> It’s not really honest to expect Facebook to correctly classify every single, tiny group created on the entire website.
I agree, but that's what Facebook said it would do. IMO the onus is on Facebook here. They promised to do something they surely knew they couldn't do. I suspect because the alternative is admitting that they don't really have any control over their recommendation algorithm, and the logical conclusion to that is to stop recommending things. But they don't ever want to do that because their engagement numbers would tank.
I don’t think it’s reasonable to interpret their statement to mean that their user-submitted content classification would never be without fault. I think people are forgetting the scale of Facebook, or even the scale of the global internet population.
If Facebook made a change to stop recommending groups that had been categorized as political, that’s a fair fulfillment of their statement. If some users are miscategorizing their user-created groups and some of those aren’t caught by automated filters and some of those are slipping into recommendations somewhere, we’re starting to play a game of “gotchas”.
What do people actually want from Facebook? 100% perfect categorization of 100% user-generated content is impossible, and I think most people on HN understand that. So is there some degree of “good enough” that would be acceptable, or is this the type of issue that will generate outrage as long as someone can find an isolated exception somewhere? If it’s the latter, I think we’re bound to wear out the patience of reasonable people following along.
I think you touch on the core problem. That 100% perfect categorization is impossible. Also, it turns out that items which are false or angry are more likely to go viral, be it in science or politics:
Unfortunately it turns out that we humans over-react, and over-spread, falsehoods. So I want both the "reshare and retweet" banned as features on social media platforms if section 230 protections are to remain.
The solution isn't to encroach on the 1st amendment right to say anything you want. It's to take away the 'gasoline' of the reshare, that has an innate bias to falsehoods, from spreading them. That's the first thing I want Facebook to change. And the second is to go back to enforcing that every account is tied to a real person. It was great when "Facebook" was about real people back in 2004 - it should get back to that original vision!
>>The solution isn't to encroach on the 1st amendment right to say anything you want. It's to take away the 'gasoline' of the reshare, that has an innate bias to falsehoods, from spreading them.
How is the "gasoline" of resharing any different than forwarding an e-mail or retweeting? Copy+Paste has been here since Usenet.
>>That's the first thing I want Facebook to change. And the second is to go back to enforcing that every account is tied to a real person. It was great when "Facebook" was about real people back in 2004 - it should get back to that original vision!
The real name requirement is part of what makes Facebook suck. It provides a false sense of security and creates an extra burden for those who have odd names like "Abcde" [1]. I don't see how Facebook is going to be able to determine whether a name in non-Latin letters is "real" or not. In 2004, Facebook was limited to a few Ivy League schools. Now it has 4e9 people to sort through. If governments have a hard time tracking even 1/4 that many people, even a panopticon like the Chinese state, what makes you think Facebook will find a solution to that problem?
They agreed to do it and haven't done it. As Facebook was in the best position out of anyone to say whether they could or could not accomplish this moderation and said they could even though they apparently can't or don't want to, anything beyond that fact is really very meaningless.
I agree, but that's what Facebook said it would do. IMO the onus is on Facebook here. They promised to do something they surely knew they couldn't do. I suspect because the alternative is admitting that they don't really have any control over their recommendation algorithm, and the logical conclusion to that is to stop recommending things. But they don't ever want to do that because their engagement numbers would tank.
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