Author Topic: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias  (Read 7185 times)

I-10east

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Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« on: May 12, 2016, 09:27:08 AM »
Ex-Facebook workers say your 'trending' section is biased against conservative viewpoints. Also allegedly left-leaning stories (like BLM) was force fed into the trending news section; Basically a moderator 'bump' for liberal talk, while suppressing conservative views. I can't say that I'm surprised.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro8QswUFyxM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0lz6ffWC-w

Murder_me_Rachel

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #1 on: May 12, 2016, 09:54:24 AM »
If you are getting your "news" from Facebook trending stories, then...that's unfortunate.  And, regardless, does that somehow devalue the actual legitimate gripes of the BLM folks*?  Don't think so.  This is a non-story of massive proportions.

*Sure, some of their antics mildly annoy me, but to say they don't have legitimate issues is ridiculous. 

finehoe

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2016, 09:59:54 AM »
If you are getting your "news" from Facebook trending stories, then...that's unfortunate. 

For real.  Who even pays attention to the 'trending stories'?

I-10east

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #3 on: May 12, 2016, 10:01:51 AM »
You always have something to say that's very 'meaningful' MMR. You never fail to disappoint; keep up the good work...

I-10east

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #4 on: May 12, 2016, 10:06:19 AM »
For real.  Who even pays attention to the 'trending stories'?

What about the political suppression (which goes hand and hand with the trending section)? FB's 'vetting' process is only teetering on the edge of propaganda, no biggie... 

coredumped

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #5 on: May 12, 2016, 10:14:32 AM »
What about the political suppression (which goes hand and hand with the trending section)? FB's 'vetting' process is only teetering on the edge of propaganda, no biggie... 

You're correct I-10, it's crappy they're pushing their agenda. But I don't see it as any worse than the garbage Fox "news" or msnbc "news" channels put out.

Facebook is under no obligation to have journalistic integrity, if there's even such a thing anymore.

But sadly, the masses get their news from facebook.
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coredumped

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #6 on: May 12, 2016, 11:10:52 AM »
its also a lie, btw.

Source? The Senate is launching and investigation in to it so I'm not sure how you would know more than them.

Again, I want to state that this whole thing is a waste of time and taxes, they are free to publish whatever they want and censor whatever they want. But it should be known what they're doing.
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finehoe

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #7 on: May 12, 2016, 11:14:41 AM »
The Senate is launching and investigation in to it so I'm not sure how you would know more than them.

LOL, all that says is that John Thune thinks he can score some airtime on FOX.

coredumped

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #8 on: May 12, 2016, 11:31:54 AM »
The Senate is launching and investigation in to it so I'm not sure how you would know more than them.

LOL, all that says is that John Thune thinks he can score some airtime on FOX.

True but meh, no different than the left wingers that come out of the wood work to talk about "gun control."
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dp8541

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #9 on: May 12, 2016, 11:55:08 AM »
The claim was originally published by Gizmodo which is an off shoot of the fairly left leaning Gawker.  I would say that gives  more credibility to this issue than just dismissing this as pissed off conservative bloggers hired by FB.  From what I have seen a lot of the possibly "suppressed" stories were related to the 2012 presidential election, which if true could have played a role in that election


http://gizmodo.com/former-facebook-workers-we-routinely-suppressed-conser-1775461006

finehoe

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #10 on: May 12, 2016, 12:07:30 PM »
The claim was originally published by Gizmodo which is an off shoot of the fairly left leaning Gawker.  I would say that gives  more credibility to this issue than just dismissing this as pissed off conservative bloggers hired by FB.  From what I have seen a lot of the possibly "suppressed" stories were related to the 2012 presidential election, which if true could have played a role in that election


http://gizmodo.com/former-facebook-workers-we-routinely-suppressed-conser-1775461006

So ONE person makes this claim and the right immediately slips into their favorite stance, that of the "victim".

carpnter

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #11 on: May 12, 2016, 12:45:58 PM »
I have seen Facebook quite often put up Satire sites (similar to The Onion) as "related articles" to a serious news article, so something isn't quite right with what they use to determine what to show.

JBTripper

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #12 on: May 12, 2016, 01:59:07 PM »
If you are getting your "news" from Facebook trending stories, then...that's unfortunate. 

For real.  Who even pays attention to the 'trending stories'?

We can debate the good sense of a person who gets their news from Facebook, but the answer to your question is "a whole lot of people." Facebook boasts about 1.6 billion monthly active users and the Pew Research Center reported in 2014 that about 30% of Facebook users get their news from the site. I imagine if this board had 1.6 billion users, and 480 million of them used it for the expressed purpose of consuming news, we would consider it to be fairly influential.

What about the political suppression (which goes hand and hand with the trending section)? FB's 'vetting' process is only teetering on the edge of propaganda, no biggie... 

You're correct I-10, it's crappy they're pushing their agenda. But I don't see it as any worse than the garbage Fox "news" or msnbc "news" channels put out.

Facebook is under no obligation to have journalistic integrity, if there's even such a thing anymore.

But sadly, the masses get their news from facebook.

It's different from Fox and MSNBC because people who consume news understand that humans are making editorial decisions about what to report, how and when. There is an inherent bias, and people have come to accept that. Facebook, however, is not a human being. It's supposed to be an algorithm. What makes Facebook different is that it purports to deliver news that is the most popular - clicked, viewed, read, 'hovered' over, whatever - to its users in the trending section.

In essence, Facebook is claiming to be reporting on how people think. By suppressing the fact that an article on Brietbart, for instance, is the most clicked news article on a network of 1.6 billion people and inserting the myth that a story about, say, Black Lives Matter is the most popular story, Facebook isn't reporting on how people think. They are shaping how people think.

You, the user, are meant to believe that most of the world does not read Brietbart, RedState, and the like. That's just the right-wing "crazies." You are meant to believe that Black Lives Matter is a sweeping, nationwide movement that has come about because police everywhere are gunning down black people for sport.

In reality, however, a lot of regular and decent people do read Brietbart, RedState, and the like. In reality, Black Lives Matter is a response to a problem that, while very real and horrible, is not so widespread as to become a topic of daily conversation on Facebook for most users.

This would all be fine if Facebook was up front about it. It's not fine, though, because Facebook doesn't have an "editorial" section. It doesn't have a "stories picked out for you" section. It has a "trending" section, and they even use little upward-climbing graph arrow icons that seem to say "these things are being placed here based on data gleaned from our users." Which we now know is a lie.

Adam White

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #13 on: May 12, 2016, 02:33:00 PM »
If you are getting your "news" from Facebook trending stories, then...that's unfortunate. 

For real.  Who even pays attention to the 'trending stories'?

We can debate the good sense of a person who gets their news from Facebook, but the answer to your question is "a whole lot of people." Facebook boasts about 1.6 billion monthly active users and the Pew Research Center reported in 2014 that about 30% of Facebook users get their news from the site. I imagine if this board had 1.6 billion users, and 480 million of them used it for the expressed purpose of consuming news, we would consider it to be fairly influential.

What about the political suppression (which goes hand and hand with the trending section)? FB's 'vetting' process is only teetering on the edge of propaganda, no biggie... 

You're correct I-10, it's crappy they're pushing their agenda. But I don't see it as any worse than the garbage Fox "news" or msnbc "news" channels put out.

Facebook is under no obligation to have journalistic integrity, if there's even such a thing anymore.

But sadly, the masses get their news from facebook.

It's different from Fox and MSNBC because people who consume news understand that humans are making editorial decisions about what to report, how and when. There is an inherent bias, and people have come to accept that. Facebook, however, is not a human being. It's supposed to be an algorithm. What makes Facebook different is that it purports to deliver news that is the most popular - clicked, viewed, read, 'hovered' over, whatever - to its users in the trending section.

In essence, Facebook is claiming to be reporting on how people think. By suppressing the fact that an article on Brietbart, for instance, is the most clicked news article on a network of 1.6 billion people and inserting the myth that a story about, say, Black Lives Matter is the most popular story, Facebook isn't reporting on how people think. They are shaping how people think.

You, the user, are meant to believe that most of the world does not read Brietbart, RedState, and the like. That's just the right-wing "crazies." You are meant to believe that Black Lives Matter is a sweeping, nationwide movement that has come about because police everywhere are gunning down black people for sport.

In reality, however, a lot of regular and decent people do read Brietbart, RedState, and the like. In reality, Black Lives Matter is a response to a problem that, while very real and horrible, is not so widespread as to become a topic of daily conversation on Facebook for most users.

This would all be fine if Facebook was up front about it. It's not fine, though, because Facebook doesn't have an "editorial" section. It doesn't have a "stories picked out for you" section. It has a "trending" section, and they even use little upward-climbing graph arrow icons that seem to say "these things are being placed here based on data gleaned from our users." Which we now know is a lie.


Assuming this is true, I totally agree on all points. (Except the bit about decent people reading Breitbart, etc). And I have to admit I've got my news from Facebook in the past  :'(

« Last Edit: May 12, 2016, 02:58:38 PM by Adam White »

UNFurbanist

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Re: Facebook's Left-Leaning Bias
« Reply #14 on: May 12, 2016, 04:06:58 PM »
Well the algorithm also features items that get more clicks. Overall liberal sources get more clicks because more people on fb tend to be liberal mainly due to age demographics. However, if you are a raging conservative you will be shown more similar right-leaning articles because it knows your preferences. If anything can be said about fb article selections it is that there is A TON of confirmation bias being perpetuated across the platform. Especially since people tend to only follow those friends with similar views on their feeds. I've been guilty of that myself but I only unfollow friends who never post anything but political opinions especially when they are "that crazy conservative uncle" type. Ultimately, if you don't like looking at liberal news sources of fb then get off fb. They are a private company. Maybe get on Fox's social media site?... oh wait, that's right.