Former Facebook Workers: We Routinely Suppressed Conservative News

I followed a lot of Rand Paul stuff, therefore I always saw a lot of articles based on Paul.

a reply to: JoshuaCox

Gizmodo is linked in with sites like io9 and Jezebel, so it's hardly conservative in its views but I wouldn't necessarily say it's overtly lib either? At least I wouldn't say it is in its mission statement anymore than io9 is. Jezebel on the other hand and Gawker ... well, we know about Gawker from the Hulk Hogan lawsuit.



I got this list from io9's page. I sometimes go there for sci-fi type stuff.

Facebook has made an official response to the allegations made by Gizmodo:

SOURCE

Facebook denied the report, saying it has "rigorous guidelines" to ensure political neutrality in the distribution of news to its 1.6 billion users around the globe.

"We take allegations of bias very seriously. Facebook is a platform for people and perspectives from across the political spectrum. Trending Topics shows you the popular topics and hashtags that are being talked about on Facebook," the company said in an emailed statement.

"These guidelines do not permit the suppression of political perspectives. Nor do they permit the prioritization of one viewpoint over another or one news outlet over another. These guidelines do not prohibit any news outlet from appearing in Trending Topics."

See what they did there? No mention of Algorithms. They clearly deflected from the real accusation.

The Gizmodo report underscored rising alarm about Facebook's growing influence in what news gets read. At issue: the small box in the upper right of a Facebook page that lists news topics that are popular on Facebook. Facebook relies on automated systems to identify what's popular. A team of curators then refine the list.

My bold.

They've just alluded to us that their Algorithms are compromised by human intervention. No one has stated that FB or employees at FB have completely silenced an issue. That might be something that is impossible to do, and would draw immediate negative attention to them. What we are talking about here are subtle manipulations of the news feeds by individuals at FB who's discretion is defined by their own morality. They may not even be thinking of it as censorship when they are doing it, because the process is so diluted.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

I'd put that official response in the same category as "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, it was a weather balloon"

a reply to: ColdWisdom

I did not see the link in your story, it is not fox news? I did hear something about facebook blocking posts earlier.

a reply to: Sublimecraft

love this I didn't have sex with that woman

a reply to: Substracto

once they blocked my account, the reason, because I was adding too many friends..

Humble brag.

If you have ANY life view other than a Liberal one, and you are STILL on Facebook, you're most definitely part of the PROBLEM. Inadvertently or not.

Even if you are a LIBERAL, I would suggest deleting Facebook. It's pure garbage and taps into so many negative emotions and social conditioning responses that keep people UNHEALTHY, and keeps people from engaging in a real way.

Just cut it out of your life. I did, and life is better without it

Is this actually news to a thinking individual? You've got the highest traffic site/app on the planet, and you're not going to abuse that power to push your biases?

Give me a freaking break. Of course this is happening.

2 years off the book no relapse.

I like to cut the faces off of my victims and keep them in an organized collection of laminated pages. Apparently, so does another one billion people around the world. I had no idea face books were so popular! I'd show you guys a picture of it, but I think it may violate some terms & conditions.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

I hope none of you are going to FB for your news. That said, as expected, FB officially denied they ever did such thing but again, I hope none of you were going to FB for news.

originally posted by: Metallicus
a reply to: ColdWisdom

I think we all knew that Facebook was pushing a liberal agenda, but I didn't realize they were actively suppressing the opposition. It just goes to show you can' trust social media (I don't have it or use it).

uh i hate to break it to you but ats qualifies as social media. youre saying you never watch tv? i dont believe it.

a reply to: JourneymanWelder

Since when did TV qualify as social media? This is news to me.

a reply to: ColdWisdom

Big surprise. I am sure this is common practice in every form of media. If they do not want something to be popular, it most likely won't be.

The left and the right are about even, so if a topic is breaking news or a big story, both sides will be looking at it/reading about it. So most topics should be trending on both sides of the political spectrum, yet only the liberal side is trending on facebook.

So an anonymous source making claims that they aren't able to prove is absolutely 100% believed by the Conservatives here, but the response by a company able to offer evidence in their statements about the system they have in place to make sure bias isn't factored in is totally and entirely not true...

Yeah, there's no bias at all in the way people in this thread believe absolutely anything that supports their political position without question, while utterly rejecting anything to the contrary.

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: JoshuaCox

Gizmodo is linked in with sites like io9 and Jezebel, so it's hardly conservative in its views but I wouldn't necessarily say it's overtly lib either? At least I wouldn't say it is in its mission statement anymore than io9 is. Jezebel on the other hand and Gawker ... well, we know about Gawker from the Hulk Hogan lawsuit.

I got this list from io9's page. I sometimes go there for sci-fi type stuff.

Did some more looking into this story and like most it's not really what it seems..

This wasn't zuckerburg or upper management making a policy....

Facebook has editors like any media site called curators. Those curators's job is to police the trending type streams to cut out as many fake stories as they can.. No one should trust Facebook if the trending stream was all porn sites and anchient alien blogs. So their job is to separate the legit news stories from the unsourced bs conspiracy site type stuff.

Well all the conservative sites (news max, drudge, exc) have a VERY high rate of unsourced and later debunked stories, so the FB curators decided to not to include them in the trending feed, until they were varified by a legit news source..

That's all.

Really conservatives should be mad a conservative media for lying so often no other news source trusts them...

First of all, I've never identified myself as a conservative or a liberal. And I will prefer to keep it that way for now.

So an anonymous source making claims that they aren't able to prove is absolutely 100% believed by the Conservatives here, but the response by a company able to offer evidence in their statements about the system they have in place to make sure bias isn't factored in is totally and entirely not true...

If you read their response (it's quoted by me above) they fail to address the real accusation. And they vaguely allude to the importance and influence these curators have. I never said the order came down from Agent Zuck to suppress conservative news. If you read the article the anonymous claimant says that he would show up for work and see that his colleagues have removed and or downplayed certain trending topics that appeared to have a political motivation behind them. The fact that reps from FB can't acknowledge the inherent subjectivity of any news organization is a huge red flag (to me).

Look at it this way, if a SJW or progressive minded leftist working for FB as a curator see's the trending topic, let's say it has to do with Trump and it's a positively covered story, that individual employee may take it upon themselves to remove that story because maybe they feel that Trump is already getting enough press. Or they think that because it's by all appearances a pro Trump news story that they should downplay its trending factor because they don't believe the story covered both sides fairly.

It's easy for someone to unconsciously inject their bias into their work. It happens here all the time, to all of us. Myself included.

But I've never identified myself politically here. This thread is about media censorship, not LEFT vs RIGHT. Because both sides have their flaws, and both parties are obsolete. The party is over. It's time for Americans to vote based on the policies and issues and not because of their allegiance to any party or institution.

UPDATE: Senate Launches GOP Inquiry Into Facebook's News Curation

SOURCE

The US Senate Commerce Committee—which has jurisdiction over media issues, consumer protection issues, and internet communication—has sent a letter to Mark Zuckerberg requesting answers to questions it has on its trending topics section. The letter comes after Gizmodo on Monday reported on allegations by one former news curator, who worked for Facebook as a contractor, that the curation team routinely suppressed or blacklisted topics of interest to conservatives. That report also included allegations from several former curators that they used a “injection tool” to add or bump stories onto the trending module.

So I think this move by GOP Senators is absolutely absurd and I will tell you why. If they are going to launch an inquiry into how FB curates its news then they should also launch inquiries into FOX, CNN, & MSNBC. They're not going to be able to pass legislation that regulates FB's news curation. But if they're willing to be openly outraged at suppression of media then they should be outraged at all forms of suppression from all major news sources.

So even if there is something to this story it looks like it will be whitewashed by politicization, again.