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Zuckerberg doubles down on Facebook political ads policy after Twitter ban
- readams 7y agoWe simultaneously fear the power of Facebook but then demand they become the final arbiter of the truth, censoring even the speech of our political leaders. Why did we think this was a good idea again? Ask China their opinion on the value of being the one to decide what is true.
- petewailes 7y agoIt's censoring advertising (or it would be if they did it), not speech. That's not even remotely the same.
- colejohnson66 7y agoTechnically, they are kindof the same. The Supreme Court has ruled that commercial speech (of which advertising is a part of) has Constitutional protection.[0][1] [0]: https://www.freedomforuminstitute.org/first-amendment-center/topics/freedom-of-speech-2/advertising-first-amendment-overview/ https://www.freedomforuminstitute.org/first-amendment-center... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_speech https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_speech
- petewailes 7y agoWith very hefty caveats. It's not a blanket protection
- hos234 7y agoOur leaders (and groups that prop them up) have never had the ability to scale their propaganda and target people as they do today. They need to stop braying about turning into China and admit that this a new ball game. That needs new rules.
- jonbronson 7y agoDemanding even the slightest level of accountability for blatantly misleading or false information does not make them the final arbiter. It's not a binary choice of absolute determination vs completely hands off.
- boreas 7y agoThere are many choices in the policy space, but the decision about how to treat an individual advertisement is essentially binary. The line between truth and falsehood must lie somewhere, and I can guarantee you that different political factions will have very different ideas about what should lie on either side of that line.
- gandutraveler 7y agoThe question is how do you define false information. Do we rely on consensus ? For e.g. let's say majority of the world population believe that earth is flat. In that case, will that still be false information? Even if we go with consensus, it's such a difficult problem to solve in this age of internet where new content is created at such a rapid pace.
- diogenescynic 7y agoI think most people just think Facebook ads should be held to same as older media like newspapers and tv that have to have an editor review the ad and approve it before it can be published. Facebook is being used as a disinformation platform and Zuckerberg thinks it’s more important to keep making money. I don’t think that trade off is worth what it’s doing to society. I think Facebook has a large share of the blame for making political discourse worse.
- sitkack 7y agoIts akin to having a nation-wide mini mart chain knowingly structure their inventory to help children buy cigarettes. They know it is happening and it is wrong, but they make money doing it so they will drag their heals (CVS pun) for as long as possible. This is the kinda thing corps get fined billions of dollars for.
- samastur 7y agoHow is not selling something to anyone censoring them?
- james-mcelwain 7y agoYou're acting as if we can't do anything about power of Facebook. It's absurd to to conflate making Facebook take editorial control of their platform with making it the state censor of an authoritarian country. Regulating and/or breaking up Facebook is hardly "demanding they become the final arbiter of truth." The goal here is reducing Mark Zuckerberg to the point where his personal judgement is irrelevant.
- quarkral 7y agoWhen we're talking about whether Facebook should be fact-checking the lies of public servants, we're missing the point. We shouldn't be having public servants that are lying to us in the first place. By the way this isn't just referring to one political party, the other party lies or blatantly dodges around truths as well. I think our government is in much deeper shit than the tech industry is, and even though I agree Facebook needs some regulation, I wouldn't trust the government to do it.
- CharlesColeman 7y ago> We simultaneously fear the power of Facebook but then demand they become the final arbiter of the truth, censoring even the speech of our political leaders. They won't be any kind of "arbiter of truth" if they just decide to refuse to carry all political ads, like Twitter has decided to do. I think that it's quite possible that a total laissez faire attitude towards quantity of paid speech may be incompatible with democracy, in the context of disinformation campaigns and massive wealth inequality, etc. Free speech without democracy is pointless. These issues may require some adjustment to our social contracts.
- readams 7y agoYou believe that all political advertising of all kinds should be simply banned?
- CharlesColeman 7y ago> You believe that all political advertising of all kinds should be simply banned? I clearly said no such thing. I merely pointed out that 1) Facebook can respond to these problems without doing any (private) viewpoint censorship and 2) we as a society may need to adjust the parameters around paid speech to protect democracy. Most things aren't black and white, and the choice isn't a binary one between extremes like laissez faire and total bans.
- colejohnson66 7y agoI personally do, but I also recognize that that may be at odds with the First Amendment. However, political ads aren’t usually just any kind of ad; They are almost always using scare tactics, or sometimes, just flat out lying. Stuff that would be illegal for a regular ad to do can sometimes be done simply because it’s a political ad. Besides, who’s going to enforce the accuracy of the ads? We’ve seen many times that the government cannot hold itself accountable, so why would they do it for political ads.
- hinkley 7y agoBecause the story arc goes like this: 1) people notice someone has gotten power 2) people notice the person is being shitty about it 3) people insist that responsibility and power go hand in hand 4) person does not rise to the challenge 5) people take the power away Making them accountable is the warning shot. Next step is divestiture.
- kevinsundar 7y agoHow does requiring facebook to fact-check (fact according to who?) take their power away? It just gives them more power.
- hinkley 7y agoBecause that's been the social contract for hundreds or thousands of years, and we know they'll probably fuck it up anyway. The question is will they percolate to the top of the priority list? Small time offenders often get away with it. [edit:] if you ask me, which you kinda did, I think we're using a self-organizing system, where people self-select into active positions in society and then we cull the worst actors - if we can - before they get too powerful. We get enough pleasant surprises out of this arrangement that we tolerate the bad ones. Trying to plan this stuff out ahead of time? You get a boring dystopia or a scary dystopia.
- kevinsundar 7y agoI really do want to hear what your opinion on this is but I'm having trouble following. I am of the opinion that letting facebook fact-check anything, let alone political speech, inherently lets them (or well a random low paid "fact-checker" reviewing ads somewhere) control what a huge mass of people see. Isn't that a ton of power?
- Traster 7y ago>Ads can be an important part of voice - especially for candidates and advocacy groups the media might not otherwise cover so they can get their message into debates It's interesting how hard Zuck is working to try and conflate the idea of 'free speech' with paid advertisements. To put it another way, if advertising on Facebook is part of my free speech, surely Zuck must run my adverts despite the fact I have no money to pay him for them.
- philliphaydon 7y agoIs this a troll comment or are you being serious?
- Derek_MK 7y agoNeither really, it's demonstrating that it's kind of dumb to consider a paid advertisement "speech" for the purposes of "free speech", considering there's inherently a restriction there on how much "speech" you get, because you have to pay for the ability to "speak".
- wan23 7y agoFree speech isn't free in the same way that free beer is. The idea is to avoid restricting what messages are allowed as much as possible. It's not about giving any particular individual a platform so much as making sure that the platform is open to a variety of ideas.
- sjwright 7y agoA system without restrictions favours the rich, it favours the dishonest, and it favours those who wield the best weaponized psychology. (And it favours most those with all three.) Your passing reference to platforms being open to a "variety of ideas" is—and I'm sorry in advance for the snark—but it's just adorable.
- ls612 7y ago
- chrischen 7y ago> "Ads can be an important part of voice - especially for candidates and advocacy groups the media might not otherwise cover so they can get their message into debates," he added. Another tool in the arsenal of the rich and powerful to give them more of a voice than the average person, is another way to look at it. Facebook are profiting from both sides. They’re a news site that’s simultaneously FOX News and MSNBC all at once. But I still have to agree with Zuckerberg on this: enforcing misinformation shouldn’t be left to a private company.
- freddie_mercury 7y agoBut a private company should enforce all the other things that Facebook has no problem moderating? Facebook has already said they have no problem enforcing this for non-politicians, after all.
- WhompingWindows 7y agoWouldn't all of this FB BS be solved if he just asks users to pay $3 a year (or .50 for developing nations), and then removing ads/sponsorship entirely? That'd be billions per year and they'd not face all these charges of political shenanigans, poisoning the democracy, etc. I doubt few of the FB users I know wouldn't part with $3 in exchange for their network/contacts that FB provides.
- mrgreenfur 7y ago
- samatman 7y agoFacebook, the platform, is in trouble. It doesn't matter what the outcome is of the 2020 election season, or what Facebook does during it. They will be blamed for it. Buying Instagram and Whatsapp was farsighted, Facebook the company can cruise for awhile on those properties. The main site is bound to fall out of fashion, and soon. Can't be soon enough for my taste.
- t_serpico 7y agoI'd wager that it already is falling out of fashion, at least among young people (say 30 and under).
- LanceH 7y agoI've been curious about this. It makes sense that students might use something else. They are all right there in one place. What happens as everyone leaves school, scatters and joins a lot of different groups? They seem to end up on facebook even if it's only because those groups already existed.
- bluetidepro 7y ago> The main site is bound to fall out of fashion, and soon. Uhhh, that already happened many years ago. Talk to anyone under 30, and Facebook is VERY out of style/out-of-date. They will most likely laugh at you or think you're being ironic if you were to bring up "hanging out on Facebook" or anything like that.
- edmundsauto 7y agoSounds like they will be in trouble in 50 years when their current userbase is dead.
- frankacter 7y agoWhile I've certainly heard that statement made, the publicly stated demographic statistics do not support it. As of July 2019, 13 - 24 year olds make up 31.9% of Facebook's overall userbase. Another 32% make up the 25-34 age range. Compare that to some of the other platform's 13-24 demographic: Twitter 39%, Instagram 37.3%, Snap Chat 58.5% While Snapchat has a slightly younger audience, they also only have 210 million active users, a 13% increase from previous year. Facebook on the other hand has 2.45 billion active users, a 9% increase from previous year.
- adam12 7y agoJust ban all political ads.
- mc32 7y agoSo should be only left with live face to face stump speeches?
- SolaceQuantum 7y agoI mean, I'm sure PACs can post to their facebook pages like the rest of us normies do. No need to purchase more eyeballs!
- thawaway1837 7y agoThere are many ways to promote yourself and your message on Facebook itself that do not involve paying Facebook.
- gorgoiler 7y agoIt is possible for the state to ensure that political parties get media airtime without having to buy ads. Canada, Ireland, and the UK all do this with Party Political Broadcasts: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_political_broadcast https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_political_broadcast
- jandrese 7y agoBut these are limited to political parties. You are proposing to take away the voice of SuperPACs who make the lion's share of the paid advertisement in a modern campaign. If billionaires don't get a voice how can they control the government? You are going to make them go back to regular lobbying and regulatory capture! What a travesty!
- rjsw 7y agoThe UK uses think tanks to get around media restrictions on political advertising. They put out press releases that get reported as "news".
- ptah 7y ago> "Ads can be an important part of voice - especially for candidates and advocacy groups the media might not otherwise cover so they can get their message into debates," he added. translation: I simply cannot say no to the amount of money made from political ads
- dominotw 7y agowondering why is it only 0.5% for twitter while much higher for FB ?
- NullPrefix 7y agoI wonder if it is okay to run ads about Zuck's presidential campaign. I know that he is not running, but still, somebody can put ads about it.
- bilekas 7y agoThis ^ I would donate to that advertising campaign.
- jonlucc 7y agoOnly if you're a currently serving politician or a candidate. Also, only as long as Facebook believes that your candidacy is for the right reasons, else they'll still apply the rules to you.
- 52-6F-62 7y agoAs an outside observer, it appears he hasn't donned the Caesar haircut for nothing.
- SolaceQuantum 7y agoI'm mostly confused as to what sorts of free speech is being violated by not using ads? Parties can post on their facebook pages and comment the same way users can. Isn't that equal speech? What's the dimension I'm missing?
- SiempreViernes 7y agoFree speech is the tech industry's default excuse for not enforcing something, and for about two decades it worked fine. Please have to have some forbearance while they get over their addiction to that particular excuse.
- orky56 7y agoThrough ads, political parties don't necessarily have to use true statements. In addition, they can target specific groups of users based on demographics and other attributes Facebook provides. The issue is that regular users who post have a higher burden of truth than someone who pays to play as a political figure.
- mattnewton 7y agoIt’s even worse than non-sponsored content competing with sponsored content IMO. These sponsored posts do not have any controls I am aware of to prevent them from running afoul of the FEC’s rules on attribution. Meaning, I can set up a new account and start paying for political ads against my opponent that are not traceable back to the candidate I work for. And worse, because of targeting controls and the ephemeral nature of the Facebook feed, it is possible to completely fly under the radar of people who would notice the violation and report it to regulators, like supporters of the attacked candidate. I think the main reason they want sponsored content is, well, it pays their salaries and fuels the stock’s valuation.
- buboard 7y agoSuppose you want to campaign to get Facebook to ban political ads. Should you be able to pay to promote it or not?
- justin66 7y agoWould anyone actually miss having their social network of choice inundating then with political ads?
- SiempreViernes 7y agoNow now, it's not like advertisement in general is particularly wanted so it's deeply unfair to single out a simple global tech giant with such an insidious question!
- sp332 7y agoOn Twitter it's at least possible for candidates or organizations to have a huge reach without paying money. On Facebook, they limit your reach so that even people who explicitly follow your page don't see your updates in their timeline unless you pay up.
- nkkollaw 7y agoThere are always bots...
- dtwest 7y agoMost people saw what Twitter did and thought, Facebook is probably under some pressure to do the same. Mark Zuckerburg saw it and thought, we now have a monopoly on social media based political advertising! $$$
- quarkral 7y agoI don't think Twitter actually hade much political advertising at all before tbh. It's like Bing traffic compared to Google.
- alwayseasy 7y agoUnder $3M per quarter according to their CFO.
- haolez 7y agoI think Zuck's statement makes more sense than Jack's, where Jack said that "democracy might break if we allow those ads" (not with these exact words). It's weird to see a CEO making a statement like that, like if it was his role to protect democracy. I think Zuck sounded more professional and centered in this case.
- _jal 7y agoThe Zuckerbot is a functioning profit-maximizer, if that's what you mean.
- haolez 7y agoI was referring to their statements. I think Jack might have omitted the part about democracy. Just announce the change and be done with it.
- sp332 7y agoIsn't it his/our/everyone's role to protect democracy? What's wrong with that idea?
- WhompingWindows 7y agoHow is it NOT his role to protect democracy? Democracy thrives on freedom of information, and with an informed populace. If the democracy's populace is gaining massive quantities of information from Twitter, isn't Jack Dorsey then directly involved in being an arbiter of democracy? For better or worse, isn't it factually true that these tech-info companies are directly woven into the fabric of our democracy?
- haolez 7y agoI was just talking about their statements, but regarding the argument, isn't this an arrogant position to take? You are basically saying that the majority of the population is not smart enough to detect fake news by themselves, and that a smaller group of smart individuals (you included) are better poised to protect "the people" and control what they should and should not be exposed to. Sounds a little dystopian and authoritarian to me as well. Fair democracy is hard.
- ataluttasgiran 7y agoPolitical ads are not a problem. Targeted political ads are the real problem. I think all targeted ads are the real problem.
- tathougies 7y agoI actually think you're right and if any regulation is to be made, this seems the easiest and most non intrusive while still offering all candidates a level playing field.
- psds2 7y agoSomeone just needs to start a dark money PAC promoting the NAMBLA agenda, surely they have a candidate in a race somewhere. Fill Facebook with these ads.
- ceejayoz 7y agohttps://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/technology/facebook-political-criticism.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/30/technology/facebook-polit... > This week, another critic emerged: Adriel Hampton, a marketer and progressive activist in San Francisco, who on Monday announced his intention to run for governor of California in protest of the policy, posting fake ads to prove his point. > Facebook has since said that it won’t allow Mr. Hampton to take advantage of its lax approach to political speech despite his candidacy, and he says he is exploring his legal options. The rules are enforced if and when they want to, completely arbitrarily.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- sjwright 7y agoWe could solve this with just a few simple requirements for online political advertising. Here's some I came up with in the past few minutes—rough ideas but let's see how they play out. • Require all advertisements to be published N days in advance on a public noticeboard with full details of every aspect of the advertisement—audience, budget, funding entity. • Do not allow targeting in any political advertising other than to narrow adverts to the geography of the candidate or issue—e.g. ads for a congressperson to their congressional district. • Require the business unit handling political advertising to have strict isolation from the rest of the company. Maybe require it to be an independent entity.
- v4dok 7y agoI am starting to think that restricting the number of people you can follow/add as friends to a number that would actually be possible to follow without specialized algorithm might be a good idea. As long as there is such informational overload, there is no escaping from having algorithms sort things for you
- cj 7y agoAre political ads labeled / presented any differently than regular ads on Facebook? The main issue I have with this is how Facebook strategically blends advertisements (which is often political during election cycles) together with organic non-sponsored content. Anecdote: My 84 year old grandmother spends 1-2 hours per day scrolling through Facebook's news feed. When I watch her do it, she pays ZERO attention to why she's seeing a specific piece of content (to her, there's no difference between a post that's labeled "Sponsored" versus an organic post from a family member). In other words, for my grandmother, Facebook has not done an effective job at informing her when she's viewing a paid advertisement vs. organic non-sponsored content. This is a clear form of user manipulation that needs to stop. Even when I scroll through Facebook, I often don't notice the "Sponsored" label on posts until after I've already read most of the post. To me, the primary issue is that Facebook does not adequately differentiate organic content from sponsored content. At least when watching television, it's absolutely clear when you're watching paid-for commercials - it's harder to manipulate someone's beliefs when they know they're watching a commercial. But with Facebook, a huge percentage of users don't know when they're interacting with an advertisement vs. organic content - this is the problem that I think needs solving. > Zuck: "Instead, I believe the better approach is to work to increase transparency. Ads on Facebook are already more transparent than anywhere else." In what way is Facebook transparent? Do they mean they simply disclose political ad spend? Or do they legitimately think they're doing a good job at properly labeling paid-for content?
- WhompingWindows 7y agoWhy can't FB charge a minimal subscription fee? For 2-3 bucks a year, wouldn't they keep the vast majority of users and simultaneously remove their dependence on shadowy advertisement dollars?
- gorgoiler 7y agoFacebook could provide a quota of free advertising to political parties, and not allow them to buy any more outside their quota. This would be akin to government provided airtime (“Party Political Broadcasts”) as done in Canada, UK and Ireland. I’ve always felt nervous about the role of money in politics and removing the requirement for massive ad-spend budgets might bring us closer to a more moral democracy, and away from pay-to-play.
- WhompingWindows 7y agoWhat about all the "independent" "non-affiliated" groups who are absolutely tied to a political party? How do you adjudicate those edge cases? It's the edge cases, IMO, that are the real bear here.
- gorgoiler 7y agoIf they are absolutely tied to a political party, then they would count towards the quota. If they claim not to have a link then it becomes Facebook’s job to determine if there is one, which seems a lot more tractable than determining if a fact is true or false. Easy at least when the message is “don’t vote for Bob!”, than when it is “we don’t see any harm in GMO wheat”. Unattributed attack ads are pretty obvious but it’s harder to tie issue ads to the party they benefit.
- tathougies 7y agoNo thanks. As a member of a small party that seems like it would just make us unable to meet the ridiculous requirements to qualify. As it is right now we can just pay for ads instead of having to meet arbitrary criteria. Thats a much fairer state of things
- gorgoiler 7y agoWhen you register to appear as an option on a ballot paper, wouldn’t that be sufficient to qualify for your quota of airtime for which you do not have to spend campaign funds?
- asah 7y agoAdblock facebook ?
- dredmorbius 7y agoNot sufficient. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21413532 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21413532
- CaptainZapp 7y ago"Ads can be an important part of voice - especially for candidates and advocacy groups the media might not otherwise cover so they can get their message into debates," Well, Mr. Zuckerberg; I don't think this explains, let alone justifies your policy of allowing outright lies in political ads without any pushback. Whenever you think this company cannot sink any lower you're always in for a massive surprise and disappointment.
- nicpottier 7y agoI just watched The Great Hack, which I can't say is fantastic as a whole, but does still raise some terrifying points of the power of targeted political ads and how they are being weaponized. I really don't see any other choice but to ban political ads entirely as Twitter is doing. For those that haven't seen it, here's some backstory on one piece about the Trinidad election: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/they-were-planning-on-stealing-election-explosive-new-tapes-reveal-cambridg/ https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/t... But basically, a political campaign was started around NOT voting as a form of protest. And those were targeted to the opposing party etc.. It is one thing if political ads were just about informing the public about a candidate, but we are far past that. This is a question about the legitimacy of our democracy now. Anybody have any bright ideas on how to apply pressure on Facebook to do the same as Twitter? This feels to me like one of the more important questions of our (immediate) time since it effects absolutely everything.
- nicpottier 7y agoThat's a long link, so the part in question. Note this is from a taped pitch from the president of Cambridge Analytica, this isn't hearsay, it is from the horse's mouth: > Nix moved on to pitch his next case study – a youth mobilisation campaign. Again, all is not as it seems. “Trinidad is a very interesting case history of how we look at problems,” Nix said. “Trinidad's tiny – it's 1.3 million people – but almost exactly half the country are Indian and half the country are Black, Afro-Caribbean. And there are two main political parties, one for the Blacks and one for the Indians… when the Indians are in power the Blacks don't get anything, and vice-versa, you know – they screw each other. So we were working, I think for the third time in Trinidad, and we were working for the Indians, and we did a huge amount for research, and two really important things came out. > “One was that all the youth, Indian and Afro-Caribbean, felt disenfranchised … And secondly, amongst the Indians the familial hierarchies were really strong. There was huge respect for their elders and their parents and their families, but not so for the Afro-Caribbeans. And that was enough information to inform the entire campaign. > “We went to the client and said, we only want to do one thing, we want to run a campaign where we target the youth – all youth, all the Blacks and all the Indians – and we try and increase apathy. And they didn't really understand why… but they allowed us to do this campaign, and the campaign had to be non-political, because no one, the kids don’t care about politics. It had to be reactive, because they’re lazy; inclusive of all ethnicities; bottom-up. It had to be exciting, because kids want to do something fun. > “We came up with this campaign which was all about ‘Be part of the gang, do something cool, be part of a movement.’ And it was called the ‘Do So’ campaign… A3 posters. And graffiti, yellow paint, you know, we cut stencils with the jigsaw… And we'd give these to kids, and they'd get in their cars at night, you know, just make a drawing, get in the car, and race around the country putting up these posters and getting chased by the police and all their friends were doing it, and it was fucking brilliant fun… > “Do So. Don't vote. Don't be involved in politics. It's like a sign of resistance against – not government, against politics. And voting. And very soon they're making their own YouTube videos. This is the prime minister’s house that's being graffitied! … It was carnage. > “And the reason why this was such a good strategy is because we knew, and we really really knew, that when it came to voting, all the Afro-Caribbean kids wouldn't vote, because they ‘Do So’. But all the Indian kids would do what their parents told them to do, which is go out and vote. And so all the Indians went out and voted, and the difference on the 18-35-year-old turnout is like 40%, and that swung the election by about 6% – which is all we needed!”
- bhupy 7y agoThe freedom of advocacy is inseparable from the freedom of speech. It costs money to print pamphlets, buy air time, pay people to stand on the corner, conduct opinion polls, etc. Every political movement in history has consisted of forming groups, contacting potential allies, soliciting donations from them, then spending that money on pamphlets, TV, radio ads, etc. That's freedom at work. The medium has now shifted away from pamphlets, TV, and radio, towards the Internet and social media. If paid advertisements are not free speech, then the concept of free speech would cease to exist beyond street corner rants.
- orky56 7y agoWith income inequality rising, the revolving door between public/private sector, and lobbying, the power of the citizenry compared to the wealthy individuals is becoming smaller. An individual can make a single post and get a single like that is shown within a closed network while a dollar can do the same on these networks. The only place left for a citizen to make a difference is at the voting booth with their one powerful vote. However the influence on that voter is guided through means the voter is not aware of.
- LanceH 7y agoThe fundamental problem is that one party thinks the people voting for the other party could only possibly do so if they were tricked. This attitude alone will get some people to vote against you. The government elite, of course, see through these shenanigans and are just out to protect people from voting wrongly.
- cs702 7y ago"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his income depends on his not understanding it." - Uptown Sinclair Source: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-get-a-man-to-understand-something https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-ge...
- mattnewton 7y agoThe real problem for me is the way political ads on social media (and on the web in general) can effectively undermine FEC attribution rules. Between direct targeting with ads that run for short periods, and promoted posts of new accounts, there is basically no way for existing regulators to enforce attribution to a PAC or candidate, so outright lies and shady adverts fly under the radar with even less consequences than in the television or print media. The debate here has to be about steps they can take to help the FEC enforce it's rules I think, not about banning it altogether. It feels like a false dichotomy, especially when freedom of speech is invoked. We don't talk about freedom of speech for drug companies when we require a side effects disclaimer at the end of a pharmacutical ad - it feels disingenuous to me to talk about it here too when we should be talking about enforcing the FEC's attribution guidelines.
- davinic 7y agoI think this could be solved by disallowing targeted political ads at any micro level. Allow campaigns to target metro areas and very broad demo groups much like TV does.
- mattnewton 7y agoLots of potential solutions here (and potential implementation problems with enforcement), but afaict nobody is even talking about it, they are argueing over a simple black and white ban.
- pjspycha 7y agoI don't see a problem with having advertisers require to have references or sources to any quotes or facts they represent. The sources would have to be credible and shown in context (no sound bites) and perhaps view-able by the users easily. Facebook or a third-party should be required to make sure the sources look credible and all reported facts or quotes have sources attached. Such a system would put most of the leg work on the advertisers and make the process easier to administer. I have no idea if Facebook already does any of this, but from their policy about fact checking, they do not require any political ads to go through their third party fact-check. Otherwise the third-party fact checker appears to do all the research themselves or they may reach out to the advertisers for more information. https://www.facebook.com/help/publisher/182222309230722?ref=MisinfomrationPolicyPage https://www.facebook.com/help/publisher/182222309230722?ref=...
- FillardMillmore 7y agoI think the crux of the question raised here is: "Is there anything wrong, ethically or legally, with a social media site accepting payments in exchange for algorithmically amplifying the amount of people that see the paid-for content? Does the answer to this question depend on the veracity of the information presented in the content? If so, does Facebook have some sort of obligation to ensure that paid-for content is substantiated by facts and evidence?"
- _cairn 7y agoAgree wholeheartedly with how you posed the question, I would like to expand: Should Adult (xxx) sites be held accountable for ads for male enlargement pills/snake oils? I personally don't think so. Is the answer to this problem to teach our population that blindly accepting what you read is safe (you can trust information posted on social media/public internet sites as fact) OR do we instead teach our citizens to filter information analytically and do research the way you are taught to in university for example? Personally I think the former option is an intractable problem. Why try to make it safe for your population NOT to have to think instead of just teaching them how to think critically?
- FillardMillmore 7y ago> Why try to make it safe for your population NOT to have to think instead of just teaching them how to think critically? Hmmm...a question like that is essentially opening up the gates for speculation - the kind of speculation that may not paint the government (the body that seems to be pushing for, as you say, "trustworthy information") in the most benevolent light. I agree with the essence of what you're getting at - it's the old biblical trope of giving a man a fish vs. teaching a man to fish. But I could think of many possible benefits (for a government) in having a population with a reduced ability or incentive to be analytical and think critically. To be fair, I can think of many possible costs as well - I don't know whether one would outweigh the other.
- 20191031 7y agoI work on a presidential campaign on the digital side. 1 - If you take away FB advertising, then you reduce political upward mobility of many lesser known candidates. 2 - FOX, CNN, MSNBC and others will have an unfair advantage to promote an insider candidate or a candidate the bosses at these networks want to help promote. If you're okay with the above outcome, then push to end FB advertising. I can tell you from the inside, FB is tremendously important in giving smaller and lesser candidates a fighting chance against those backed by big money, establishment and insiders. I'm even curious if AOC herself would have been able to prevail without FB advertising. Even something small as promoting an event like a town hall, greatly benefits the smaller candidates, IMO. As for twitter advertising, it wasn't helpful for us and it only constitutes a small fraction of "digital". If you look at the campaign spending data across you'll see a similar trend. So it's an easier decision for twitter.
- stevespang 7y agoLiars begat liars. Zuck lies, and he likes earning revenue off liars as well.
- undefined3840 7y agoI don’t know how anyone can buy the free speech argument from Facebook when they are extremely strict on any display of adult nudity...
- 12thwonder 7y agofreedom to express one's opinion is different from spreading disinformation (e.g. incorrect election dates) to manipulate public, and the latter should be minimized somehow someway. i would like to know if you disagree and why.
- tathougies 7y agoWhy is his policy so diffficult for people to swallow? He has made a standard rule without room for arbitrary censorship and everyone is upset. If you can pay, you can publish on Facebook. This is a good thing. Fairness is important when it comes to monopolies offering services.
- colejohnson66 7y agoPeople are upset because he’s allowing ads that flat out lie simply because they’re a political ad. If the some Democratic nominee put out an ad saying “Trump reverses decision to ban LGBTQ+ from the military,” despite it being blatantly false (there’s no gray truth in that), they would allow it. This rule means I could go form a PAC and post a ridiculous ad like “Voting for Biden will give you AIDS.” That has no basis in reality, yet from Zuckerberg’s words, it sounds like they would allow it.
- tathougies 7y agoGood! That's fantastic. Some people believe those things. It's not just your voice and those of people like you that should be heard in a democracy. No one in any country has sole authority to determine 'fact'. If they did, we should just appoint them to be king, call them 'god', and be done with the whole government thing.
- colejohnson66 7y agoThe courts have already upheld the FTC’s authority many times in regards to false and deceptive advertising. I can’t legally make an ad that says “Vaccines cause autism; Buy homeopathic natural remedies!” Why is political advertising any different? Because then someone is the arbitrator of truth? The FTC does that already, just not with politics.
- danans 7y ago> If you can pay, you can publish on Facebook That's not true for Facebook or any other advertising platform. These platforms have entire sets of policies on what ads they will or will not run. Some restrictions are legally mandated, while others are based their own internal standards (i.e. they won't run blatantly racist ads even though they aren't technically illegal). The decision to run political ads regardless of whether they contain lies is a specific choice they are making, not something that emerges from a universal principle of access to paid advertising. And it's Mr. Zuckerberg's right to choose that route, as CEO of his company. But it doesn't absolve him of criticism for making the decision the way he did, whether from Mr. Dorsey, or a random nobody on this forum.
- TearsInTheRain 7y agoI wonder if all of this fervor against political ads would have happened if Clinton was elected.
- jmull 7y agoLying used to be wrong. Now, apparently, many are convinced it is wrong to have any barriers to lying. The con men have certainly gotten the upper hand. I suppose if we fall for this obvious and absurd BS we deserve the world we get (collectively).
- simion314 7y agoI want to ask the "Free speech" defenders on this thread, if the political ads are properly labeled and FB offers me a switch to turn them all off would it make you happy?
- dredmorbius 7y agoKeep in mind that a critical element of political (and in broader scope, all) advertising, is that its effects are not simply limited to the direct recipient. Political advertising literally shapes representation and policy. This is even more the case for narrowly targeted, and particularly negative / dissuading advertising. A chief tool and complaint in recent years has been of suppressing voter turnout, at times through issue advertising, but also specifically by spreading disinformation about candidates, voting processes, locations, times, and requirements. Simply disabling advertising for a narrow range of users capable and motivated to block ads does not protect against the social consequences of such activities. That's from someone who's not a free-speech absolutist.
- throwaway129917 7y agoAlways remember: Zuckerberg is devoid of ethics. He'd eat your child if it made him a profit.
- mikelyons 7y agoThis whole thing is one huge advocacy to remove money from politics in every way we can. If money is speech, only the rich are heard!
- brownkonas 7y agoMore broadly, Congress has failed to act with respect to campaign finance reform. Twitter's response gives me (some) hope that there could be a grass roots, free market reform of sorts. Fundraising becomes slightly less important if you can't spend the money online. Not sure of the overall effect, as TV providers are unlikely to turn away the lucrative ad spend.
- sitkack 7y agoThe humans need to come to terms with how we communicate facts and opinions. This started in the modern age with Bernays [1] in 1928. I'd like to have an ISO9001 traceable, encrypted log of all the ads shown to me. Every pixel that was placed on a screen meant to change my mind. And it should be traceable all the way back to the mine the ore was dug from. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_(book)
- klyrs 7y agoA true win for free speech. Not "free as in beer" but "free as in if you're rich enough to pay more than the competition, that's your price"
- tyfon 7y agoPaid political ads gives the ones with the most money an unfair advantage it's as simple as that. I'm all for the actions of twitter in this case but it really should be mandated by law.
- cabaalis 7y agoThe primary problem is that it's not illegal for politicians to lie to the electorate. Without solving that problem, we will always have sub-par leadership and questions about what is or is not a valid advertisement. In official capacity (under oath) it's illegal for us to lie to them. In their official capacity (under oath of office) they get to lie all day long, straight through their teeth. CEOs can't defraud their shareholders, but politicians can do so every day of their lives.
- nidificate 7y agoOften times in politics, what is a "lie" is more a matter of opinion rather than fact. Who gets to be the arbiter of truth?
- colejohnson66 7y agoIn theory, the electorate. They vote out politicians who lie. In practice, people don’t seem to care.
- ep103 7y agoIf only we had some sort of system, where individuals could be sued for making damaging statements. Maybe each side could present their case, and a jury of their peers could be the ultimate deciders.
- Aperocky 7y agoThat system certainly doesn't sound like facebook to me.
- mattnewton 7y agoIt's not illegal to lie but it is required to attribute that lie to the political campaign making it per the FEC's attribution rules, and the hope is that people will be able to spot lies and call them out. IANAL but this is the general idea as I understand it. To me, the problem is these kinds of sponsored posts undermine that by not enforcing the attribution, by being more ephemeral than TV or print ads, and by allowing specific enough targeting to exclude anyone who might call it out.
- xwowsersx 7y agoAs best I can tell, a lot of the arguments here are something along the lines of (trying to steel man): letting politicians pay for ads in order to increase their reach reduces the competition to a question of who has the most money and gives an outsized voice to them, leaving the politicians with less money unable to compete. So in order to ensure a vibrant and fair democratic process and political debate, we shouldn't allow politicians to buy ads on social media platforms. (If I've misrepresented the basic argument, please correct me.) But the thing is that the whole premise of free speech is the belief that sunlight is best disinfectant for bad ideas. We have this belief (whether warranted or not, though I'd argue it is) that _utlimately_ we will arrive at the good ideas and reject the bad ideas through public discourse. In other words, we have faith, from a holistic standpoint, that the polity will decide issues based on the substance of the ideas presented to them in the political arena (I understand well that this isn't the case in specific instances nor in every period of time, but it's still the belief broadly speaking). That being the case, increased reach - where reach simply = number of eyeballs you shove your message in front of - doesn't mean anything per se. The people who participate in the democratic process and public discourse still must sift through the ideas to determine which are good and which are bad. Maybe the counterargument to my point is "well, yes, we do believe that ideas are ultimately what win out, but if the candidates with less money cannot reach an audience, then you never get to a debate in the first place." I guess I do hear that argument and I'm unsure. I think where this gets complicated is when you start to think not just in terms of hard cash and spending on political ads. What about when media outlets and other organizations are dedicated, for whatever reason, to a certain candidate. For example, when TYT clearly favors a candidate and spends an entire election season praising them, etc - should that be allowed? In some ways those are resources being used as well to increase the reach of a candidate. It's time, money, staff, resources, etc. It seems to me that it just gets very dicey when you look at things just in terms of cash. You end up having to effectively try to centralize the whole process and make sure that everyone's reach is exactly even, which just isn't possible without massive government intervention and coercion and flagrant violations of free speech. I just don't see how this works out well in the end.
- dredmorbius 7y agoMuch of the "sunlight" defence points back to John Stuart Mill. Mill's argument has been subtly distorted over the years. I strongly recommend Jill Gordon's paper "John Stuart Mill and the 'Marketplace of Ideas'" (1997), which explores Mill's views and the history of their use, in depth: https://www.pdcnet.org/soctheorpract/content/soctheorpract_1997_0023_0002_0235_0250 https://www.pdcnet.org/soctheorpract/content/soctheorpract_1... (Paywalled, though available via Sci-Hub / Library Genesis.) https://philpapers.org/rec/GORJSM https://philpapers.org/rec/GORJSM
- yedava 7y agoRegarding advocacy groups, a few years ago, it was quite easy to setup a page on Facebook, build an audience and spread your message organically. But then Facebook severely limited the content from liked pages that was showing up in your feed. So the page admins had no choice but to buy ads in order for their content to show up in their subscribers feed. So if Facebook cared more about free speech than increasing profits, they'd go back to the older model where someone with no money, but plenty of time to volunteer, could build a sizeable audience. It's not bad to want a good return on your investment, but to couch that in a feel-good pitch for free speech just seems wrong.
- resters 7y agoThe real issue with FB and Twitter is the news feed algorithms, not the paid content. The inciting incident that gave rise to the concerns is simply that Trump won. Only a tiny fraction of the reach that Trump obtained via FB and Twitter was paid advertising. Most of the reach that benefitted Trump was simply the algorithm amplifying journalistic stories (mostly negative) that allowed Trump to dog whistle effectively. Imagine someone with 800 FB friends who shares an article from, the NYT or Huffpost that is harshly critical of Trump for saying something that comes across as racist. There are three broad categories to characterize those who see the shared content: a) people who are in the target audience of the article, who dislike Trump, who expected him to be racist, and who consider the article further proof (and vindication) of their view b) people who read the coverage and find it unfair to Trump, even if they agree with the gist. c) people who actually agree with the racist view Trump is alleged to have expressed. If the user sharing the article has 800 friends, most are probably in group a, but Trump benefits from any friends the user has who are in groups b or c. To them, the article reinforces their support for Trump or their view that the coverage was unfair. For those who view the coverage as unfair, a steady stream of similarly unfair-seeming articles makes them effectively immune to negative press about Trump. In 2019 many of Trump's supporters are in this group. When Trump describes "fake news" he is appealing to this group. The reach that benefits Trump may be 100 of the 800 friends, and it cost Trump's campaign nothing. Trump triggered these kinds of signaling cascades many, many times during the 2016 campaign. Sadly, the biggest problem is reporting that is not journalism but in-group focused entertainment writing. Many of the "most shared" articles from major papers are not thorough, in-depth stories, they are light on journalism and heavy on in-group signaling. It is this kind of article that helps Trump the most, for the aforementioned reasons. These are also the kinds of articles that get the most clicks and generate the most revenue for the paper.
- hinkley 7y agoI’ve had several occasions where a coworker in a meeting said words to the effect of “if someone offers us money we’re gonna take it.” Blurting out, “so you’re a whore then” in a staff meeting? Not okay. So I just stared. If I could stand to look at Zuck I’d be staring right now.
- dredmorbius 7y agoI once remarked to an editor (reporter) for a tech news site (appearing occasionally on HN) that a specific channel there listed itself as specifically sponsored. Their response: I'm glad to hear we're <doing it for money> and not <giving it away for free>. (Using words beginning with 'W' and 'S' respectively for each concept.)
- hinkley 7y agoI have told several coworkers in private that if money was all they were interested in, that there are more lucrative fields. I was referred for a CtH position at a small company years ago where they turned out to be, to quote the old CIA line, looking for a certain moral flexibility. I declined to convert, and I also don't accept referrals from that person anymore. I was not at all surprised to see a couple of those people end up at an online gambling company in my neighborhood a few years later. And relieved they didn't seem to recognize me. I keep hearing there are people who went into CS entirely for the money. I have deluded myself that I hadn't met many of them. But you encounter a bunch of them in one place and it's pretty hard to ignore.
- mwsfc 7y agoMy take? This is really a pretty simple equation for FB. Politcal ads = good business opportunity ....perhaps essential. Since FB tends to be a self-reinforcing echo chamber on both ends of the political spectrum, political ads will keep users engaged with the platform. For a variety of reasons interest in the 2020 campaign is likely to be sky high so allowing the ads should keeps FB's DAU's & MAU's in the preferred direction. Not allowing the ads could in-turn adversely affect those metrics and subsequently pull down ALL of their advertising rates. Freedom of Speech rational of allowing adds? (scoff, scoff, snort, outburst of laughter.....)
- colejohnson66 7y agoIt sounds like you’re saying that because Facebook wants more money, they can do what they want. No. They shouldn’t get a free pass simply because it maximizes profit. Slight tangent: Regulation is a thing because businesses have been shown to not self regulate when its in their best interest not to. A corporation maximizing profits could be a good thing for consumers, but it could also be bad. And when it’s bad, that’s when regulation is supposed to come in.
- mwsfc 7y agoNo, I never said Facebook is justified to do whatever they want because of their desire to reap more profits. Slight tangent: I don't disagree with your comments about regulation. Back to my earlier point, FB stands to lose more if they don't run political ads so expecting them to change their position in light Twitter's recent announcement is just not going to happen. Cloaking their position as promoting Freedom of Speech is complete rubbish.
- dredmorbius 7y agoMoney doesn't talk, it swears. -- Bob Dylan
- toss1 7y agoI'd be OK with Zuck's approach, IFF it were implemented with full transparency. I define full transparency as providing a full, near-real-time, public record of EVERY advert run, including (but not limited to): who paid for it & in what currency, all targeting parameters, and count of views. This would allow any person, public interest group, competitor, or other interested party to be informed and respond as they saw appropriate. This would also make FB adverts more like major media adverts, where anyone can (with a little bit of work) see exactly who is running what for & against their position. As FB is currently opaque, it is a magnet for manipulators seeking the holy grail of adverts, micro-targeted at the exact people who will respond, highly effective at changing behavior, and completely unnoticed by the opposition. FB may see this as attracting revenue, but the transparent option described above will likely generate more with the likely cycles of responses to adverts, counter-responses, etc. False claims, wholly misleading edits? Fine, just as long as everyone can see who's spreading that crap, and to whom, and can respond.
- stjohnswarts 7y agoZuck, it's a private company, you don't owe anyone a "voice" especially fake political ads. Just shut it all down if you don't want to fact check. it's all less than 1% of your ad revenue. Be the good guy for once instead of the mocked automaton everyone thinks you are.
- DevKoala 7y agoI agree with Zuckerberg on this one; improving transparency and policing the platform is the solution. Twitter doesn't have the answer for "what is a political ad" and I believe soon enough they will run into issues that will put in evidence their lack of foresight.
- ineedasername 7y agoI wonder if there might be a middle path where only ads directly from the campaign are allowed. It wouldn't necessarily resolve the "is it telling the truth" issue, but it would curtail some of the more extreme black propaganda & dark money ads.
- rhizome 7y agoWe could probably look back to when the laws were passed about identifying the source of broadcast and print ads, as well as "...and I approve this message" in broadcast ads. I'm sure there was some controversy, or at least discussion, that could be reflected upon in the current fight. Perhaps the whole history of fights in campaign finance reform applies. I wouldn't be surprised if Facebook has already done this.
- ping_pong 7y agoHe still hasn't learned despite years of being CEO. It's frankly stupid of him to have responded. You don't dig in your heels because that attracts the media attention, like a shark to a drop of blood. You say "This is something we're going to look at and evaluate closely." And then wait until the news gets bored of it. And then quietly release that you won't because of several reasons.
- jinushaun 7y agoThis is why Zuck doesn’t understand Instagram and Tik Tok. Politics and news articles is what killed Facebook for the new generation.
- jaimex2 7y agoFair enough. If they want political advertising on Facebook to stop just ban the practice of political advertising. I don't know why we expect any company to self regulate when an action hurts its interests.
- Paraesthetic 7y agoZuck the cuck
- gandutraveler 7y agoI'm not a fan of facebook but lately I'm seeing a lot of attacks on fb. Some are valid and some are outrageous. The problem of misinformation has existed for ages and if fb stops then something else will replace it. I don't use fb anymore but still see fake news/ads all over the internet. If we seriously need to fix this then it should be enforced by a law which applies to every media/news organization.
- sobani 7y agoDoesn't mean Facebook should actively try to make the problem worse. Luckily Twitter didn't follow the reasoning that as long as it's not illegal, it's OK.
- nswest23 7y agocan we all just stop using fb? Then no one will advertise there.
- SuperSandro2000 7y agoFool