6 ms·

Are they going to provide evidence, here? This is thin as water. Facebook has been making life miserable for everyone by being entirely unpredictable in its ad

Are they going to provide evidence, here? This is thin as water. Facebook has been making life miserable for everyone by being entirely unpredictable in its ad provision and targeting. The rules and algorithms change willy-nilly, and reliable engagement is nigh impossible, and even more so when the media landscape of the left is fragmented across many separate sources and the media of the right is very centralized. If we could see aggregate numbers for left/right, we'd get better answers. But somehow I doubt they can or will make those numbers known.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
r721 6y ago
Quote from WSJ story: "In late 2017, when Facebook tweaked its newsfeed algorithm to minimize the presence of political news, policy executives were concerned about the outsize impact of the changes on the right, including the Daily Wire, people familiar with the matter said. Engineers redesigned their intended changes so that left-leaning sites like Mother Jones were affected more than previously planned, the people said. Mr. Zuckerberg approved the plans. “We did not make changes with the intent of impacting individual publishers,” a Facebook spokesman said." https://archive.md/uhZpP https://archive.md/uhZpP
- Fellshard 6y ago
  That doesn't tell us it was targeted - perhaps that's not the explicit claim the article makes, but it is certainly implied. If Facebook can't control the impressions for each ad partner, it's likely more than just Mother Jones were affected. If their algorithms are bad enough, driving people off the platform, that might also contribute to declines. (This is one major reason I no longer use FB: it can no longer serve any of the baseline purposes it was intended for, because of how poorly its feed algorithms work.)
  - _exnk 6y ago
    The Verge is a Vox owned website. They do some good reporting but they’re not the most impartial.
    - wwright 6y ago
      What does an impartial website look like? How does one have a website that sees no particular group as more correct than any other?
      - iaw 6y ago
        In order to determine impartiality you have to use your brain to think through what the themes of every article coming from the paper are. An impartial source of news will be critical of both sides, a biased source of news is only critical of one. Bias doesn't necessarily make the news wrong but it does mean the news is framed in a way to benefit one particular group or another.
        Can_Not 6y ago
        There are plenty of articles that criticize "both sides" on topics where only one side has done wrong.
      - _exnk 6y ago
        Check out the hill. They do a decent job of representing many different viewpoints without being alarmist. Opinion pieces are pretty clearly differentiated from reporting pieces.
      - gen3 6y ago
        apnews.com or reuters.com seem to be pretty impartial, since they are intended to be wire services.
- uselesscynicism 6y ago
  Notice the careful wording: >policy executives were concerned about the outsize impact of the changes on the right, including the Daily Wire This could be reworded: the initial implementation primarily punished right-wing news organizations, especially the Daily Wire, but someone noticed and complained >Engineers redesigned their intended changes so that left-leaning sites like Mother Jones were affected more than previously planned Engineers decided that it would be good to censor far-left propaganda outfits like Mother Jones as well, if they were going to censor the Right, since someone complained, instead of only censoring the Right, so they changed their algorithm to be somewhat more critical of e.g. Mother Jones than the original algorithm, leaving the final implementation ... a black box that censors some political voices and not others. Fast forward three years, to this week. Consider the NY Post Hunter Biden corruption story that hopefully you've heard about by now. Now it's clear Facebook and Twitter have no problem blocking an "individual publisher" founded in 1801 in the final weeks before an election, when anything is permitted to stop the "fascist" Donald Trump from winning another election, if said newspaper publishes information that might make Joe Biden look bad.
  - threeseed 6y ago
    > publishes information that might make Joe Biden look bad There is credible information that this information is a part of a Russian disinformation effort to influence the campaign. Now whether it's true or not is irrelevant. If the FBI has warned this information is suspect and is actively investigating then it is only appropriate for Facebook to err on the side of caution. Especially given we are weeks from an election.
    - Fellshard 6y ago
      Yet there is no indication that that is the basis on which the story was initially slowed, and no indication that they apply that consistently.
      - krimeo 6y ago
        The story was suppressed because it materials were allegedly obtained by hackers.
- eznzt 6y ago
  "left-leaning sites" is not an individual publisher.
  - ggggtez 6y ago
    > left-leaning sites like Mother Jones It's not clear if they are quoting the engineers here, but that sounds like an individual publisher to me.
emilfihlman 6y ago
As a person interested in guns, media platforms have been nothing but killing access to them: deplatforming, hiding, unpublishing, fake strikes, whatnot. Ie perhaps it's more that people are not that interested in the left (not surprising since it's not a centrist viewpoint) if they can't give the same kind of concrete proofs.
benjaminjosephw 6y ago
The fact that there's little evidence is itself the problem. Facebook is manipulating the reach of some news sources over others but their methodology is completely opaque. The choices about how the news feed works can't be entirely free of a subjective understanding of how the world works so the question isn't "is the new feed biased?", it's "how is it biased?". Without transparency, speculating is the only route we have to ask that question. At this point we know that Facebook has the potential to significantly influence political discourse with the choices it makes. The fact that those choices are hidden is a problem but a bigger problem is the influence itself. No privately held company should ever be allowed this level of (potential/actual) influence on political discourse.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

r721 6y ago

Quote from WSJ story: "In late 2017, when Facebook tweaked its newsfeed algorithm to minimize the presence of political news, policy executives were concerned about the outsize impact of the changes on the right, including the Daily Wire, people familiar with the matter said. Engineers redesigned their intended changes so that left-leaning sites like Mother Jones were affected more than previously planned, the people said. Mr. Zuckerberg approved the plans. “We did not make changes with the intent of impacting individual publishers,” a Facebook spokesman said." https://archive.md/uhZpP https://archive.md/uhZpP

Fellshard 6y ago
That doesn't tell us it was targeted - perhaps that's not the explicit claim the article makes, but it is certainly implied. If Facebook can't control the impressions for each ad partner, it's likely more than just Mother Jones were affected. If their algorithms are bad enough, driving people off the platform, that might also contribute to declines. (This is one major reason I no longer use FB: it can no longer serve any of the baseline purposes it was intended for, because of how poorly its feed algorithms work.)
- _exnk 6y ago
  The Verge is a Vox owned website. They do some good reporting but they’re not the most impartial.
  - wwright 6y ago
    What does an impartial website look like? How does one have a website that sees no particular group as more correct than any other?
    - iaw 6y ago
      In order to determine impartiality you have to use your brain to think through what the themes of every article coming from the paper are. An impartial source of news will be critical of both sides, a biased source of news is only critical of one. Bias doesn't necessarily make the news wrong but it does mean the news is framed in a way to benefit one particular group or another.
      - Can_Not 6y ago
        There are plenty of articles that criticize "both sides" on topics where only one side has done wrong.
    - _exnk 6y ago
      Check out the hill. They do a decent job of representing many different viewpoints without being alarmist. Opinion pieces are pretty clearly differentiated from reporting pieces.
    - gen3 6y ago
      apnews.com or reuters.com seem to be pretty impartial, since they are intended to be wire services.
uselesscynicism 6y ago
Notice the careful wording: >policy executives were concerned about the outsize impact of the changes on the right, including the Daily Wire This could be reworded: the initial implementation primarily punished right-wing news organizations, especially the Daily Wire, but someone noticed and complained >Engineers redesigned their intended changes so that left-leaning sites like Mother Jones were affected more than previously planned Engineers decided that it would be good to censor far-left propaganda outfits like Mother Jones as well, if they were going to censor the Right, since someone complained, instead of only censoring the Right, so they changed their algorithm to be somewhat more critical of e.g. Mother Jones than the original algorithm, leaving the final implementation ... a black box that censors some political voices and not others. Fast forward three years, to this week. Consider the NY Post Hunter Biden corruption story that hopefully you've heard about by now. Now it's clear Facebook and Twitter have no problem blocking an "individual publisher" founded in 1801 in the final weeks before an election, when anything is permitted to stop the "fascist" Donald Trump from winning another election, if said newspaper publishes information that might make Joe Biden look bad.
- threeseed 6y ago
  > publishes information that might make Joe Biden look bad There is credible information that this information is a part of a Russian disinformation effort to influence the campaign. Now whether it's true or not is irrelevant. If the FBI has warned this information is suspect and is actively investigating then it is only appropriate for Facebook to err on the side of caution. Especially given we are weeks from an election.
  - Fellshard 6y ago
    Yet there is no indication that that is the basis on which the story was initially slowed, and no indication that they apply that consistently.
    - krimeo 6y ago
      The story was suppressed because it materials were allegedly obtained by hackers.
eznzt 6y ago
"left-leaning sites" is not an individual publisher.
- ggggtez 6y ago
  > left-leaning sites like Mother Jones It's not clear if they are quoting the engineers here, but that sounds like an individual publisher to me.

emilfihlman 6y ago

As a person interested in guns, media platforms have been nothing but killing access to them: deplatforming, hiding, unpublishing, fake strikes, whatnot. Ie perhaps it's more that people are not that interested in the left (not surprising since it's not a centrist viewpoint) if they can't give the same kind of concrete proofs.

benjaminjosephw 6y ago

The fact that there's little evidence is itself the problem. Facebook is manipulating the reach of some news sources over others but their methodology is completely opaque. The choices about how the news feed works can't be entirely free of a subjective understanding of how the world works so the question isn't "is the new feed biased?", it's "how is it biased?". Without transparency, speculating is the only route we have to ask that question. At this point we know that Facebook has the potential to significantly influence political discourse with the choices it makes. The fact that those choices are hidden is a problem but a bigger problem is the influence itself. No privately held company should ever be allowed this level of (potential/actual) influence on political discourse.