Does Facebook Need to Be Fair?
In this video, Rob outlines all the ways Facebook *could* rig an election. Among them: manipulating the newsfeed algorithm, blacklisting stories in their trending news section, and selectively deploying the “I Voted” module:
Though Facebook says it won’t use that power, the company last week drew criticism over the way it has curated its “Trending” module. Here’s Rob with details:
In at least one non-negligible way, Facebook joined journalism’s dirty ranks [last] week, as the company found itself accused of having a liberal bias. And perhaps it really does. A series of Gizmodo reports have raised new information about how the company’s “Trending” module works. “Trending” is the list of popular headlines that appears in the top right of Facebook.com; it also appears under the search bar in its ubiquitous mobile app. While many users believed that this module was compiled algorithmically, Gizmodo (and now The Guardian) have revealed that humans, working on contract for the company, guide its creation every step of the way. What’s more, these workers (often Ivy-educated twenty-somethings) “routinely suppressed conservative news,” according to the allegations of one former employee who talked to Gizmodo.
In an attempt to appease concerns over partisan bias, Mark Zuckerberg invited a bunch of conservative media figures to Facebook HQ this week. One of them was Glenn Beck, who took to Medium yesterday to describe “what disturbed me about the Facebook meeting.” His most highlighted quote:
It was like affirmative action for conservatives. When did conservatives start demanding quotas AND diversity training AND less people from Ivy League Colleges. I sat there, looking around the room at ‘our side’ wondering, ‘Who are we?’ Who am I?
An Atlantic reader thinks that Facebook pushing any political preference would be bad for business:
Read more from The Atlantic:
This article was originally published on The Atlantic.
