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Internal Docs Show Human Intervention at Almost Every Stage Of Facebook's News Operation (theguardian.com)
More evidence has surfaced to support Gawker's two recent reports that claimed editors manipulate the trending news and a few other aspects on Facebook. The Guardian, citing leaked documents it obtained, reports that the topics one sees on Facebook are determined on a number of factors including "engagement, timeliness, Pages you've liked and your location." From the report: But the documents show that the company relies heavily on the intervention of a small editorial team to determine what makes its "trending module" headlines -- the list of news topics that shows up on the side of the browser window on Facebook's desktop version. The company backed away from a pure-algorithm approach in 2014 after criticism that it had not included enough coverage of unrest in Ferguson, Missouri, in users' feeds. The guidelines show human intervention -- and therefore editorial decisions -- at almost every stage of Facebook's trending news operation, a team that at one time was as few as 12 people.Sam Biddle of Gawker, wrote: Never trust what a company tells you, on/off record -- FB straight up lied to Recode last year. He adds: unless they're under oath a company like Facebook has every incentive to lie about how it operates. It's not illegal to lie to a reporter!"
Update: 05/12 20:49 GMT by M : Facebook has published a blog post in which it explains how Trending Topics on its platform works. The company insists that there is no discrimination against sources of any political origin.
Update: 05/12 20:49 GMT by M : Facebook has published a blog post in which it explains how Trending Topics on its platform works. The company insists that there is no discrimination against sources of any political origin.
They're not exactly the highest professional or unbiased quasi news entity either.
Facebook can place on their website whatever the hell they like. They are not a monopoly subject to government oversight. Facebook will not be testifying before a committee on this manner.
Fixed! Was editing some other story, saw this breaking news -- had to quickly get it up.
Napoleon was the best general in the world because he bought the Newspapers. Propaganda is a weapon of war and a way to shape society and opinion.
Manipulating trending topics is essentially a violation of the neutrality that people expect from their data providers. (And that we require from common carriers. Facebook is basically a common carrier at this point--how many hundreds of millions of messages, articles, advertisements, events, etc... go through Facebook?)
Real lawyers write in C++
If you think FB is unfairly biased, just buy myspace and turn it into Fox News.
Who was deciding that not "enough" people were posting about it to make the newsfeeds....?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
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Facebook is an entertainment company, not a news company. Facebook's business goal is to ~encourage~ its users to visit the site as often as possible and stay as long as possible.
It is completely and wholly Facebook's prerogative how Facebook accomplishes its business goals, with legal parameters, of course.
So long as Facebook is not breaking the law, I say that the complainers should take their whining somewhere else.
And to those idiots in Congress who are wasting public money on this, why in the world are you messing with facebook when the good people of Flint, MI still cannot drink the water?
Are you attempting to imply that they lied about Facebook? Are you attempting to claim that Facebook lying to customers has no impact? Are you trying to claim that because one person did something wrong they can never point out that another did something wrong? Are you trying to claim that Facebook is innocent? What is the point, perhaps simply a cheap attempt at karma whoring?
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Kudos for fixing it when it was reported! Another good sign that the new owners are a lot more diligent than Dice ever was.
Thanks manishs, as a Slashdot oldtimer, it makes me happy. :-)
The outrage here is humans taking the jobs of algorithms?
Anyone who uses Facebook as their primary news source deserves all they get.
"Who was deciding that not "enough" people were posting about it to make the newsfeeds....?" That would be the black lies matter cabal.
Every now and then, technology intersects strongly with politics, such as when restrictions on information or technology or abuse of either are enshrined in law. Such is the case with surveillance, global warming, GMO labelling, workplace non-discrimination, and many other topics that hold huge interest among a large number of technology-oriented people.
When there is news in such areas, Slashdot would be remiss not to report on them. You may not like the majority opinion in such threads (and indeed the majority often has it ass backwards), but the reports are often right on topic as News for Nerds.
The solution for your lack of interest in such topics is so simple that I'm surprised that it didn't occur to you: just don't read them.
Republicans don't care what you do with your reproductive organs. But when you're hosting another human being, we think that human being deserves some legal protection. Yes, that literally is to "protect the children".