Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Quietly Hid Webpages Bragging of Ability to Influence Elections (theintercept.com)
Sam Biddle, reporting for The Intercept: When Mark Zuckerberg was asked if Facebook had influenced the outcome of the 2016 presidential election, the founder and CEO dismissed the notion that the site even had such power as "crazy." It was a disingenuous remark. Facebook's website had an entire section devoted to touting the "success stories" of political campaigns that used the social network to influence electoral outcomes. That page, however, is now gone, even as the 2018 congressional primaries get underway.
In the wake of a public reckoning with Facebook's unparalleled ability to distribute information and global anxiety over election meddling, bragging about the company's ability to run highly effective influence campaigns probably doesn't look so great. Facebook's "success stories" page is a monument to the company's dominance of online advertising, providing examples from almost every imaginable industry of how use of the social network gave certain players an advantage. "Case studies like these inspire and motivate us," the page crows.
In the wake of a public reckoning with Facebook's unparalleled ability to distribute information and global anxiety over election meddling, bragging about the company's ability to run highly effective influence campaigns probably doesn't look so great. Facebook's "success stories" page is a monument to the company's dominance of online advertising, providing examples from almost every imaginable industry of how use of the social network gave certain players an advantage. "Case studies like these inspire and motivate us," the page crows.
The bigger they get, the less they get to hide behind that "hey it's our platform, don't like our bias? Build your own" bullshit. At some point people who care about election integrity and things like that are going to wake up to the fact that allowing a seriously biased company like Facebook to play power broker in one moment and go John Galt on the other is just straight up poisonous for our society.
At some point, their "standards" are going to have to start resembling that of common carriers and the "mistakes" where somethings like a total annihilation of conservative content (with no comparable loss elsewhere) will have to be treated as an obviously intentional propaganda act.
You mean like the British data mining and analytics firm that has messed in dozens of American elections, including the trump campaign and brags a near 100% win rate? Or the American media giving trump 6 billion dollars of free air time to boost ratings, more money than all other candidates combined? I'm confused if we are supposed to bomb the British or the MSM. I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest the playing field would be vastly improved by removing all large donor and any corporate donor money. If Bernie can raise half a billion dollars in small donations then anyone who is fit to run can too.
In reality, how many times has Facebook, or anything you saw on Facebook, changed YOUR mind? It's a place where people do not go to change minds, theirs or anyone else's.
The key issue is radicalization. You might have started thinking that democrats are well-meaning but ultimately untrustworthy to govern people. Then you joined a Facebook group that keeps you busy with all kinds of alternative facts and you end up believing in Pizzagate, Agenda 21, and other out-there stuff.
Sure, you still have not changed how you voted. However, your GOP candidate now is full Trumpster and you are willing to overlook recent white robes and a mistress, because other side in your mind is the devil. A decade ago it was small government fiscal conservative family values you voted for, now you RINO such guys.
Just for grins, I signed up to a lot of right-wing pages and groups because I wanted to screenshot and make fun. People mentioning Pizzagate, Agenda 21, NWO are laughed at, or are warned off as potential trolls, so they don't make others look bad. Hell, they even dropped Snopes on people who decided to post brain dead stuff.
Of course, there are the obviously insane groups, but in general, they did a lot to police themselves and get rid of the trolls in their midst. Mainly because if they step out of line even a little bit, Facebook will kill the groups. A single mention of selling firearm parts will get a whole group deleted, so admins are very proactive in deleting posts.
Of course they do! They constantly "play down/block" a lot of conservative posts, stories etc, but, PROMOTE liberal causes & stories. http://dailycaller.com/2016/05... https://gizmodo.com/former-fac... http://money.cnn.com/2016/05/0... https://www.npr.org/sections/t...