Facebook Doesn't Care About Fixing Fake News Problem On Its Platform (theguardian.com) 113
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Journalists working as factcheckers for Facebook have pushed to end a controversial media partnership with the social network, saying the company has ignored their concerns and failed to use their expertise to combat misinformation. Current and former Facebook factcheckers told the Guardian that the tech platform's collaboration with outside reporters has produced minimal results and that they've lost trust in Facebook, which has repeatedly refused to release meaningful data about the impacts of their work. Some said Facebook's hiring of a PR firm that used an antisemitic narrative to discredit critics -- fueling the same kind of propaganda factcheckers regularly debunk -- should be a deal-breaker.
Facebook now has more than 40 media partners across the globe, including the Associated Press, PolitiFact and the Weekly Standard, and has said false news on the platform is "trending downward." While some newsroom leaders said the relationship was positive, other partners said the results were unclear and that they had grown increasingly resentful of Facebook. Facebook has said that third-party factchecking is one part of its strategy to fight misinformation, and has claimed that a "false" rating leads an article to be ranked lower in news feed, reducing future views by 80% on average. The company has refused, however, to publicly release any data to support these claims. Facebook said in a statement that it had "heard feedback from our partners that they'd like more data on the impact of their efforts," adding that it has started sending "quarterly reports" with "customized statistics" to partners and would be"looking for more statistics to share externally in early 2019." Facebook declined to share the reports with the Guardian.
Facebook now has more than 40 media partners across the globe, including the Associated Press, PolitiFact and the Weekly Standard, and has said false news on the platform is "trending downward." While some newsroom leaders said the relationship was positive, other partners said the results were unclear and that they had grown increasingly resentful of Facebook. Facebook has said that third-party factchecking is one part of its strategy to fight misinformation, and has claimed that a "false" rating leads an article to be ranked lower in news feed, reducing future views by 80% on average. The company has refused, however, to publicly release any data to support these claims. Facebook said in a statement that it had "heard feedback from our partners that they'd like more data on the impact of their efforts," adding that it has started sending "quarterly reports" with "customized statistics" to partners and would be"looking for more statistics to share externally in early 2019." Facebook declined to share the reports with the Guardian.
Re:TL;DR (Score:4, Insightful)
Facebook doesn't care.
It's not news and there's no reason to bother expanding the point into anything more than those three words. Next article, please.
Of course facebook doesn't care. Sensationalist crap brings in more participation on their site. Both from the camp spreading the fake news and those coming on to argue that it is in fact fake.
We care... (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't get your news from Facebook (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Don't get your news from Facebook (Score:5, Informative)
I don't take anything I read on Facebook as fact. If I care about it, I double check on some more reputable site. Facebook is like the phone service. They provide the means of communications, but aren't the ones making calls. Don't just believe all the random things your friends or pages you follow post.
Exactly. Facebook is like the fence between two gossipy ladies' back yards. Take what you hear with a grain of salt. Or a whole big shaker of it.
And along the same lines, I don't think the freakin' fence should be censoring their conversation either.
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To expand on the phone service analogy, there are plenty of paid-for robocalls as well, often times given higher priority than other people. To boot, the robocalls can be paid for and be on any topic, even if it is an overt lie.
It is funny looking at memes on FB, looking to see where the picture came from, and finding that it originated at some political campaign organization.
I don't have the time to fact check every single lie, and I can't really make a macro to automatically post a Snopes link when they
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Facebook is a bulletin board in the town square. Anyone can post any damned thing they want. That's a good thing, but just don't rely on the town bulletin board for hard news.
That's what REAL news sites are for.
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I don't take anything I read on Facebook as fact. If I care about it, I double check on some more reputable site. Facebook is like the phone service. They provide the means of communications, but aren't the ones making calls.
The normal news is no different. People who don't understand things write articles about them which mislead, confuse, and misinform. Then you have to go double-check to make sure they got it right.
Partnering with "fake news" outlets (Score:3, Insightful)
Basically if you're partnering with institutions like Politifact, Vox and Snopes then you'll get a very one sided narrative and everything else will be labeled fake news. Perhaps censoring content isn't that great of an idea and these reporters are just mad Facebook isn't listening to their ideas on what should be censored.
News and information should be free, even if it's fake, people can do the fact checking for themselves. The problem here is that these journalists are basically saying "everyone else is dumb, we need to filter the information they get". It's a dangerous proposition.
Re: Partnering with "fake news" outlets (Score:1)
They also partner with organizations like Weekly Standard, which is overtly consetvative. I believe there was a dust up early on because some dubious right wing org that was added for so called balance was abusing the system.
Lack of transparency is why we do not know the real facts about who is exerting what influence.
But TFS mentions Weekly Standard, so you have no excuse for you fake, distorted claim.
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Re:Partnering with "fake news" outlets (Score:4, Insightful)
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Too bad that this side you describe is running the news media and Facebook/Google these days. Being one sided indeed isn't a concern if you're on the "right" side.
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Too bad that this side you describe is running the news media and Facebook/Google these days. Being one sided indeed isn't a concern if you're on the "right" side.
You must be trolling. Various news media, FB, and Google are run by different people, and the "right" side appears to be the source of all the fake news of late.
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people can do the fact checking for themselves.
They can, but they don't, wherein lies the problem.
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So a government/NGO should step in and fix this? It's a gross underestimation of people's intelligence which is exactly what leads to fascist/socialist/communist media control policies.
When anyone calls anything fake (Score:3, Insightful)
As if they both weren't wrong, public lies to get votes, and never really followed anyway. Telling the truth about that - I've watched this crap since Eisenhower - would be news. What we see today, not so much.
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Since when are rules that make sense in a dense city right for farms? And vice versa...I'm sure the land use, pest control, trash burning, and fertilizer requirements are different - or should be. You can't swing your arms in the city without breaking a nose. Does that mean farmers shouldn't be able to swing their arms?
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From what I observe, the whole central statist model has some real serious issues. One size does NOT fit all.
Re:Stop redefining shit to fit your world view (Score:4, Interesting)
Which again, was my point. As long as we allow facts to be called fake, we can't get rid of the crap.
And that's where we sit - factually, right now.
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Fake news vs paridoy (Score:5, Insightful)
There are some "New sources" that seem like fully legitimate news sources however if you reads their terms of use [foxnews.com] " Company furnishes the Company Sites and the Company Services for your personal enjoyment and entertainment." Or in general stating what they say may not be true, as it could be parody. Then there is a wide range of editorial comprehension of the news, where peoples personal feelings of the news gets expressed, often by stating a sentience in a different way, such as "Government Shutdown" vs "Government Slowdown" vs "Placing a hold on paying most bills until a budget is signed"
We also have incomplete and often inaccurate "Breaking News" which is stating what it known at the time, and normal mistakes do happen in the news as well.
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You correctly pick on Fox, however it's the same with pretty much all of the media. Those statements you mentioned are there to keep them from being sued if they're wrong, which is not the same as your suggested parody.
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I piked on Fox mainly because that statement was very early in its terms and services. I would love to have the New Media have some sort of consequences for providing misleading information, however every solution I think of seems like scary 1984 type of solution.
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Seems like some simple rules could be implemented based on whether the reporting causes harm or not. For instance, I've long held that reporting a suspect's name or anything else identifying them prior to conviction is wrong. Much like the Duke Lacrosse fake rape case, we should practice what we preach on innocent until proven guilty. Once proven, then report the details. It might make DAs and the like focus on their job instead of the press as well. It would seem that such restrictions would slow down the
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However the Truth can create harm, and the powers to be, and the powers to interpret and enforce can deem information that causes them harm to be false. We need to know how truthful the information is, while making sure the judges on its truthfulness are kept in check. The Free Media even with posting fake news or just misleading news on times, is still better then a government controlled news source, where the "Good of the People" rule is used to block what is just inconvenient for the leadership.
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It's not government controlled, it's a set of rules on when information can be made public. There's a big difference - the news still has all its knowledge, it just has to sit on them for a bit as a general concept. During that time, the "facts" can be made clear, and then when things are reported, the likelihood of reporting facts increases. After all, reporting a "fact" that's not an actual fact should be considered libelous at the least. It's just that the press has been protected overly much from the ef
of course not.. (Score:1)
the morons who believe the 'fake news' are more likely to also click on ads.
Cat Videos (Score:1)
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Exactly. If you're getting your "news" from social media, you're not only doing it wrong, you're a moron.
Actual Papers (Score:3)
I only read major media (Score:1)
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AP, LA Times, and that's about it when I get news off of Facebook. Otherwise, I go to the main websites. I can't believe anyone would get their news off Facebook unless they follow the major media there and use Facebook to catch current stories.
It's lazy and easy... and it doesn't matter if someone reads more than a headine on facebook... See information enough times and people start to believe it. (that's why advertising works).
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AP, LA Times, and that's about it when I get news off of Facebook. Otherwise, I go to the main websites. I can't believe anyone would get their news off Facebook unless they follow the major media there and use Facebook to catch current stories.
It's lazy and easy... and it doesn't matter if someone reads more than a headine on facebook... See information enough times and people start to believe it. (that's why advertising works).
I tell you three times true
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Facebook Doesn't Care About Fixing Conservative Views Problem On Its Platform
If you had looked into the matter at all, you would know that the Russian Internet Research Agency was posting both conservative and liberal material in order to sow discord among the American public. They were wildly successful. So successful in fact, that they started actively supporting Trump because Putin hates Hillary Clinton. But you are more concerned with being butthurt over some perceived censorship than you are with a rival nation interfering with our democratic process. Get your priorities st
'They threw us under the bus at every opportunity& (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.businessinsider.nl... [businessinsider.nl]
"Two former employees for the fact-checking site Snopes said Facebook threw fact-checkers under the bus when their work prompted a backlash."
Dumb fucks (Score:2)
Current and former Facebook factcheckers told the Guardian that the tech platform's collaboration with outside reporters has produced minimal results and that they've lost trust in Facebook...
They had trust in Facebook?
LOL
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no, the dumb fucks are those that use social media for news.
facebook is (one way ) for coworkers, schoolmates and relatives to stay in touch. that's all.
don't be a dumb-ass, get your news from actual journalists.
Posted By? (Score:2)
Hey BeauHD, you need to change your name to Captain Obvious. Does anyone not already know this?
Title is too long (Score:2)
Facebookâ(TM)s roots (Score:2)
It was a platform for kids to play around and search for a hookup on campus. It shouldâ(TM)ve never been more than that.
Where you get your news (Score:1)
People who trust "news" they see on Facebook are about as dumb as the people who trust they're getting an "authentic Rolex" for $15 from a guy on the street.
Here's a tip: any news from *any* source should be (a) weighed for bias based on the source, (b) cross-referenced with a diverse selection of other sources to check validity, and (c) checked against *opposing* sources to see what -- if anything -- is being left out, exaggerated, etc.
Yes, I know that's actual *work* which people are loathe to do these d
Fakebook cares only about a couple things (Score:1)
Re:Fakebook cares only about a couple things (Score:5, Insightful)
As a conservative, let me just state for the record that your number 2 is full of number 2.
I have a redneck cousin who's an extreme conservative and posts multiple times a day, stuff that makes me cringe. FB does nada to block that shit.
Good (Score:1)
The very last thing on Earth I want from a social media company is for them to require a panel of censors to approve my posts before they're visible to anyone else. There is no universe where that increases my confidence in the accuracy of information I receive through that platform. In fact, it will have quite the opposite effect.
What's really pissing people off isn't "fake news," because lies have been an issue since humans could communicate. The problem is the breakdown of trust in our society. There is
They just care less. (Score:2)
They're like a person who's not sorry for the thing they did, they're sorry that you were offended by what they did. It's not so much that they intentionally offended you, they just don't personally see the problem, and so aren't willing to pay any consequences to fix it. Keep in mind that they likely have immediate metrics to hand for how many reduced views and shares they'll receive. Even though they likely have no metric for "does that even matter?", it's still harder to argue for doing the right thin
Delegitimze Facebook. (Score:2)
Facebook does not deserve our traffic.
The "Fake News" on Facebook was a real problem - the fix is to educate your ignorant relatives about actually looking at URLs and how to tell what the real URL is, not the deceptive one and how to click around to a site to confirm it's a real one before sharing something that looks too good to be true. Also CHECK THE STUPID DATE of the article. I don't know how many times dead celebrities have died again on my news feed.
That being set aside - yes, Facebook along with
To fix fake news today (Score:1)
To fix fake news today would require banning the likes of WaPo, NYT and CNN. Are the âoejournalistsâ sure this is what they want?
Fake news isn't a FB problem (Score:2)
It is idiots' swallowing anything you write.
Can't trust any data Facebook provides unless... (Score:2)
...a reputable auditor verifies the source of data and process, reviewing evidence directly from the systems involved. This is standard for anything, it's why we have CPAs to ensure companies aren't cheating investors. If it's really true, then a third-party should be able to verify the results.
But it doesn't matter because Facebook obviously isn't interested in stopping any clickbait like fake news since they depend on the revenue it provides. If they were, they would simply create a whitelist of all reput
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Re: Yeah.... (Score:1)
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Only in Trump land does 33 indictments and guilty pleas from an investigation equal no evidence.
Indictment just means that those individuals were charged; it says nothing about the actual culpability of the accused. Of the guilty pleas, how many were directly related to candidate Trump colluding with Russians to undermine the election?
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But GUILTY until proven innocent!
Ask them who was charged, and what they were charged with, and when the trial starts and you'll start to get a picture that they don't know, don't care. The indicted Russians will never see trial, because the are all in Russia. The indicted Russians have 0 ties to Trump or his campaign. None of the indicted Russians have ties to the actual crimes committed by the FBI and Justice Department either, but that's because they don't really care about fraudulent Russian FSB sponsor
Re: Translation (Score:1, Insightful)
None of these indictments, and none of the evidence is in any way linked to Trump, nor does any of it suggest collusion.
But you already know that. You're just dishonest and retarded.
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Idiot.
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What makes right-wing nutjobs like you SO, SO mad is that deep down you know the gibberish you spout is stupid and crazy, and as you get madder you spout more of it, and you're locked into a neverending cycle of self-hatred and rage.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
When you were younger, were you like "I'm going to grow up and become like one of those ranting homeless person on street corners screaming about CIA coverups"? Or did you always have these weird thoughts?