A look at the alliance of convenience between Facebook and Trump admin as sources say Zuckerberg told employees that Facebook is likely to fare better under GOP
In late 2019, during one of Mark Zuckerberg's many trips to Washington to defend Facebook in front of Congress …Tweets:@juddlegum,@sarahfrier,@adamserwer,@juddlegum,@sarahfrier,@jasonschreier,@kurtwagner8,@jawillick,@slightlylate,@michaelduncan,@joshtpm,@jamesfallows,@jamisonfoser,@mhelft,@kombiz,@jesselehrich, and@davidguraTweets:Judd Legum /@juddlegum:ZUCKERBERG: Facebook is not a “right-wing echo chamber” FACTS: In August, the top two websites on Facebook were THE DAILY WIRE and FOX NEWS BREI
What changed today is the framing going internal-to-public: sources tell Bloomberg Zuckerberg told employees Facebook is likely to fare better under the GOP, recasting four years of conservative courtship as a deliberate bet on which party's regulators treat the company better.
First-order effects
Watchdogs like Judd Legum immediately test the claim against the data, citing Fox News and The Daily Wire as Facebook's top sites to argue the platform already functions as a right-wing distribution engine regardless of what Zuckerberg tells employees.
Facebook enters its next round of congressional hearings carrying an explicit partisan-alignment narrative on top of its earlier Russia-related testimony, giving both parties new ammunition — Democrats on capture, Republicans on vindication.
Second-order effects
Conservative media outlets whose traffic depends on Facebook distribution gain leverage in any future policy dispute, since the company now has a stated interest in keeping that audience relationship intact.
Rival platforms face pressure to make their own Washington posture legible, because Facebook has set a template where regulatory survival is treated as a function of party alignment rather than policy substance.
Third-order effects
If the 2016-to-2020 sequence holds — trust-rebuilding meetings, private dinners, then open acknowledgment of partisan preference — platform 'neutrality' becomes a negotiating position rather than a principle, and moderation decisions get priced against which party controls the levers of oversight.
Congressional oversight of platforms hardens along partisan lines, since each side now reads the same product decisions as either capture by or concession to the other.
The trend: Major social platforms are shifting from claiming political neutrality to openly managing their regulatory exposure through partisan relationships, with Facebook the clearest case study.
ZUCKERBERG: Facebook is not a “right-wing echo chamber” FACTS: In August, the top two websites on Facebook were THE DAILY WIRE and FOX NEWS BREITBART and THE BLAZE outperform THE NEW YORK TIMES https://twitter.com/...
Facebook has been careful to keep Trump and conservatives happy— appeasing those in power while the company faces regulatory risk. Wrote a cover story w/ @KurtWagner8 about why it's a problem for the upcoming election. https://www.bloomberg.com/... https://twitter.com/...
The #2 URL on Facebook for all of August was an AP article that QAnon used to bolster their theory that Trump is saving America from a pedophile cult controlled by prominent Democrats https://twitter.com/...
This story also builds on many scoops by our competitors, linked. There are so many examples of Facebook doing special favors for people in power, looking the other way when rules are broken, giving face time with Zuck, etc. Literally not enough room in our story for all of them.
“[Zuckerberg] told employees that Facebook is likely to fare better under Republicans, according to people familiar with the conversations.” Hell of a Businessweek cover story by @KurtWagner8 and @sarahfrier https://www.bloomberg.com/... https://twitter.com/...
NEW: FB critics, including employees & the Biden campaign, say it's giving Trump a free pass. FB says it's upholding free speech. First @BW cover story w/ @sarahfrier looks at FB's failures enforcing its policies & what that means for the election https://www.bloomberg.com/... ht…
This story hilariously refers to an “alliance between Facebook and Trump,” meaning that Facebook does not censor Trump to the extent favored by liberal employees. https://www.bloomberg.com/...
There isn't much in here that's new, but seeing it all condensed is jaw-dropping. I hope good folks still at FB are reading this & dusting off their resumes; you can't fix a system broken by unaccountable will to power, but you can deny it your talent: https://www.bloomberg.com/.…
If Facebook is so rigged against Democrats, as this article suggests, why have Democrats spent nearly $1 billion on Facebook since the Ad Library launched? Makes ya think, huh. https://www.bloomberg.com/...
Facebook is again getting an eminently justified wave of bad publicity today. It deserves every bit. It is the prime incubator racist, quasi-fascist propaganda, state-run psyops operations and more. But to really understand the problem it is important to understand the ...
I would like the “BIden has dementia” people to watch him on CNN right now, *and* compare him with what they heard from Trump today or anytime recently.
Haven't read the paywalled story yet. But I love the cover. Back when I was at Fortune circa 2011, we did a bubble cover story with a photo illustration of Zuck blowing bubblegum. Company was furious about it. Can't imagine they'll love this one https://www.bloomberg.com/... http…
“Facebook, more so than other platforms, has gone out of its way to not ruffle feathers in the current admin,” says [me], co-founder of @accountabletech, an org making recommendations to tech companies on public-policy issues. “At best, you could say it's willful negligence.” htt…
There has been “an alliance of convenience between the world's largest social network and the White House, in which Facebook looks the other way while Trump spreads misinformation about voting that could delegitimize the winner or even swing the election.” https://twitter.com/...