4 ms·

I'm puzzled why Facebook is getting the blame here. If you are seeing toxic content in your feed, it's because your friends put it there. It's not Facebook's fa

I'm puzzled why Facebook is getting the blame here. If you are seeing toxic content in your feed, it's because your friends put it there. It's not Facebook's fault that your friends suck.

nym 8y ago
Maybe it's that facebook encourages the content from your friends that is toxic, because that toxic content leads to more clicks, engagement, and ultimately revenue.
angott 8y ago
Yes, but your friends share content that sucks because the Facebook algorithm fills their feeds with click-bait, with the sole purpose of increasing engagement and user retention metrics.
pawelk 8y ago
> If you are seeing toxic content in your feed, it's because your friends put it there. Not really. Facebook put it there for me. Time and again it shows me items like "[Friend] replied to a comment on [toxic thing]", where the thing gets a prominent preview etc. I haven't seen a real update from [Friend] in my feed for months, yet there are plenty when I visit their profile. Even if the friend is fighting the good fight and has commented to correct some misconceptions, it's clear that this particular action was selected for my feed because it's related to a controversial item.
smt88 8y ago
No. The most toxic content is often comments, which are shown to me even when I don't want to see them. If it weren't for comments from non-friends, Facebook would have no toxic content for me at all.
- gscott 8y ago
  If you go to the persons profile and click unfollow then you won't see their comments on posts that are now yours.
  - smt88 8y ago
    I can't do that with billions of users. I'm saying that I'm shown comments by complete strangers on every post that shows up in my news feed. There's no way to turn that off. Facebook was great until it started inserting posts from people I didn't explicit whitelist as friends, and I'm including news articles in that category.
    - gscott 8y ago
      You must have your privacy settings to "World" change it to friends or maybe Friends and Friends of Friends and you will be better off. Sometimes when I want to say something on a subject I will go to Facebook and do a search on that subject and post on World readable posts with the opposite opinion of my own.

I'm puzzled why Facebook is getting the blame here. If you are seeing toxic content in your feed, it's because your friends put it there. It's not Facebook's fault that your friends suck.

nym 8y ago

Maybe it's that facebook encourages the content from your friends that is toxic, because that toxic content leads to more clicks, engagement, and ultimately revenue.

angott 8y ago

Yes, but your friends share content that sucks because the Facebook algorithm fills their feeds with click-bait, with the sole purpose of increasing engagement and user retention metrics.

pawelk 8y ago

> If you are seeing toxic content in your feed, it's because your friends put it there. Not really. Facebook put it there for me. Time and again it shows me items like "[Friend] replied to a comment on [toxic thing]", where the thing gets a prominent preview etc. I haven't seen a real update from [Friend] in my feed for months, yet there are plenty when I visit their profile. Even if the friend is fighting the good fight and has commented to correct some misconceptions, it's clear that this particular action was selected for my feed because it's related to a controversial item.

smt88 8y ago

No. The most toxic content is often comments, which are shown to me even when I don't want to see them. If it weren't for comments from non-friends, Facebook would have no toxic content for me at all.

gscott 8y ago
If you go to the persons profile and click unfollow then you won't see their comments on posts that are now yours.
- smt88 8y ago
  I can't do that with billions of users. I'm saying that I'm shown comments by complete strangers on every post that shows up in my news feed. There's no way to turn that off. Facebook was great until it started inserting posts from people I didn't explicit whitelist as friends, and I'm including news articles in that category.
  - gscott 8y ago
    You must have your privacy settings to "World" change it to friends or maybe Friends and Friends of Friends and you will be better off. Sometimes when I want to say something on a subject I will go to Facebook and do a search on that subject and post on World readable posts with the opposite opinion of my own.