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Welcome to Facebook Co. Where a clique of Silicon Valley exec yuppies now decide what is right and what is wrong for us to see. It's a very slippery slope. Can

Welcome to Facebook Co. Where a clique of Silicon Valley exec yuppies now decide what is right and what is wrong for us to see. It's a very slippery slope. Cannot wait for the next elections where any candidates with politically "wrong" ideas will see their pages silently being discarded or randomly hidden from timelines without warnings.

TallGuyShort 7y ago
Arguably that's already happening. In the last round of Senate elections, Austin Peterson was repeatedly banned with vague explanations about the Terms & Conditions. It's of course just a coincidence that in most cases the post that triggered it were criticizing the incumbent whose reelection Facebook had contributed tens of thousands of dollars to.
GuiA 7y ago
No need to wait for anything; see for instance the Nancy Pelosi video fiasco. https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/may/24/politics-watchdog/viral-video-nancy-pelosi-speech-was-manipulated/ https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/may...
stevenjohns 7y ago
Happened in Australia just weeks ago. Various pages belonging to the main Libertarian party ("Liberal Democratic Party") started getting shutdown[0] about a month before elections. [0] https://www.facebook.com/davidlimbrickldp/posts/2098174403813744 https://www.facebook.com/davidlimbrickldp/posts/209817440381...
- King-Aaron 7y ago
  Possibly because LibDem supporters tend to post obscenely racist/xenophobic/hateful things that often get flagged/reported.
  - stevenjohns 7y ago
    No, they don’t. And that doesn’t justify shutting down the pages of three(!) state(!) parties with sitting parliament members weeks before elections. If Facebook has issues with commenters, then those commenters should be punished.
  - warp_factor 7y ago
    Racism is becoming the catch-it-all excuse that you can throw at pretty much anything to justify why you should take it down.
sonnyblarney 7y ago
" Where a clique of Silicon Valley exec yuppies now decide what is right and what is wrong for us to see." I'm not sympathetic at all to FB overall, but I am sympathetic here. Zuck would definitely prefer to not be in the business of moderating content. They've created a kind of 'internet platform' and by virtue of their situation, they're kind of forced to do this. And there is - no - solution. Every nation has different laws, different thresholds for various kinds of activity, and I suggest most of what FB 'takes down' is probably technically legal, but just beyond what they would like to do. They are also under considerable pressure from many countries to act explicitly in some cases. I'm not familiar with this Indian/Iranian situation, but it very well could be that Indian government officials leaned on them to do it. The less transparency there is, the more there is political interference in business, the more they have no choice: "We don't like Iran, so stop all this pro-Iran stuff in our country or we shut you down" type threats. And no doubt the US gov. has their interests as well, both on the 'local petty stuff' (i.e. law enforcement) to 'strategic stuff' (i.e. we don't like Iran either, stop their propaganda). I do however think that FB will actually try to do the right thing, I think it's just beyond their capability. I don't think Zuck is trying to promote his view of the world in the filtering. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think this is 'an information architectural nightmare' - not really a political thing. This could be an existential crisis for FB, as this happens more and more, they'll be expected to moderate 'everything' and then the business becomes infeasible.
- opportune 7y ago
  Serving content and not doing any moderation is a choice to decide what is right and wrong for us to see. They must make the choice and I don't feel sorry for them considering how much money they (facebook as a whole, execs, employees, investors) make
djakjxnanjak 7y ago
And congress only had to grill them for a few hours to make it happen!
stjohnswarts 7y ago
They are free to exclude whatever they like, they're a private company and not beholden to what you think they should be doing. If they do the wrong thing they will go on the trash-heap of bad ideas in history, so far they're doing okay as far as being a business goes.
- yeahigotgoats 7y ago
  this is such a lazy, sheepish argument. we all know what is happening. when your private internet provider starts to shut you down for your stupid ideas, or your private bank denies you service lets see how you feel then. and to act like the government does not already regulate the hell out of private business is just a foolish position.
  - root_axis 7y ago
    A single social media website is not at all comparable to an ISP or a bank though. Facebook is a wholly unimportant distraction.
    - furgooswft13 7y ago
      There's sooo many banks though. There's probably 3 right next to each other right now on Main St. North Bumble Fuck. Less ISPs sure, but if Comcast is throttling your Netflix, you could probably nab cellular internet, or satellite, or gasp dial up. Sure those options suck, but so does hosting your businesses social media presence on Myspace, or your neighbors kid's basement hosted phpBB forum.
- patrick5415 7y ago
  And yet, we have laws that require businesses to build ADA compliant bathrooms, and laws that forbid them from discriminating in both their employment practices and customer relations. If you want to make the “but they are a private business” argument, will you also argue that a private business should be able to say, serve only white people?
- warp_factor 7y ago

TallGuyShort 7y ago

Arguably that's already happening. In the last round of Senate elections, Austin Peterson was repeatedly banned with vague explanations about the Terms & Conditions. It's of course just a coincidence that in most cases the post that triggered it were criticizing the incumbent whose reelection Facebook had contributed tens of thousands of dollars to.

GuiA 7y ago

No need to wait for anything; see for instance the Nancy Pelosi video fiasco. https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/may/24/politics-watchdog/viral-video-nancy-pelosi-speech-was-manipulated/ https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/may...

stevenjohns 7y ago

Happened in Australia just weeks ago. Various pages belonging to the main Libertarian party ("Liberal Democratic Party") started getting shutdown[0] about a month before elections. [0] https://www.facebook.com/davidlimbrickldp/posts/2098174403813744 https://www.facebook.com/davidlimbrickldp/posts/209817440381...

King-Aaron 7y ago
Possibly because LibDem supporters tend to post obscenely racist/xenophobic/hateful things that often get flagged/reported.
- stevenjohns 7y ago
  No, they don’t. And that doesn’t justify shutting down the pages of three(!) state(!) parties with sitting parliament members weeks before elections. If Facebook has issues with commenters, then those commenters should be punished.
- warp_factor 7y ago
  Racism is becoming the catch-it-all excuse that you can throw at pretty much anything to justify why you should take it down.

sonnyblarney 7y ago

" Where a clique of Silicon Valley exec yuppies now decide what is right and what is wrong for us to see." I'm not sympathetic at all to FB overall, but I am sympathetic here. Zuck would definitely prefer to not be in the business of moderating content. They've created a kind of 'internet platform' and by virtue of their situation, they're kind of forced to do this. And there is - no - solution. Every nation has different laws, different thresholds for various kinds of activity, and I suggest most of what FB 'takes down' is probably technically legal, but just beyond what they would like to do. They are also under considerable pressure from many countries to act explicitly in some cases. I'm not familiar with this Indian/Iranian situation, but it very well could be that Indian government officials leaned on them to do it. The less transparency there is, the more there is political interference in business, the more they have no choice: "We don't like Iran, so stop all this pro-Iran stuff in our country or we shut you down" type threats. And no doubt the US gov. has their interests as well, both on the 'local petty stuff' (i.e. law enforcement) to 'strategic stuff' (i.e. we don't like Iran either, stop their propaganda). I do however think that FB will actually try to do the right thing, I think it's just beyond their capability. I don't think Zuck is trying to promote his view of the world in the filtering. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think this is 'an information architectural nightmare' - not really a political thing. This could be an existential crisis for FB, as this happens more and more, they'll be expected to moderate 'everything' and then the business becomes infeasible.

opportune 7y ago
Serving content and not doing any moderation is a choice to decide what is right and wrong for us to see. They must make the choice and I don't feel sorry for them considering how much money they (facebook as a whole, execs, employees, investors) make

djakjxnanjak 7y ago

And congress only had to grill them for a few hours to make it happen!

stjohnswarts 7y ago

They are free to exclude whatever they like, they're a private company and not beholden to what you think they should be doing. If they do the wrong thing they will go on the trash-heap of bad ideas in history, so far they're doing okay as far as being a business goes.

yeahigotgoats 7y ago
this is such a lazy, sheepish argument. we all know what is happening. when your private internet provider starts to shut you down for your stupid ideas, or your private bank denies you service lets see how you feel then. and to act like the government does not already regulate the hell out of private business is just a foolish position.
- root_axis 7y ago
  A single social media website is not at all comparable to an ISP or a bank though. Facebook is a wholly unimportant distraction.
  - furgooswft13 7y ago
    There's sooo many banks though. There's probably 3 right next to each other right now on Main St. North Bumble Fuck. Less ISPs sure, but if Comcast is throttling your Netflix, you could probably nab cellular internet, or satellite, or gasp dial up. Sure those options suck, but so does hosting your businesses social media presence on Myspace, or your neighbors kid's basement hosted phpBB forum.
patrick5415 7y ago
And yet, we have laws that require businesses to build ADA compliant bathrooms, and laws that forbid them from discriminating in both their employment practices and customer relations. If you want to make the “but they are a private business” argument, will you also argue that a private business should be able to say, serve only white people?
warp_factor 7y ago