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Facebook is autogenerating pages for white supremacists
- samizdis 6y agoThis is simplistic, but as short-term measures wouldn't it be prudent to turn off problematic autogeneration functions until they could be deployed reliably, which is to say, worked on properly before release into the wild? Similarly, much as I realise the imperative to earn maximum ad revenue by encouraging maximum engagement (or time on the platform), couldn't FB radically cut back its suggested content and its newsfeed inserts etc until they weren't the equivalent of leading people from the light and down into the dungeons? Newsgroups/usenet etc had all manner of dark corners, inhabited by all manner of bad agents, but they reflected the same interests as existed IRL. No one got stuff shoved in their face unless they looked for it. I am sure that FB has the talent to do better than it is doing at the moment. Move fast and break things is a great slogan, but if what you are breaking is society, and in some cases lives, then maybe slow down a bit.
- sebastialonso 6y agoMove fast and break things is a terrible slogan. See Google for example.
- samizdis 6y agoI see your point. "... sounds like a catchy slogan" would have been nearer to what I meant.
- rafale 6y agoMove fast and break the social fabric of society.
- xiphias2 6y agoWe should have prison sentence for companies that break the law...take down the web site for 1 year and see what happens. But as these prison sentences don't exist, ,,move fast and break things'' will stay the best strategy.
- imwillofficial 6y agoIt auto generated a page for what people put as their employer. The clickbait title of the year folks. God I hate what arstechnica has become. Being swallowed by Cande Nast has stolen their soul.
- cryptoz 6y agoHow does that make this any less of a problem? What does "It auto generated a page for what people put as their employer" have to do with this being 'clickbait'? Article title and contents match up with each other perfectly. Autogenerating pages for white supremacists is wrong. Do we agree on that statement? Well, if it's wrong, then they shouldn't do it. Doesn't matter if they had a 'reason' to do it. That is maybe even worse. They still shouldn't be doing things like this.
- disposekinetics 6y ago> Autogenerating pages for white supremacists is wrong. Do we agree on that statement? Why would that be wrong? It isn't an endorsement, anymore than Wikipedia having an article on Adolf Hitler is an endorsement. Edit: It's just making Facebook reflect reality.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- will4274 6y ago> Autogenerating pages for white supremacists is wrong. Do we agree on that statement? Not really tbh. Is it wrong that Microsoft Word will do a mail merge for white supremacists? I would think that undesirables are bounced at the door, not on a feature by feature basis.
- imwillofficial 6y ago"Autogenerating pages for white supremacists is wrong. " No it is not, it's morally neutral. It's an automated action that you disagree with. I couldn't care less about some autogenerated page for baby-eating-hitler. I don't give a fuck about this outrage, tbh
- Proven 6y agoIs that a crime?
- pseudo0 6y agoThe "research" underpinning this article was published almost a year ago, Ars must be really hurting for content to repackage this as fresh news.