What changed by September 2020 is scale and proximity: rather than handing academics a dataset, Facebook embedded two dozen of its own staffers alongside 17 outside researchers studying the platform's effect on the 2020 election itself — an arrangement that sits between the 2018 arms-length model and the election advisory body of experts Facebook was reportedly exploring a year later.
First-order effects
The 17 independent researchers gain working-level access to Facebook data and staff during the campaign window, while the two dozen embedded staffers gain visibility into how outsiders interrogate the platform's election role.
Second-order effects
The collaboration creates the pipeline for concrete disclosures: Facebook subsequently committed to giving researchers targeting data on 1.3M social issue, electoral, and political ads run from August 3 through November 3, 2020 (targeting data on 1.3M political ads), turning the study into a de facto transparency mechanism.
Third-order effects
If the pattern holds, platform election accountability shifts from one-off audits toward standing structures — internal-external hybrid teams first, then formal expert advisory bodies like the one Facebook approached experts about in 2021 — with the terms of data access, not press statements, becoming the battleground over credibility.
The trend: Platforms are moving from resisting scrutiny of their electoral influence to institutionalizing researcher access, with the shape of that access — embedded, funded, and data-gated by the platform itself — defining how credible the resulting findings will be.
KLAXON! Facebook newsroom has announced a new research project on 2020 election. By Sir Nick Clegg. ‘One of the much debated questions around social media is: what impact does it have on democracy’ NO. SHIT. SHERLOCK https://twitter.com/...
Facebook unveiled a partnership to give independent researchers new data to examine how U.S. Facebook and Instagram users engage on the platforms ahead of November's vote https://www.wsj.com/...
With users' permission, Facebook will tinker with their News Feeds, change their ad experiences, ask them to download apps that monitor their off-FB behavior, and even stop using FB altogether. They'll survey them and compare results to the control group. https://www.protocol.com…
This is a big deal. What a difference 4 years make! (now) Facebook Joins With Researchers to Study Its Influence on Elections https://www.wsj.com/... (then) Facebook's fake news: Mark Zuckerberg rejects ‘crazy idea’ that it swayed voters https://theguardian.com/... https://twitte…
Facebook will over control the data , avoid covering bias , has only permitted this after a purge of content and has few outside monitors . And they are losing the window on any chance of good faith community testing https://twitter.com/...
This sounds like a great initiative, I'm glad FB is giving researchers access to better data. However its also frustrating to see the Matthew Effect in action: high-profile, established researchers get great data while the rest of us have to make do with much less. https://twitte…
Wonder if the result will be as bad as the last time it hired independent folks: The tech giant will log what volunteers in the study do and see on Facebook and Instagram to provide researchers with aggregated behavioral data https://www.wsj.com/...
This is going to be a big deal. When you ask a quantitative social scientist about social media impact in 2016, they eventually throw up their hands with “we will never know, we don't have the data”. This is less likely to be their answer after 2020, but we need more platforms. h…
@slpng_giants @karaswisher That's all incorrect. A bunch of academics have been working hard to find a way to do this work while respecting privacy, and this kind of access should become standard instead of prompting fact-free dunks. From the PIs: https://medium.com/...
“A group led by professors from New York University and the University of Texas at Austin will study how Facebook and Instagram users in the U.S. engage on the platforms in the run-up to elections in November.” https://www.wsj.com/...
No. Just no. Congress or state officials need to undertake this investigation, not a series of unaccountable academics working with Facebook. https://twitter.com/...
Eyyyy, they're (partially) Freeing (a bit of) the Data! #FreeTheData And to an all-star group of independent researchers. Experience says not to count our chickens, but I'm still excited about this - it could lead to some really important work. (oh, and: your move, YouTube.) http…
We desperately need to have better access to Facebook's data to understand its impact on democracy. So this is a step forward. Some great researchers involved, too. Let's hope they get the material they need to help inform real policy changes. https://about.fb.com/...
At the same time, of course it's going to raise concerns about whether we want Facebook tinkering with our online experiences. But then again, isn't it already doing that? At least here, there's some oversight. https://www.protocol.com/...
This is a big deal. Four years after the election raised so many questions about social media's impact on politics, we're still making assumptions based on anecdotes or research that's using a fraction of the data. This could provide a much fuller picture. https://www.protocol.co…
NEW: Facebook's partnering with more than a dozen academics to study the impact of the platform on the 2020 election. The only catch: We won't know what they find until after the election is over. https://www.protocol.com/...