm works. I prefer a chronological feeds mostly because then I know I'm not being manipulated by an algorithm. Making in transparent would give me confidence in it.
- akoncius 8y ago
  explaining algorithm would help bad actors to abuse it even more..
danschumann 8y ago
Angry? It makes you angry but that doesn't mean it's angry. Just like hate speech that causes you to hate but isn't necessarily motivated by hatred.
- darkstar999 8y ago
  Read the article. "Angry" in this context is the Facebook reaction (such as the "like").
  - SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
    You are right, but that metric is even more meaningless. Fox New Headline ”Immigration crisis confirmed as 70,000 illegals pass into USA in Feburary - CBP” Guess what? People on the left and right both ‘ANGRY’ that for different reasons.
    - bonniemuffin 8y ago
      I think the point here is that the Angry reaction is a signifier of divisive content. Divisiveness gets people talking, so the metrics look good even though the discourse is unhealthy and tearing society apart on both sides.
volak 8y ago
Fox News dominates ratings on TV so its not surprising they'd be #1 - there's also the fact this is "engagements" and not click-throughs. I'd wager good 15% of these are probably people clicking "Angry" not actually engaging. If you look at "content with the most shares" not surprisingly Reuters and Patch tops the list. OP's headline presumes any algorithm should achieve left/right balance - this is just impossible. There was a good tweet the other day something along the lines of If I Google a headline the results are: * New York Times: Your number of free articles is 0 * Wall Street Journal: Subscription needed * Bloomberg: See this article for $1 * Fox News: Completely free * Breitbart: Completely free Seeing this its no stretch to understand why media struggles
- Animats 8y ago
  * New York Times: Your number of free articles is 0 ... The Washington Post recently tightened up their paywall, too.
- api 8y ago
  I understand the economics of course but it seems obvious to me that if real newspapers charge then propaganda and anger porn will rule discourse. If you want some more on the list for balance there are plenty of left wing Breitbarts you could add. Those are free too. BTW I think fear porn / anger porn is an appropriate term. It releases brain chemicals that can be addictive just like sex porn. This explains some of its virality.
  - volak 8y ago
    There are left wing Breitbarts just like there's MSNBC for TV. The issue then becomes why these are far less popular. Its not because of a FB algorithm - that's for certain. I can ask everyone in my family if they've heard of Breitbart and 99% will say yes. If I ask if they've heard of Rachael Maddow.. maybe 40%? This is despite both of them engaging heavily in anger porn
    - jerkstate 8y ago
      That's not really a valid comparison. Rachel Maddow is an anchor on MSNBC, which my guess is everyone has heard of. I know what Breitbart is but I don't know any of their writers by name.
ykevinator 8y ago
Fox news is the new 700 club. It's a steady diet of comfort food.
- matt4077 8y ago
  Funny dog videos are “comfort food”. Fox News is hate porn.
  - SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
    Fox runs approx ~50% negative content on Trump. MSNBC run 92%+ negative [0] [1] [2] If your view of Fox News was largely based from 2008 and The Daily Show - How could you know? With a blanket statement like “Fox News is hate porn” you clearly aren’t seeking alternative viewpoints. This isn’t even getting into that you are lumping Fox NEWS and Fox News Channel Opinion Shows together which isn’t unfair to do so long as you do the same with CNN and MSNBC alike). [0] https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/media-trump-hatred-coverage/ https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/media-trump-ha... [1] https://www.npr.org/2017/10/02/555092743/study-news-coverage-of-trump-more-negative-than-for-other-presidents https://www.npr.org/2017/10/02/555092743/study-news-coverage... [2] https://www.chicagotribune.com/g00/news/columnists/kass/ct-trump-media-coverage-harvard-kass-0521-20170519-column.html?i10c.ua=4&i10c.encReferrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8%3d https://www.chicagotribune.com/g00/news/columnists/kass/ct-t...
    - JMTQp8lwXL 8y ago
      Just because Fox is 50% negative on Trump and MSNBC is 92% negative, doesn't mean in aggregate, Fox is less negative. There are other news topics, beyond Trump. Hard to believe, I know, but there are.
    - dumitrupetrov 8y ago
      Apparently facts don't work on the left when they contradict their belief. I tried it's not working. Just like pre-programmed NPC's.
Alterlife 8y ago
I wish it could be made illegal to optimise for engagement. “Engagement” their acceptable replacement word for what they really want to optimise for: Addiction.
- geofft 8y ago
  "Engagement" is unfortunately a proxy for "profit," if a business is ad-supported or otherwise has revenue proportional to use. And it is basically illegal not to optimize for profit. (You do not have to micro-optimize every decision for short-term profit, but you do have to act in the best interests of the company, and the best interest of a for-profit company is, at the end of the day, profit.) Netflix has said one of their major competitors is now the desire to go to sleep instead of keeping watching, for instance. If you want to make optimizing for engagement illegal—a plan I support, tbh—you need to eliminate capitalism either from the inside or the outside. From the inside, you can try to win hearts and minds of customers and employees with endeavors that aren't structured for profit, e.g., public-benefit corporations or perhaps hybrid non-profit models (like Mozilla, or like OpenAI's new thing, which I am cautiously optimistic about, or like Etsy before they gave up their B-corp status to save the business, which is part of the caution in my optimism). If you can hire all the best employees away from the Facebooks and Netflixes of the world to the Mozillas and Etsys of the world (which, given the number of software engineers who are incredibly frustrated about spending their days micro-optimizing ad engagement, doesn't actually seem that hard), you can probably out-compete them. Or, from the outside, you can just make for-profit companies past a certain point of profit straight-up illegal (which is to say, make the government cease to recognize corporate structures beyond certain limits - this isn't additional government intervention, this is just the removal of government protections for corporations like the corporate veil, work-for-hire, "right-to-work," tax advantages, etc.).
- nlh 8y ago
  It’s such a slippery slope, but you’re so right. Chemists designed a chemical that’s optimized for engagement too — it’s called heroin! On the other side, one could argue that just about any successful product or service, by definition, optimized for engagement (addiction). Hit TV shows, beautiful vacation spots, sex. So where do you draw the line?
alkibiades 8y ago
why is fox news “angry” yet i’m sure feeds full of aoc and black lives matter would be considered woke. Biased article. The anger is very prevalent with both sides.
- jimmy1 8y ago
  Exactly. Someone with currently no political home what-so-ever, anyone else here that thinks otherwise needs to take a step back and evaluate the extremism that has taken over both sides.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- cowpig 8y ago
  "Angry" is the facebook reaction. Dividing the world into two "sides" isn't good for us. I don't think the world of political discourse is really divided into two "sides" as you imply, despite that being useful for media that make money from making people angry.
  - SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
    I’m open minded to what you are saying - but if you don’t think there are “sides” or at least someone has a strong interest in promoting that idea - it may because you are too firmly planted in one side yourself. I agree with GP, as someone with no clear cut political ideology, it’s obvious that wedge issues are formed and selected to fit divisions. See no further than almost every establishment Democrat having talked about border security for years, even building a wall in comments, now voting against anything border related because “their side” has adopted that Trump wants border security so they must be fully against it. [0] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gISMNv3qm8M&app=desktop https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gISMNv3qm8M&app=desktop (just picked a “Democrat for Wall” result, my personal opinions on that completely aside. You could pick any wedge issue and find a more reasonable time for it)
- abathur 8y ago
  I think they are just counting the "reaction" of the users with the content, and suggesting there are a greater portion of people picking the "angry" reaction on the Fox News articles.
gnicholas 8y ago
> the “angry” reaction dominates many pages, with “Fox News driving the most angry reactions of anyone, with nearly double that of anyone else.” So does this mean that Fox News is dominating the news feed because of liberal people hating on it, or is it because of articles that Fox News writes that riles up their base?
- cowpig 8y ago
  I think it's healthier to avoid dividing everybody into two categories, and interpreting everything with respect to those. But to answer your question within your own worldview, it's both.
  - isoskeles 8y ago
    Why aren’t you commenting this at the OP? Do you think “Fox News dominated” wasn’t intentionally playing into the idea of dividing everybody into two categories?
    - cowpig 8y ago
      I think "Fox New dominated" is the headline because the research it is reporting on shows that Fox News dominates the rankings in feeds. edit: also I did respond to the top level, but with a link to something which I felt contributed to my understanding of this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc
  - gnicholas 8y ago
    Perhaps you can enlighten me on other reasons that people would react with an angry emoji, aside from the two I described. Also, I’m not interpreting everything with respect to two categories — I'm interpreting single study this way.
    - darkpuma 8y ago
      There may be two broad motivations for leaving an angry emoji; either they are angry at the article or the article made them angry. However categorizing these two groups as "liberal" or "their base" isn't justified. It may be the case that somebody, perhaps a conservative, is angry at Fox News for a particular spin or editorialization but generally likes other Fox News articles. It may also be the case that somebody who considers themselves something other than "liberal" or "Fox News' base" finds a Fox News article in their facebook stream and is either angry at Fox News or because of Fox News. It's also possible, although perhaps less likely, that a liberal might become angry not at Fox News but because of what Fox News is reporting. They might not be amused to see Fox News in their stream, but it's certainly possible that the substance of the story has them angered even more. To give an example, consider this current Fox News headline: > New Zealand shooting's a social media wake-up call -- YouTube, others, must stop amplifying violent crimes [A 'fox news conservative' sees that headline and leaves an angry emoji.] Is it because he's angry about the shooting? Or angry at Youtube/etc? Or angry because he thinks Fox news is cynically exploiting the tragedy to take pot shots at a tech company? [A liberal sees that headline and leaves and angry emoji.] Is it because he's angry that Fox News is making it into his news feed? Or because he's angry at the shooting? Or angry at youtube/etc? Or angry because he thinks Fox news is cynically exploiting the tragedy to take pot shots at a tech company? You really can't say. Any particular individual may have their own reason for posting an angry emoji at a headline like that. For a headline like that, it's quite possible for a liberal and a fox news conservative to have the exact same reason for leaving an angry emoji.
adolph 8y ago
Their feeds give them permission to like what they already like. Their feeds let them know that their culture is winning. https://harpers.org/archive/2019/04/like-this-or-die/ https://harpers.org/archive/2019/04/like-this-or-die/
cowpig 8y ago
CGP Grey has an interesting video about anger-inducing content and engagement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc
Ozzie_osman 8y ago
This is kind of sad, that angry is the top emotion. If FB was really optimizing for time well spent, you'd think the ranking system would be able to pick up on content or sources that predictably generate angry reactions.
- dymk 8y ago
  That’s not FB optimizing, it’s Fox News
toofy 8y ago
Seeing the top shared and engaged content in this article is pretty much the exact reason I and pretty much everyone I know abandoned Facebook long ago. It has been reduced to mostly just a place for people who are highly addicted to outragePorn clickbait. As the article says: > ...Instead, it’s often an angry, reactive place where people go to get worked up and to get scared. I haven't checked to see if this has been studied, but I'd wager a years salary that information which causes fear and/or outrage are highly addictive and that Facebook's core crowd are hooked. I'd also wager that this addiction is why so many aren't concerned with whether or not the information is accurate, as long as they get their dose.
- smokeyj 8y ago
  It's funny how clearly people are addicted to outrage, yet also in complete denial about it. They don't see it as outrage, instead it's measured, proportional, and reactionary response to the opposition. It's the opposition that's addicted to outrage, not my team. Unfortunately I think we've forged a new road to politics, we can call it "outrage marketing". The more the opposition is outraged, the more publicity you get - the more extreme candidates from both sides bubble up in popularity.
  - pixl97 8y ago
    Related video to watch: CGPGrey, This video will make you angry.
platz 8y ago
If you're wondering how articles like "Woman smears menstrual blood on face to show periods are beautiful and powerful" are motivated and end up getting amplified, look no further than The Toxoplasma Of Rage (Slate Star Codex) http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the-toxoplasma-of-rage/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the-toxoplasma-of-rage/ ... "So there’s a tradeoff here, with X on one side and Y on the other. X can get everyone to agree in principle that Q is bad, but no one will pay any attention to it. And Y can get everyone to pay attention to Q, but a lot of people who would otherwise oppose it will switch to supporting it just because they’re so mad at the way it’s being publicized. At least Y got them to pay attention! They’re traveling up an incentive gradient that rewards them for doing so, even if it destroys their credibility." ... "People talk about the shift from old print-based journalism to the new world of social media and the sites adapted to serve it. These are fast, responsive, and only just beginning to discover the power of controversy. They are memetic evolution shot into hyperdrive, and the omega point is a well-tuned machine optimized to search the world for the most controversial and counterproductive issues, then make sure no one can talk about anything else. An engine that creates money by burning the few remaining shreds of cooperation, bipartisanship and social trust."
joeblow21 8y ago
Their algo is now attempting to surpress fake news so it makes sense that fox would rise to the top. Most the “angry” is people reading fox news content and getiing angry about what they are reading - attempted coup, deep state, socialists etc.
teddyh 8y ago
Other people in this thread have already posted links to The Toxoplasma Of Rage by Slate Star Codex and This Video Will Make You Angry by CGP Grey, so I’ll just complete the set with You're not going to believe what I'm about to tell you by The Oatmeal: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe
karlakush 8y ago
My feed is primarily ski videos, sports highlights, and memes. Facebook even explains exactly why this is happening with a message above each post saying I'm seeing this because it's "Similar to Posts You've Interacted With." If you don't want to see Fox News articles, unfollow Fox News or stop interacting with them.
saltvedt 8y ago
I've created a news aggregator based on Wikipedia references. While this might be comparing apples to oranges, here's the list of the most cited websites by Wikipedia: https://cited.news/domains https://cited.news/domains It's still a bit buggy, so the "blank" domain is ranked #1, followed by NY Times, BBC and The Guardian. Fox News is ranked at #93 at that list: https://cited.news/domains/show/www.foxnews.com/citations https://cited.news/domains/show/www.foxnews.com/citations
- burfog 8y ago
  Wikipedia itself is quite biased. Some domains are even banned despite providing real news with original reporting.
  - thundergolfer 8y ago
    Know where to find that list? I googled around and couldn't get it.
    - cooper12 8y ago
      No sources are actually blanket "banned". Some exceptionally bad ones like the Daily Mail are "deprecated", but that does not mean it can't be used anywhere ever. For your edification: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Per... (there's a legend at the bottom)
      - burfog 8y ago
        They are banned. Search your list for "blacklist". Note that the blacklisted sources are only on one side of the political spectrum -- not one thing on the other side got blacklisted.
        cooper12 8y ago
        Oh, you meant Breitbart and Infowars? Those can still be used, but require whitelisting; so still not a ban. You can read the linked discussions for more information. Not gonna rehash and spell it all out for you here. I wouldn't say two instances are a pattern of anything, but going by your logic, guess that side of the spectrum just has more history of spam and persistent abuse on the English Wikipedia.
mannyk7 8y ago
This "study" simply tells me really nothing. It does sort out the types of users who want to connect and click on those posts in questions. Personally speaking, I would look elsewhere for a more in-depth and bias-free analysis for any business driven venture. Too much presumptions made in this article. Just that the way it defines “meaningful interactions”, "divisive" topics, “angry” reaction, etc. is rather unprofessional. A better way is to define and characterize the users of these news postings and get statistical averages on the response time and intensity of responses as well as commonly used words/phrase in reply.
anonytrary 8y ago
Things might be simpler if content aggregators had the option of making public their feed algorithms in exchange for not being responsible for user-posted content. Congress will eventually learn that automated censorship is not even close to being a solved problem, and it may never be truly solved. Whether or not automated zero-error censorship is even possible is a question for philosophers and mathematicians. I find it crazy that we're burdening companies with this job when we know so little about it. Common sense tells us that users should be responsible for what they post. If you post something illegal, you should pay the price, not the ISP, not Google, not Facebook. If users aren't held accountable for their own actions, then they'll continue to post abominable things. It should not the responsibility of Google, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc. to provide a safety net for the user. The internet is like a virtual highway. Some people build roads, but it is the responsibility of the rest of us to learn how to use those roads safely and in accordance with the laws. We usually don't punish the road-builders for accidents (unless the road was built with malicious intent).
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
mcguire 8y ago
I'm not sure how I feel about ladbible leading breitbart.
bennettfeely 8y ago
It's still wild to me Fox News, with its 18.5M followers is still following its boycott of Twitter, and hasn't tweeted since last November. Neither has Fox News Politics, (2M followers) or Fox and Friends (1.3M followers).
nojvek 8y ago
I realized my friends didn’t use Facebook. I didn’t use Facebook much. It was just ads and pages posting crap that played with my emotions. I kept Facebook so I could message a friend if I was in their city and we could meet. I held my account for years in that hope. I then realized I haven’t messaged anyone for a year. I mostly use other channels. I deleted Facebook and been happy ever since. My entire circle of friends is mostly Facebook zombies. My prediction is it will be a generational thing. Kinda like how young people really don’t buy that much jewelry compared to their parents

237 points by sethbannon 8y ago

I have started to use FB for only humor and private groups about side projects. I got tired of all the politics and news. If it bleeds it leads keeps the mind steeped in negativity.

1337biz 8y ago
I am using FB the same way. The only thing left making it useful are the groups and the event calendar function. Meetup still seems mostly driven by tech or some super niche topics while FB carters to a broad audience.
- tmaly 8y ago
  I would prefer a more niche product that would take the best of FB groups and meetup together. Its nice to have focused discussion, but it is also good to actually get together face to face.

untog 8y ago

Worth reading the entire article, it's a great, if depressing read. I seriously wonder Facebook is up to the challenge here - they made algorithmic changes to make the news feed a better place and it very obviously failed. And yet they haven't changed a thing in reaction. Was anyone even looking? It all feels incredibly reactionary: make a change to answer your critics and then forget all about it until it becomes an issue again.

cal5k 8y ago
Perhaps Facebook’s algorithms aren’t the issue. Maybe WE are the problem :)
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

revskill 8y ago

Long time ago, my facebook newsfeed was full of my friends' sharing, it's been very useful place for us to keep friends update. But now, it's a different place. It's a place for ads, for livestream, for real "social" stuffs, but most of them is useless to me for what i use facebook for.

jaabe 8y ago
The Facebook news feed is dead to anyone but trolls, at least in my anecdotal experience. Facebook is only useful for its yellow pages function. Unfortunately that alone is enough to keep my social circle on Facebook. It’s just really hard to break away, because social circles consists of people with different social circles, and not everyone is going to replace Facebook with the samething, and then everyone is still on Facebook. Maybe e-mail could be the core of the next generation yellow pages? It’s the only thing everyone has.
- kthejoker2 8y ago
  Excuse me, do you mean white pages? I don't use Facebook for finding businesses.
  - jaabe 8y ago
    I guess I do, in Denmark they came in the same book called the yellow pages (de gule sider). I guess that was because we’re a tiny nation, but now that you mention it the “people” pages were indeed white.
- chongli 8y ago
  Email was killed by spam (and lack of ease of use) long ago. Now it's mostly used by business.
- nradov 8y ago
  My Facebook news feed is fine. I actively unfollow (hide all from) almost all shared third-party content (including news) so that I mostly only see original content from my friends and family.

qrbLPHiKpiux 8y ago

> livestream Watching very closely to see how they handle this.

hgjwq 8y ago

If the top sites were nytimes, new yorker and bbc you would be very happy right? ;)

matt4077 8y ago
Those three are not the “left-wing equivalent” of Fox. See, for example, the media bias chart: https://www.adfontesmedia.com https://www.adfontesmedia.com Left equivalents of Fox are Daily Kos et al.
- JMTQp8lwXL 8y ago
  Can we talk about how Fox News is literally at the intersection of the Yellow, Orange, and Red rectangles? For context: - Yellow: Fair interpretation of the news - Orange: Extreme/unfair interpretation of the news - Red: Nonsense damaging to the public discourse
  - dumitrupetrov 8y ago
    And that's what said other rival left leaning Media outlet's. Nice. Because you 'obviously' know what's better for those people, that's what your TV said, 'fox news is bad'.
- burfog 8y ago
  It looks like that chart just assumes that the median news is neutral. This is not a valid assumption. What is "Neutral" anyway? When news sources are compared against public opinion in the USA, Fox is just a tiny bit left of center now. This should make it obvious why Fox is the most popular news channel. If Fox were really "Hyper-Partisan Right" bordering on "Most Extreme Right", then it couldn't possibly be as popular as it is.

IgorPartola 8y ago

That’s why I no longer participate in Facebook other than their marketplace. I also turn off retweets on Twitter. I want to see what my friends have to say, not what they share. Shared content is either garbage, propaganda, or news which I get elsewhere.

NicoJuicy 8y ago

Hey Mr. Zuckerberg, Send me back my friends list, it's how facebook originated. And if you continue down this road. It's how someone else might take over. It's just common sense. With friendly regards, A facebook reader ( not a user anymore, since i don't post anything on it)

JakeWesorick 8y ago

I'd love to see companies that use an algorithm to create "feeds" also release a full explanation on how the algorithm works. I prefer a chronological feeds mostly because then I know I'm not being manipulated by an algorithm. Making in transparent would give me confidence in it.

akoncius 8y ago
explaining algorithm would help bad actors to abuse it even more..

danschumann 8y ago

Angry? It makes you angry but that doesn't mean it's angry. Just like hate speech that causes you to hate but isn't necessarily motivated by hatred.

darkstar999 8y ago
Read the article. "Angry" in this context is the Facebook reaction (such as the "like").
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  You are right, but that metric is even more meaningless. Fox New Headline ”Immigration crisis confirmed as 70,000 illegals pass into USA in Feburary - CBP” Guess what? People on the left and right both ‘ANGRY’ that for different reasons.
  - bonniemuffin 8y ago
    I think the point here is that the Angry reaction is a signifier of divisive content. Divisiveness gets people talking, so the metrics look good even though the discourse is unhealthy and tearing society apart on both sides.

volak 8y ago

Fox News dominates ratings on TV so its not surprising they'd be #1 - there's also the fact this is "engagements" and not click-throughs. I'd wager good 15% of these are probably people clicking "Angry" not actually engaging. If you look at "content with the most shares" not surprisingly Reuters and Patch tops the list. OP's headline presumes any algorithm should achieve left/right balance - this is just impossible. There was a good tweet the other day something along the lines of If I Google a headline the results are: * New York Times: Your number of free articles is 0 * Wall Street Journal: Subscription needed * Bloomberg: See this article for $1 * Fox News: Completely free * Breitbart: Completely free Seeing this its no stretch to understand why media struggles

Animats 8y ago
* New York Times: Your number of free articles is 0 ... The Washington Post recently tightened up their paywall, too.
api 8y ago
I understand the economics of course but it seems obvious to me that if real newspapers charge then propaganda and anger porn will rule discourse. If you want some more on the list for balance there are plenty of left wing Breitbarts you could add. Those are free too. BTW I think fear porn / anger porn is an appropriate term. It releases brain chemicals that can be addictive just like sex porn. This explains some of its virality.
- volak 8y ago
  There are left wing Breitbarts just like there's MSNBC for TV. The issue then becomes why these are far less popular. Its not because of a FB algorithm - that's for certain. I can ask everyone in my family if they've heard of Breitbart and 99% will say yes. If I ask if they've heard of Rachael Maddow.. maybe 40%? This is despite both of them engaging heavily in anger porn
  - jerkstate 8y ago
    That's not really a valid comparison. Rachel Maddow is an anchor on MSNBC, which my guess is everyone has heard of. I know what Breitbart is but I don't know any of their writers by name.

ykevinator 8y ago

Fox news is the new 700 club. It's a steady diet of comfort food.

matt4077 8y ago
Funny dog videos are “comfort food”. Fox News is hate porn.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  Fox runs approx ~50% negative content on Trump. MSNBC run 92%+ negative [0] [1] [2] If your view of Fox News was largely based from 2008 and The Daily Show - How could you know? With a blanket statement like “Fox News is hate porn” you clearly aren’t seeking alternative viewpoints. This isn’t even getting into that you are lumping Fox NEWS and Fox News Channel Opinion Shows together which isn’t unfair to do so long as you do the same with CNN and MSNBC alike). [0] https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/media-trump-hatred-coverage/ https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/media-trump-ha... [1] https://www.npr.org/2017/10/02/555092743/study-news-coverage-of-trump-more-negative-than-for-other-presidents https://www.npr.org/2017/10/02/555092743/study-news-coverage... [2] https://www.chicagotribune.com/g00/news/columnists/kass/ct-trump-media-coverage-harvard-kass-0521-20170519-column.html?i10c.ua=4&i10c.encReferrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8%3d https://www.chicagotribune.com/g00/news/columnists/kass/ct-t...
  - JMTQp8lwXL 8y ago
    Just because Fox is 50% negative on Trump and MSNBC is 92% negative, doesn't mean in aggregate, Fox is less negative. There are other news topics, beyond Trump. Hard to believe, I know, but there are.
  - dumitrupetrov 8y ago
    Apparently facts don't work on the left when they contradict their belief. I tried it's not working. Just like pre-programmed NPC's.

Alterlife 8y ago

I wish it could be made illegal to optimise for engagement. “Engagement” their acceptable replacement word for what they really want to optimise for: Addiction.

geofft 8y ago
"Engagement" is unfortunately a proxy for "profit," if a business is ad-supported or otherwise has revenue proportional to use. And it is basically illegal not to optimize for profit. (You do not have to micro-optimize every decision for short-term profit, but you do have to act in the best interests of the company, and the best interest of a for-profit company is, at the end of the day, profit.) Netflix has said one of their major competitors is now the desire to go to sleep instead of keeping watching, for instance. If you want to make optimizing for engagement illegal—a plan I support, tbh—you need to eliminate capitalism either from the inside or the outside. From the inside, you can try to win hearts and minds of customers and employees with endeavors that aren't structured for profit, e.g., public-benefit corporations or perhaps hybrid non-profit models (like Mozilla, or like OpenAI's new thing, which I am cautiously optimistic about, or like Etsy before they gave up their B-corp status to save the business, which is part of the caution in my optimism). If you can hire all the best employees away from the Facebooks and Netflixes of the world to the Mozillas and Etsys of the world (which, given the number of software engineers who are incredibly frustrated about spending their days micro-optimizing ad engagement, doesn't actually seem that hard), you can probably out-compete them. Or, from the outside, you can just make for-profit companies past a certain point of profit straight-up illegal (which is to say, make the government cease to recognize corporate structures beyond certain limits - this isn't additional government intervention, this is just the removal of government protections for corporations like the corporate veil, work-for-hire, "right-to-work," tax advantages, etc.).
nlh 8y ago
It’s such a slippery slope, but you’re so right. Chemists designed a chemical that’s optimized for engagement too — it’s called heroin! On the other side, one could argue that just about any successful product or service, by definition, optimized for engagement (addiction). Hit TV shows, beautiful vacation spots, sex. So where do you draw the line?

alkibiades 8y ago

why is fox news “angry” yet i’m sure feeds full of aoc and black lives matter would be considered woke. Biased article. The anger is very prevalent with both sides.

jimmy1 8y ago
Exactly. Someone with currently no political home what-so-ever, anyone else here that thinks otherwise needs to take a step back and evaluate the extremism that has taken over both sides.
deleted 8y ago
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cowpig 8y ago
"Angry" is the facebook reaction. Dividing the world into two "sides" isn't good for us. I don't think the world of political discourse is really divided into two "sides" as you imply, despite that being useful for media that make money from making people angry.
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  I’m open minded to what you are saying - but if you don’t think there are “sides” or at least someone has a strong interest in promoting that idea - it may because you are too firmly planted in one side yourself. I agree with GP, as someone with no clear cut political ideology, it’s obvious that wedge issues are formed and selected to fit divisions. See no further than almost every establishment Democrat having talked about border security for years, even building a wall in comments, now voting against anything border related because “their side” has adopted that Trump wants border security so they must be fully against it. [0] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gISMNv3qm8M&app=desktop https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gISMNv3qm8M&app=desktop (just picked a “Democrat for Wall” result, my personal opinions on that completely aside. You could pick any wedge issue and find a more reasonable time for it)
abathur 8y ago
I think they are just counting the "reaction" of the users with the content, and suggesting there are a greater portion of people picking the "angry" reaction on the Fox News articles.

gnicholas 8y ago

> the “angry” reaction dominates many pages, with “Fox News driving the most angry reactions of anyone, with nearly double that of anyone else.” So does this mean that Fox News is dominating the news feed because of liberal people hating on it, or is it because of articles that Fox News writes that riles up their base?

cowpig 8y ago
I think it's healthier to avoid dividing everybody into two categories, and interpreting everything with respect to those. But to answer your question within your own worldview, it's both.
- isoskeles 8y ago
  Why aren’t you commenting this at the OP? Do you think “Fox News dominated” wasn’t intentionally playing into the idea of dividing everybody into two categories?
  - cowpig 8y ago
    I think "Fox New dominated" is the headline because the research it is reporting on shows that Fox News dominates the rankings in feeds. edit: also I did respond to the top level, but with a link to something which I felt contributed to my understanding of this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc
- gnicholas 8y ago
  Perhaps you can enlighten me on other reasons that people would react with an angry emoji, aside from the two I described. Also, I’m not interpreting everything with respect to two categories — I'm interpreting single study this way.
  - darkpuma 8y ago
    There may be two broad motivations for leaving an angry emoji; either they are angry at the article or the article made them angry. However categorizing these two groups as "liberal" or "their base" isn't justified. It may be the case that somebody, perhaps a conservative, is angry at Fox News for a particular spin or editorialization but generally likes other Fox News articles. It may also be the case that somebody who considers themselves something other than "liberal" or "Fox News' base" finds a Fox News article in their facebook stream and is either angry at Fox News or because of Fox News. It's also possible, although perhaps less likely, that a liberal might become angry not at Fox News but because of what Fox News is reporting. They might not be amused to see Fox News in their stream, but it's certainly possible that the substance of the story has them angered even more. To give an example, consider this current Fox News headline: > New Zealand shooting's a social media wake-up call -- YouTube, others, must stop amplifying violent crimes [A 'fox news conservative' sees that headline and leaves an angry emoji.] Is it because he's angry about the shooting? Or angry at Youtube/etc? Or angry because he thinks Fox news is cynically exploiting the tragedy to take pot shots at a tech company? [A liberal sees that headline and leaves and angry emoji.] Is it because he's angry that Fox News is making it into his news feed? Or because he's angry at the shooting? Or angry at youtube/etc? Or angry because he thinks Fox news is cynically exploiting the tragedy to take pot shots at a tech company? You really can't say. Any particular individual may have their own reason for posting an angry emoji at a headline like that. For a headline like that, it's quite possible for a liberal and a fox news conservative to have the exact same reason for leaving an angry emoji.

adolph 8y ago

Their feeds give them permission to like what they already like. Their feeds let them know that their culture is winning. https://harpers.org/archive/2019/04/like-this-or-die/ https://harpers.org/archive/2019/04/like-this-or-die/

cowpig 8y ago

CGP Grey has an interesting video about anger-inducing content and engagement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE3j_RHkqJc

Ozzie_osman 8y ago

This is kind of sad, that angry is the top emotion. If FB was really optimizing for time well spent, you'd think the ranking system would be able to pick up on content or sources that predictably generate angry reactions.

dymk 8y ago
That’s not FB optimizing, it’s Fox News

toofy 8y ago

Seeing the top shared and engaged content in this article is pretty much the exact reason I and pretty much everyone I know abandoned Facebook long ago. It has been reduced to mostly just a place for people who are highly addicted to outragePorn clickbait. As the article says: > ...Instead, it’s often an angry, reactive place where people go to get worked up and to get scared. I haven't checked to see if this has been studied, but I'd wager a years salary that information which causes fear and/or outrage are highly addictive and that Facebook's core crowd are hooked. I'd also wager that this addiction is why so many aren't concerned with whether or not the information is accurate, as long as they get their dose.

smokeyj 8y ago
It's funny how clearly people are addicted to outrage, yet also in complete denial about it. They don't see it as outrage, instead it's measured, proportional, and reactionary response to the opposition. It's the opposition that's addicted to outrage, not my team. Unfortunately I think we've forged a new road to politics, we can call it "outrage marketing". The more the opposition is outraged, the more publicity you get - the more extreme candidates from both sides bubble up in popularity.
- pixl97 8y ago
  Related video to watch: CGPGrey, This video will make you angry.

platz 8y ago

If you're wondering how articles like "Woman smears menstrual blood on face to show periods are beautiful and powerful" are motivated and end up getting amplified, look no further than The Toxoplasma Of Rage (Slate Star Codex) http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the-toxoplasma-of-rage/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the-toxoplasma-of-rage/ ... "So there’s a tradeoff here, with X on one side and Y on the other. X can get everyone to agree in principle that Q is bad, but no one will pay any attention to it. And Y can get everyone to pay attention to Q, but a lot of people who would otherwise oppose it will switch to supporting it just because they’re so mad at the way it’s being publicized. At least Y got them to pay attention! They’re traveling up an incentive gradient that rewards them for doing so, even if it destroys their credibility." ... "People talk about the shift from old print-based journalism to the new world of social media and the sites adapted to serve it. These are fast, responsive, and only just beginning to discover the power of controversy. They are memetic evolution shot into hyperdrive, and the omega point is a well-tuned machine optimized to search the world for the most controversial and counterproductive issues, then make sure no one can talk about anything else. An engine that creates money by burning the few remaining shreds of cooperation, bipartisanship and social trust."

joeblow21 8y ago

Their algo is now attempting to surpress fake news so it makes sense that fox would rise to the top. Most the “angry” is people reading fox news content and getiing angry about what they are reading - attempted coup, deep state, socialists etc.

teddyh 8y ago

Other people in this thread have already posted links to The Toxoplasma Of Rage by Slate Star Codex and This Video Will Make You Angry by CGP Grey, so I’ll just complete the set with You're not going to believe what I'm about to tell you by The Oatmeal: https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe https://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe

karlakush 8y ago

My feed is primarily ski videos, sports highlights, and memes. Facebook even explains exactly why this is happening with a message above each post saying I'm seeing this because it's "Similar to Posts You've Interacted With." If you don't want to see Fox News articles, unfollow Fox News or stop interacting with them.

saltvedt 8y ago

I've created a news aggregator based on Wikipedia references. While this might be comparing apples to oranges, here's the list of the most cited websites by Wikipedia: https://cited.news/domains https://cited.news/domains It's still a bit buggy, so the "blank" domain is ranked #1, followed by NY Times, BBC and The Guardian. Fox News is ranked at #93 at that list: https://cited.news/domains/show/www.foxnews.com/citations https://cited.news/domains/show/www.foxnews.com/citations

burfog 8y ago
Wikipedia itself is quite biased. Some domains are even banned despite providing real news with original reporting.
- thundergolfer 8y ago
  Know where to find that list? I googled around and couldn't get it.
  - cooper12 8y ago
    No sources are actually blanket "banned". Some exceptionally bad ones like the Daily Mail are "deprecated", but that does not mean it can't be used anywhere ever. For your edification: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Per... (there's a legend at the bottom)
    - burfog 8y ago
      They are banned. Search your list for "blacklist". Note that the blacklisted sources are only on one side of the political spectrum -- not one thing on the other side got blacklisted.
      - cooper12 8y ago
        Oh, you meant Breitbart and Infowars? Those can still be used, but require whitelisting; so still not a ban. You can read the linked discussions for more information. Not gonna rehash and spell it all out for you here. I wouldn't say two instances are a pattern of anything, but going by your logic, guess that side of the spectrum just has more history of spam and persistent abuse on the English Wikipedia.

mannyk7 8y ago

This "study" simply tells me really nothing. It does sort out the types of users who want to connect and click on those posts in questions. Personally speaking, I would look elsewhere for a more in-depth and bias-free analysis for any business driven venture. Too much presumptions made in this article. Just that the way it defines “meaningful interactions”, "divisive" topics, “angry” reaction, etc. is rather unprofessional. A better way is to define and characterize the users of these news postings and get statistical averages on the response time and intensity of responses as well as commonly used words/phrase in reply.

anonytrary 8y ago

Things might be simpler if content aggregators had the option of making public their feed algorithms in exchange for not being responsible for user-posted content. Congress will eventually learn that automated censorship is not even close to being a solved problem, and it may never be truly solved. Whether or not automated zero-error censorship is even possible is a question for philosophers and mathematicians. I find it crazy that we're burdening companies with this job when we know so little about it. Common sense tells us that users should be responsible for what they post. If you post something illegal, you should pay the price, not the ISP, not Google, not Facebook. If users aren't held accountable for their own actions, then they'll continue to post abominable things. It should not the responsibility of Google, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc. to provide a safety net for the user. The internet is like a virtual highway. Some people build roads, but it is the responsibility of the rest of us to learn how to use those roads safely and in accordance with the laws. We usually don't punish the road-builders for accidents (unless the road was built with malicious intent).

deleted 8y ago

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mcguire 8y ago

I'm not sure how I feel about ladbible leading breitbart.

bennettfeely 8y ago

It's still wild to me Fox News, with its 18.5M followers is still following its boycott of Twitter, and hasn't tweeted since last November. Neither has Fox News Politics, (2M followers) or Fox and Friends (1.3M followers).

nojvek 8y ago

I realized my friends didn’t use Facebook. I didn’t use Facebook much. It was just ads and pages posting crap that played with my emotions. I kept Facebook so I could message a friend if I was in their city and we could meet. I held my account for years in that hope. I then realized I haven’t messaged anyone for a year. I mostly use other channels. I deleted Facebook and been happy ever since. My entire circle of friends is mostly Facebook zombies. My prediction is it will be a generational thing. Kinda like how young people really don’t buy that much jewelry compared to their parents