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Zuckerberg throws out fact checkers, warns of more Drumpf-friendly line

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So apparently Zuckerberg is pulling a Musk, in his case by throwing out 'biased' fact-checkers, to be replaced by commentary from FB users.
I quit Facebook because it's become a freak show of a cesspit, where you encounter the most judgemental, bizarre, and terrible people, so I doubt handing fact-checking off to its most vocal users will lead to anything good.

The move comes as Zuckerberg and other tech executives seek to improve relations with US President-elect Donald Trump before he takes office later this month.
Trump and his Republican allies have criticised Meta for its fact-checking policy, calling it censorship of right-wing voices.

Given FB's reach and influence, this is to say the least alarming.
Hopefully it'll accelerate the platform's demise, if nothing else.
 
Business model is clicks and attention. Over time that platform has been filing up more and more with garbage partly because people have become less willing to share their wholesome activities with family and friends and I think an etiquette has developed over time where you don’t post pictures of other people you know. So, what do you do then? Just load up the place with spam and click-bait.

Also Zuckerberg obviously wants to cozy up to Trump now. Those power stations for his data centers are not going to just fall into his lap. Like other tech people, Musk, Thiel, Andreesen, Bezos etc…. they need to bend the knee to be favoured. We have a new era of shameless oligarchy coming up.
 
The blog post/announcement doesn't sound anything like Trump, or being Trump-friendly.


I use Facebook and I have many American friends who are pretty much all Democrats and critical thinkers. The Democrats have sometimes complained about this: "too much content being censored that shouldn’t have been". The new changes seek to redress this.
 
And, given all the amount of crap I have seen on facebook, a lot of it right wing crap, the fact chekcers were doing a lousy job anyway.

I just cannot get upset about this. Does not really change anything.
In fact, I have a problem with the implied idea that right wing ideas..which normally I very strongly disagree with....should be somehow surpressed.
Yeah, the right wing lies and lot and sayhs a lot of crap. but the other side is not much better.
 
I guess my questions are:

Who were these fact checkers?

What were their qualifications?

What was their process?

Why were they even hired in the first place?

What was the user feedback, before and after?
 
I can't say that I ever saw anything officially fact-checked on Facebook ever. That could be because Facebook tended to not promote political and social content.

The announcement says the fact-checkers were based in California.

"As part of these changes, we will be moving the trust and safety teams that write our content policies and review content out of California to Texas and other US locations."

Note, they're not going to fact-check but they are going to "continue to focus these systems on tackling illegal and high-severity violations, like terrorism, child sexual exploitation, drugs, fraud and scams".
 
Problem is who decides what is deception?
I think having to oput up with deception and lies is a part of the price we pay for free speech. I don't trust "Gate keepers: of any kind.
I get the sick feeling you would love to suppress political speech which you don't like.
For the good of the people, of course. They have to protected from "fake news".
 
One of the things I find scary is both sides of the political spectrum seem anxious to suppress speech which they don't like.
 
Problem is who decides what is deception?
I think having to oput up with deception and lies is a part of the price we pay for free speech. I don't trust "Gate keepers: of any kind.
I get the sick feeling you would love to suppress political speech which you don't like.
For the good of the people, of course. They have to protected from "fake news".
It's pretty bad when you equate "fact-checking" with "fake news". Trumpish much?
 
It's pretty bad when you equate "fact-checking" with "fake news". Trumpish much?
I was being ironic.
Problem is the white between fact checking and trying to censor stuff you don't like is very, very thin,
I admit I am a free speech absolutist.
 
Given that the fact "checkers" managed to conclude that the Hunter Biden laptop was classic Russian disinformation, I'd say we're all better off without them.
 
Given that the fact "checkers" managed to conclude that the Hunter Biden laptop was classic Russian disinformation, I'd say we're all better off without them.
"Fact checkers" are just censors. The Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Maoist China all had their "fact checkers," too.
 
"Fact checkers" are just censors. The Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Maoist China all had their "fact checkers," too.
Exactly. Politicians should be able to lie freely and without any form of fact checking.
And so should any news agency. Who wants to hear the truth when they can hear how your leadership is saving them from massive columns of rape intending, pet eating, job stealing, welfare taking, transpushing, abortion happy immigrant caravans that are all hounding the border.
While at the same time praising Putin for his humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

Checking whether any of such claims are true and confronting people with them is evil censorship. And unAmerican.
 
Zuckerberg has given up on facebook - he wants to rule the Metaverse.
Reality is for the none Transhumans.
 
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Given that the fact "checkers" managed to conclude that the Hunter Biden laptop was classic Russian disinformation, I'd say we're all better off without them.

better that ten thousand scammers romance scam a million of the elderly than one pic of hunter biden’s dick go unseen
 
Problem is who decides what is deception?
I think having to oput up with deception and lies is a part of the price we pay for free speech. I don't trust "Gate keepers: of any kind.

see, i think that's the problem. you think people need to decide what's true and what's not, when it simply is or isn't. people need to decide what to do about the lies, but for you to act like you can't figure it out and nothing can be done is part of the lies that keep the charade going.

but anyway, i think the opposite. i think social media sites have a duty to ensure their platforms aren't being abused by liars and scammers to take advantage of everyone else. unless you want the internet to end up an unusable network of ai and scams lying and cheating where you can't even tell who's real and who's a bot. how is that freedom?

I get the sick feeling you would love to suppress political speech which you don't like.
For the good of the people, of course. They have to protected from "fake news".

well once again you completely misread someone and never learn from it. if it's easier to accuse me of being something i'm not to win an argument in your mind, well keep lying to yourself. and everyone else can lie to you too then
 
I was being ironic.
Problem is the white between fact checking and trying to censor stuff you don't like is very, very thin,
I admit I am a free speech absolutist.
The line is between an AI-generated Trump spewing hate-filled, racist, misogynist lies and the real Trump spewing hate-filled, racist, misogynist lies. The former is lies and fake news and needs to be stopped everywhere. The latter is not - let it roll.

Why the difference? Because you can also make an AI-generated Joe Biden or Kamala Harris spew hate-filled, racist, misogynist lies. Or anything at all that you would like them to say to advance your crummy fascist agenda. They will be just as "real" as Trump lies to people that they are.

And if you get the MAGA people believing everything and anything they see (or hear or read, etc.), and they do already, you can have a brainless mob to do your atrocities for you. 6-Jan-2021...

Just FYI, this forum is highly unusual for a US-based discussion board compared to the US population generally. We have skeptical Americans here with questions and furrowed brows. Out there, skepticism is socialist, commie, librul treason and just not done.
 
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The basic principle should be: the more reach a media item attains, the higher the level of scrutiny for its veracity should be.
It is not a good state of affairs when people have to rightfully assume that most of what they hear and see is made up or twisted.
 
Okay, I'll bite. Can one of you people who call fact checkers 'censors' explain your reasoning? I know I'm naïvely hoping you're arguing in good faith, but I'm in a good mood today and can afford to be optimistic.
 
Okay, I'll bite. Can one of you people who call fact checkers 'censors' explain your reasoning? I know I'm naïvely hoping you're arguing in good faith, but I'm in a good mood today and can afford to be optimistic.
Wondered where that bottle of Jack D had ended up.
 
The media's job is to make money. Telling truths is optional.

Just like the job of corporations is to make money, and nothing that does not further that goal.

That is why they must never be in a position where they can do that in a way that is generally harmful. False Reporting should come with penalties, accurate reporting with benefits; we don't question regulating chemical companies not to dump toxic waste into the water or air, but supposedly we can't do anything we media companies do the same.
 
Exactly. Politicians should be able to lie freely and without any form of fact checking.
And so should any news agency. Who wants to hear the truth when they can hear how your leadership is saving them from massive columns of rape intending, pet eating, job stealing, welfare taking, transpushing, abortion happy immigrant caravans that are all hounding the border.
While at the same time praising Putin for his humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

Checking whether any of such claims are true and confronting people with them is evil censorship. And unAmerican.
The censorship of the Hunter Laptop story really illustrates how silly your screed is. You're not against lies; you just want to protect the lies you like.
 
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And let's not forget, the pre-Musk Twitter "fact checkers" suspended the Babylon Bee for correctly calling Richard Levine a man.
 
and the BB was happy that it got to bask in the victim complex that is the birthright of all right-wingers.
Whiny snowflake babeis need to grow up
 
The media's job is to make money. Telling truths is optional.

The truth of this makes me sadder by the day. Or filled with insatiable murderous rage. Fine line.

It was a depressing revelation to me a few years ago when it gradually became apparent. The good news is that there is a section of the media where their bottom line is enhanced by largely telling the truth so it's not completely demoralising.

The reason why the mainstream media (MSM) comes under so much attack from the right wing media and right wing social media is that the majority of the MSM's output does still have a firm foundation in fact.
 
It was a depressing revelation to me a few years ago when it gradually became apparent. The good news is that there is a section of the media where their bottom line is enhanced by largely telling the truth so it's not completely demoralising.

The reason why the mainstream media (MSM) comes under so much attack from the right wing media and right wing social media is that the majority of the MSM's output does still have a firm foundation in fact.
Agreed. MSM news is not completely delusional; it just has informing the public with quality, unbiased, and thorough journalism ranking fairly low on its priority list.
 
The censorship of the Hunter Laptop story really illustrates how silly your screed is. You're not against lies; you just want to protect the lies you like.

Is the Hunter Biden story the only reason why you think Meta et al. should get rid of fact checkers?
 
Agreed. MSM news is not completely delusional; it just has informing the public with quality, unbiased, and thorough journalism ranking fairly low on its priority list.
But at least it is ON the priority list, unlike what the tech boys want.
 
"Fact checkers" are just censors. The Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Maoist China all had their "fact checkers," too.
You know that someone is too far gone when they post stuff like this without immediately replacing it with "Edit: Nevermind, I need to think about some stuff."

The censorship of the Hunter Laptop story really illustrates how silly your screed is. You're not against lies; you just want to protect the lies you like.
Not fact checking.

And let's not forget, the pre-Musk Twitter "fact checkers" suspended the Babylon Bee for correctly calling Richard Levine a man.
Not fact checking.

You could have spent this time fact checking yourself instead of ruffling your own feathers.
 
And let's not forget that time Stacy said she wouldn't go out with me if I was the last man on earth. Damn fact checkers!
 
You know that someone is too far gone when they post stuff like this without immediately replacing it with "Edit: Nevermind, I need to think about some stuff."


Not fact checking.


Not fact checking.

You could have spent this time fact checking yourself instead of ruffling your own feathers.
"Fact checkers" are just people. Just another person. These people don't have a monoply on truth and can be as biased as anyone else. And it seems quite apparent that the far-left has gone apoplectic about Meta and Twitter as they're losing narrative control. That's what "fact checkers" are really about.
 
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"Fact checkers" are just people. Just another person. These people don't have a monoply on truth and can be as biased as anyone else. And it seems quite apparent that the far-left has gone apoplectic about Meta and Twitter as they're losing narrative control. That's what "fact checkers" are really about.

Do you have some examples of this erroneous fact checking?
 
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