Facebook says it's piloting an effort to closely watch posts that rapidly gain millions of views to ensure they don't violate community standards
Earlier this week, I wrote about how platforms proved they can stop a piece of health-related misinformation in its tracks.
The Interface Casey Newton
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Discussion
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@grantstern
Grant Stern
on x
Facebook has had this for years and used it to stop news posts going viral on @OccupyDemocrats. I have seen it in real-time. Nothing new. Well, except that they nought use it on disinformation for a CHANGE. https://twitter.com/...
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@rmac18
@rmac18
on x
Facebook announcing something long overdue, but as we've seen with past policies, it means nothing unless it's applied equally for all users. If there are people at the top that advocate for preferential treatment of some pages or users, there will always be a workaround. https:/…
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@3r1ng
Erin Gallagher
on x
A virality circuit breaker sounds like a good idea. https://twitter.com/...
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@jason
@jason
on x
They've always had this They just purposefully ignored it to get traffic https://twitter.com/...
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@wongmjane
Jane Manchun Wong
on x
@CaseyNewton That's actually pretty good idea — prioritized content moderation
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@slpng_giants
@slpng_giants
on x
2016: Give Alex Jones the ability to harass Sandy Hook parents at scale 2017: Cause a genocide in Myanmar. 2018: Live stream the murder of 52 Muslims 2019: Create a cult designated by the FBI as a domestic terror threat. 2020: Let's do a circuit breaker! Nailed it, @facebook! htt…
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@caseynewton
Casey Newton
on x
If you're wondering why this column completely buries the lede (that Techmeme helpfully elevates here) it's because I got the information 15 minutes before my deadline 😆 https://twitter.com/...
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@navalang
Navneet Alang
on x
It's almost like this obvious, much-discussed-by-critics-idea was delayed or ignored because Facebook has a financial and ideological investment in unchecked virality https://twitter.com/...
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@jpanzer
John Panzer
on x
It makes no sense they were not already doing this. I implemented similar systems before 2010, because this is so blazingly obvious it's close to the first thing you do to prioritize manual review targeting. https://twitter.com/...
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@jason_kint
Jason Kint
on x
Shocked this isn't already standard practice but certainly reads to be a positive step for those who believe better moderation is a step towards a better Facebook. Me, I still think it's a distraction...band-aid...from fixing a toxic business model. https://twitter.com/...
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@fbajak
Frank Bajak
on x
Why didn't Facebook do this four years ago? It didn't know then that its algorithms were promoting extreme content? https://twitter.com/...
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@gadyepstein
Gady Epstein
on x
Incredible. Figuring out in 2020 that you might want to check on viral phenomena on your platform. Of course there have never been financial incentives to put the brakes on, only moral ones https://twitter.com/...
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@donie
Donie O'Sullivan
on x
It's just stunning that this is just becoming a thing. Always an obvious approach to people with common sense. https://twitter.com/...
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@emilybell
Emily Bell
on x
Honestly the fact FB is not doing this already is astonishing . Also ‘virality circuit breaker’ lol. They are editing /curating the feed, with humans, *as they should* https://twitter.com/...
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@ericgarland
Eric Garland
on x
FACEBOOK: “Now that we're about to be in a vast series of civil, criminal, and counterintelligence prosecutions, we'll now pilot a thing where maybe we detect hostile foreign intelligence. Possibly.” https://twitter.com/...
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@oliverdarcy
Oliver Darcy
on x
This is such a no brainer! It's *insane* that Facebook is only just doing this now. https://twitter.com/...
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@asharangappa_
Asha Rangappa
on x
This is the kind of thing that my *undergraduates* have recommended in their policy papers in my Disinformation & Democracy class since about [checks watch] THREE YEARS AGO. Why has it taken Facebook — which supposedly has “experts” — this long to come up with it? 🙄 https://twitt…
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@tayhatmaker
Taylor Hatmaker
on x
it's bonkers that Facebook doesn't have a system like this already in place https://twitter.com/...
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@evelyndouek
Evelyn Douek
on x
Great news — friction baby! it's the next frontier now that we're wandering around outside the take-down/leave-up binary of content moderation https://twitter.com/...
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@sivavaid
Siva Vaidhyanathan
on x
People who understand this stuff have been telling FB to do this for YEARS. But when engagement and growth drive everything, no one listens to the scholars. https://twitter.com/...
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@summerson
Camazon dot com
on x
they should ban the Android subreddit then https://twitter.com/...
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@carnage4life
Dare Obasanjo
on x
Still scratching my head on the Microsoft acquisition here. Other MSFT consumer services like Skype/XBox Live/Minecraft do not have the ability for hate speech to be broadcasted and observed by the media at scale. This is breaking the brand into jail. https://www.engadget.com/...