5 ms·

‘Orwellian’: Facebook faces backlash for ‘harmful extremist content’ alerts

33 points by anonymousiam 5y ago

gentleman11 5y ago
Sam Harris proposed a “this changed my mind” button to compete with (or was it replace?) “likes” a few times. That would do more to combat extremism and polarization than any label
- agucova 5y ago
  I would actually love to use a platform with this idea at it's center: posts which persuade people to change opinions are prioritized.
  - ehnto 5y ago
    It would be more community than aparatus to make that happen. I also don't know if it's the right feedback loop. Wouldn't it promote extreme ideas? Since if you agree with the general consensus, you wouldn't click the button. If we pretend it works as advertised, it would promote very persuasive changes in the status quo.
- cjtrowbridge 5y ago
  No it wouldn't. People would just use it to troll.
  - gentleman11 5y ago
    People troll because they don’t think it matters what they say or do and just want to affect something, even sarcastically or hurtfully. A platform that got people to engage in a different way might reduce trolling
    - jhanschoo 5y ago
      Not necessarily. For example, it suffices that one's in-group celebrates trolling opinions not accepted by the in-group. Then trolling is an easy way to prove to oneself, if not their in-group, that one belongs to their in-group.
- ineedasername 5y ago
  Along with: 1) I already agreed with this post's ideas to detect echo Chambers, and maybe trigger more content with opposing viewpoints. 2) I disagree with this post to have a strong active signal if that besides just passively not hitting the "like" button. Or maybe these are awful ideas. But as much as intrusive data collection is part of the problem, as long as people are being fed content based on simplistic algorithms that optimize for anger and fear, we won't get anywhere. In systems will many millions of pieces of content, random selection won't work. Showing similar content to that already viewed has been less than productive. There has to be some way to have social media and content outlets optimize for something other than $minutes_of_attention.
mrd3v0 5y ago
Sensationalist cyclic journalism. Facebook allows misinformation and extremist pages to operate, let's lynch them. Facebook puts a simple warning on top on suspicious posts, Orwellian. This is one of the reasons why corporations as big as Facebook don't have an identity or code, this sensationalist journalism that tries to spin the public and how they approach a certain predicament aiming to generate the largest number of engagements.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  Note that this is the Washington Times, not the Washington Post. The last time I checked, the Washington Times was slightly to the right of Fox News. It was more of an opinion paper than a journalistic endeavor. It may have changed since then, but that was my assessment about ten years ago.
  - wpietri 5y ago
    This is all factually correct. It has long printed white nationalists, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times#White_nationalism,_neo-Confederatism,_and_racism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times#White_nat...
agumonkey 5y ago
between orwellian outbursts on the information/political layer, and the matrixian ar/transhumanists talks online .. I wonder how much of our progression is inevitable
olliej 5y ago
TLDR: The people pedaling false information and pushing extremist views are complaining that they're being tagged as posting misinformation and extremism.
- ultrablack 5y ago
  You have been tagged!
- wpietri 5y ago
  Not sure why this is getting voted down. It's a far-right paper quoting far-right sources only (or at least as far as I could read before uncloseable ads took over my tab). Asymmetric polarization is a real problem in the US, and the Washington Times has been a leader in that for decades: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times
  - lostmsu 5y ago
    Just an attempt to explain downvoting. Unbiased critical thinking requires one to only look at the validity of the message. The author should not matter at all. The only exception to that I am aware of is when an extraordinary claim is made that is previously considered unlikely, when disproving it is very hard. In that case it might be easier for the sake of saving time of readers to point out that author lied or misled in similar statements before. An example of that would be somebody coming up with a energy out of thin air idea (extremely unlikely, hard to check in-house), and pointing out that same person made such claims for 10+ years, perhaps with different apparatus and it never worked when reviewed, etc allows quick dismissal for many people until more trusted source checks and speaks on the matter. "Extremist" material plaque on Facebook however is factual information, there's nothing to quickly dismiss based on credentials of the author here. Therefore bringing up their identity only introduces previously missing bias in otherwise unbiased conversation, thus damaging clear thought process.
    - wpietri 5y ago
      > Unbiased critical thinking requires one to only look at the validity of the message. The author should not matter at all. This is obviously not what people do. It's not what experts in media criticism recommend. And it's also not even vaguely practical. The number of claims made is effectively infinite. The time needed to validate a given claim varies, but is often quite large, and can be effectively infinite. No single person can fully validate even a tiny fraction of all the claims made. Ergo, a person must choose between almost never deciding anything or collaborating with other people to do the work of validation. This introduces the vital concept of trust. The whole existence of journalism is part of that. If the world worked the way you suggest, we would just need something like 4chan: a bunch of anons posting messages. Then individuals could validate each one themselves. Instead what we have is established, branded newspapers, networks, magazines, and the like. What most have in common is a reputation for accuracy, something they invest quite a bit in maintaining and defending through the use of standard journalistic practices, professional editors, and fact-checking departments. The Washington Times purports to be a respectable journalistic outfit, inviting its readers to trust it. Its history demonstrates that is has a strong agenda and is willing to ride roughshod over traditional standards of validity in pursuit of partisan gains. There's nothing wrong with noting that so that people don't mistake it for some sort of journalistic effort.
protomyth 5y ago
Well, if it's like the absolutely tone deaf alerts under videos on YouTube then I would expect some protests. The COVID misinformation warning on a video tracking air traffic for the last two years or the "sovereign citizen" warning on a video about a mishandled police stop (no sovereign citizen mentioned) does more harm than good.
- smsm42 5y ago
  You've seen nothing yet. How about chess analysis video marked as "hate speech"? https://www.wired.com/story/why-youtube-chat-chess-flagged-hate-speech/ https://www.wired.com/story/why-youtube-chat-chess-flagged-h... Makes sense, no? "White begins and wins in 3 turns" - surely this is a KKK recruitment video?!
  - protomyth 5y ago
    I certainly hope we can start thinking about the slander / libel laws in the US because these constant ML driven accusations are going to get worse and worse and do ruin people's lives.
bmarquez 5y ago
If you're curious about actual examples of the warning, as well as content that potentially triggered the warning (a meme about Donald Rumsfeld's death was cited), ZeroHedge has some screenshots: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-07-01/new-facebook-warning-are-you-concerned-someone-you-know-becoming-extremist https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-07-01/new-facebook-warni... Note: Their comment section is probably not safe for work
gentleman11 5y ago
Bad ml systems + automated systems labeling people as extremists and warning their friends about them or deplatforming them… imagine getting flagged and trying to convince people on hn to upvote your blog post that asks for help so a real human at <big Corp> looks into it to fix a false flag. If the accusation was racism or sexism, who will dare support the person claiming they are innocent?
JohnTHaller 5y ago
Please note that this is "The Washington Times", not the Washington Post. The Times is a small, far-right newspaper in DC that dabbles in conspiracy theories (Obama is a Muslim, Covid is a Chinese bioweapon) and anti-science reporting (rejecting climate science and second hand smoke effects): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times
- CarelessExpert 5y ago
  Kinda interesting watching the downvotes come out for comments like this. The Washington Times is right up there with OANN and should not be viewed as a serious source of journalism.
  - wpietri 5y ago
    Yup. I've been watching my comments about this bob up and down. That's typical for me whenever I post something that's directly critical of the US far right, even if it's neutrally stated and supported by references. For all the supposed concern about Orwellian social media censorship on HN, there's clearly a brigade of far-right supporters eager to downvote anything they aren't comfortable with.
    - JohnTHaller 5y ago
      Quite a few people on HN downvote facts that they don't like. Here again: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27748820 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27748820
lostmsu 5y ago
The largest independent non-profit anti-corruption organization in Russia [0] has been recently classified as "extremist" by the government, and some people who simply donated money to them were fired. Many members and some of their family were arrested. I am sure that new Facebook feature would quickly become favorite for duchebags in Kremlin to find more supporters to prosecute. 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Corruption_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Corruption_Foundation
skyzyx 5y ago
Piping this through NewsGuard has a score of 12.5/100. It’s more _Animal Farm_ than Orwell.

33 points by anonymousiam 5y ago

Sam Harris proposed a “this changed my mind” button to compete with (or was it replace?) “likes” a few times. That would do more to combat extremism and polarization than any label

agucova 5y ago
I would actually love to use a platform with this idea at it's center: posts which persuade people to change opinions are prioritized.
- ehnto 5y ago
  It would be more community than aparatus to make that happen. I also don't know if it's the right feedback loop. Wouldn't it promote extreme ideas? Since if you agree with the general consensus, you wouldn't click the button. If we pretend it works as advertised, it would promote very persuasive changes in the status quo.
cjtrowbridge 5y ago
No it wouldn't. People would just use it to troll.
- gentleman11 5y ago
  People troll because they don’t think it matters what they say or do and just want to affect something, even sarcastically or hurtfully. A platform that got people to engage in a different way might reduce trolling
  - jhanschoo 5y ago
    Not necessarily. For example, it suffices that one's in-group celebrates trolling opinions not accepted by the in-group. Then trolling is an easy way to prove to oneself, if not their in-group, that one belongs to their in-group.
ineedasername 5y ago
Along with: 1) I already agreed with this post's ideas to detect echo Chambers, and maybe trigger more content with opposing viewpoints. 2) I disagree with this post to have a strong active signal if that besides just passively not hitting the "like" button. Or maybe these are awful ideas. But as much as intrusive data collection is part of the problem, as long as people are being fed content based on simplistic algorithms that optimize for anger and fear, we won't get anywhere. In systems will many millions of pieces of content, random selection won't work. Showing similar content to that already viewed has been less than productive. There has to be some way to have social media and content outlets optimize for something other than $minutes_of_attention.

mrd3v0 5y ago

Sensationalist cyclic journalism. Facebook allows misinformation and extremist pages to operate, let's lynch them. Facebook puts a simple warning on top on suspicious posts, Orwellian. This is one of the reasons why corporations as big as Facebook don't have an identity or code, this sensationalist journalism that tries to spin the public and how they approach a certain predicament aiming to generate the largest number of engagements.

reaperducer 5y ago
Note that this is the Washington Times, not the Washington Post. The last time I checked, the Washington Times was slightly to the right of Fox News. It was more of an opinion paper than a journalistic endeavor. It may have changed since then, but that was my assessment about ten years ago.
- wpietri 5y ago
  This is all factually correct. It has long printed white nationalists, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times#White_nationalism,_neo-Confederatism,_and_racism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times#White_nat...

agumonkey 5y ago

between orwellian outbursts on the information/political layer, and the matrixian ar/transhumanists talks online .. I wonder how much of our progression is inevitable

olliej 5y ago

TLDR: The people pedaling false information and pushing extremist views are complaining that they're being tagged as posting misinformation and extremism.

ultrablack 5y ago
You have been tagged!
wpietri 5y ago
Not sure why this is getting voted down. It's a far-right paper quoting far-right sources only (or at least as far as I could read before uncloseable ads took over my tab). Asymmetric polarization is a real problem in the US, and the Washington Times has been a leader in that for decades: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times
- lostmsu 5y ago
  Just an attempt to explain downvoting. Unbiased critical thinking requires one to only look at the validity of the message. The author should not matter at all. The only exception to that I am aware of is when an extraordinary claim is made that is previously considered unlikely, when disproving it is very hard. In that case it might be easier for the sake of saving time of readers to point out that author lied or misled in similar statements before. An example of that would be somebody coming up with a energy out of thin air idea (extremely unlikely, hard to check in-house), and pointing out that same person made such claims for 10+ years, perhaps with different apparatus and it never worked when reviewed, etc allows quick dismissal for many people until more trusted source checks and speaks on the matter. "Extremist" material plaque on Facebook however is factual information, there's nothing to quickly dismiss based on credentials of the author here. Therefore bringing up their identity only introduces previously missing bias in otherwise unbiased conversation, thus damaging clear thought process.
  - wpietri 5y ago
    > Unbiased critical thinking requires one to only look at the validity of the message. The author should not matter at all. This is obviously not what people do. It's not what experts in media criticism recommend. And it's also not even vaguely practical. The number of claims made is effectively infinite. The time needed to validate a given claim varies, but is often quite large, and can be effectively infinite. No single person can fully validate even a tiny fraction of all the claims made. Ergo, a person must choose between almost never deciding anything or collaborating with other people to do the work of validation. This introduces the vital concept of trust. The whole existence of journalism is part of that. If the world worked the way you suggest, we would just need something like 4chan: a bunch of anons posting messages. Then individuals could validate each one themselves. Instead what we have is established, branded newspapers, networks, magazines, and the like. What most have in common is a reputation for accuracy, something they invest quite a bit in maintaining and defending through the use of standard journalistic practices, professional editors, and fact-checking departments. The Washington Times purports to be a respectable journalistic outfit, inviting its readers to trust it. Its history demonstrates that is has a strong agenda and is willing to ride roughshod over traditional standards of validity in pursuit of partisan gains. There's nothing wrong with noting that so that people don't mistake it for some sort of journalistic effort.

protomyth 5y ago

Well, if it's like the absolutely tone deaf alerts under videos on YouTube then I would expect some protests. The COVID misinformation warning on a video tracking air traffic for the last two years or the "sovereign citizen" warning on a video about a mishandled police stop (no sovereign citizen mentioned) does more harm than good.

smsm42 5y ago
You've seen nothing yet. How about chess analysis video marked as "hate speech"? https://www.wired.com/story/why-youtube-chat-chess-flagged-hate-speech/ https://www.wired.com/story/why-youtube-chat-chess-flagged-h... Makes sense, no? "White begins and wins in 3 turns" - surely this is a KKK recruitment video?!
- protomyth 5y ago
  I certainly hope we can start thinking about the slander / libel laws in the US because these constant ML driven accusations are going to get worse and worse and do ruin people's lives.

bmarquez 5y ago

If you're curious about actual examples of the warning, as well as content that potentially triggered the warning (a meme about Donald Rumsfeld's death was cited), ZeroHedge has some screenshots: https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-07-01/new-facebook-warning-are-you-concerned-someone-you-know-becoming-extremist https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-07-01/new-facebook-warni... Note: Their comment section is probably not safe for work

gentleman11 5y ago

Bad ml systems + automated systems labeling people as extremists and warning their friends about them or deplatforming them… imagine getting flagged and trying to convince people on hn to upvote your blog post that asks for help so a real human at <big Corp> looks into it to fix a false flag. If the accusation was racism or sexism, who will dare support the person claiming they are innocent?

JohnTHaller 5y ago

Please note that this is "The Washington Times", not the Washington Post. The Times is a small, far-right newspaper in DC that dabbles in conspiracy theories (Obama is a Muslim, Covid is a Chinese bioweapon) and anti-science reporting (rejecting climate science and second hand smoke effects): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times

CarelessExpert 5y ago
Kinda interesting watching the downvotes come out for comments like this. The Washington Times is right up there with OANN and should not be viewed as a serious source of journalism.
- wpietri 5y ago
  Yup. I've been watching my comments about this bob up and down. That's typical for me whenever I post something that's directly critical of the US far right, even if it's neutrally stated and supported by references. For all the supposed concern about Orwellian social media censorship on HN, there's clearly a brigade of far-right supporters eager to downvote anything they aren't comfortable with.
  - JohnTHaller 5y ago
    Quite a few people on HN downvote facts that they don't like. Here again: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27748820 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27748820

lostmsu 5y ago

The largest independent non-profit anti-corruption organization in Russia [0] has been recently classified as "extremist" by the government, and some people who simply donated money to them were fired. Many members and some of their family were arrested. I am sure that new Facebook feature would quickly become favorite for duchebags in Kremlin to find more supporters to prosecute. 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Corruption_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Corruption_Foundation

skyzyx 5y ago

Piping this through NewsGuard has a score of 12.5/100. It’s more _Animal Farm_ than Orwell.