<story><title>Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”</title><url>https://i.postimg.cc/CLBCNx0Q/D4Hg99zw.jpg</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Dove</author><text>Facebook is removing content because they wanted to make money with a website, and the job of statecraft fell in their laps in the process.  They didn&amp;#x27;t volunteer, they aren&amp;#x27;t qualified, nobody told them they were signing up to run a kingdom, let alone the world.  So they don&amp;#x27;t produce lofty, philosophical, well-thought-out positions on free speech and human rights.  They don&amp;#x27;t carefully manage the public square with the long term good of humanity in mind.  They make the same expedient, best-effort, unenlightened, sounds-good-to-me decisions that literally every poorly qualified there-for-the-wrong-reasons ruler in all of history has made.  Your majesty, people are dying because cats are vessels of Satan!  By royal decree, kill the cats.  That&amp;#x27;s all this is.&lt;p&gt;I think they are trying, and I wish they had a Thomas Jefferson on staff and saw themselves as needing one.  But they don&amp;#x27;t.</text></item><item><author>snowwrestler</author><text>Facebook is removing content because that is ground they want to stand on. Removing content feels like censorship, so it lends itself to political grandstanding in their favor. Millions of people get upset and demand that Facebook handle all content neutrally, which is exactly what Facebook wanted everyone to think in the first place.&lt;p&gt;The real issue with Facebook is the editorial decisions they make about promoting some content over others. It’s totally optional and is also a powerful form of censorship. A link that shows up in no one’s “algorithmic timeline” is worthless, even if it is not actually removed from the platform.&lt;p&gt;The essential lie is that the algorithm is neutral. It’s not; it is intentionally biased to favor Facebook’s goals: increase ad inventory and the data used to target ads.</text></item><item><author>gunapologist99</author><text>Facebook seems to be censoring so much because Facebook believes that most people will actually believe whatever bits of misinformation are floating around out there.&lt;p&gt;But is everyone that easily manipulated? More importantly, does everyone actually believe that they can be easily manipulated, or do they just think that everyone &lt;i&gt;else&lt;/i&gt; is so easily manipulated, but somehow they&amp;#x27;re above the fray?&lt;p&gt;And at what point does the censorship to protect me from manipulation become manipulation itself?&lt;p&gt;Facebook is fighting a losing battle if they think they will survive a battle with their own users. This is way past censoring Alex Jones. You can&amp;#x27;t possibly censor every crackpot conspiracy theorist. Actually, we&amp;#x27;re probably &lt;i&gt;all&lt;/i&gt; crackpot conspiracy theorists in some way. We probably all believe some conspiracy about 9&amp;#x2F;11 or the NSA or elections or vaccines or masks or aliens or royal families or whatever.&lt;p&gt;The rate of censoring is almost certainly accelerating faster than facebook&amp;#x27;s growth, and once you&amp;#x27;ve been censored once, you&amp;#x27;re likely to radically curb your use of that platform. I can&amp;#x27;t imagine that FB doesn&amp;#x27;t have stats on how many people keep using FB after they&amp;#x27;ve been censored just once.&lt;p&gt;FB only works when you and 99% of your social group are on there.&lt;p&gt;And the network effect works in reverse, too.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rtpg</author><text>They chose to do algorithmic timelines.&lt;p&gt;They could do a chronological timeline. They could choose to not do any editorializing. They chose instead to get into the content promotion business.&lt;p&gt;Their active choices lead to this result</text></comment>
<story><title>Facebook is now claiming official CDC.gov links are “False Information”</title><url>https://i.postimg.cc/CLBCNx0Q/D4Hg99zw.jpg</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Dove</author><text>Facebook is removing content because they wanted to make money with a website, and the job of statecraft fell in their laps in the process.  They didn&amp;#x27;t volunteer, they aren&amp;#x27;t qualified, nobody told them they were signing up to run a kingdom, let alone the world.  So they don&amp;#x27;t produce lofty, philosophical, well-thought-out positions on free speech and human rights.  They don&amp;#x27;t carefully manage the public square with the long term good of humanity in mind.  They make the same expedient, best-effort, unenlightened, sounds-good-to-me decisions that literally every poorly qualified there-for-the-wrong-reasons ruler in all of history has made.  Your majesty, people are dying because cats are vessels of Satan!  By royal decree, kill the cats.  That&amp;#x27;s all this is.&lt;p&gt;I think they are trying, and I wish they had a Thomas Jefferson on staff and saw themselves as needing one.  But they don&amp;#x27;t.</text></item><item><author>snowwrestler</author><text>Facebook is removing content because that is ground they want to stand on. Removing content feels like censorship, so it lends itself to political grandstanding in their favor. Millions of people get upset and demand that Facebook handle all content neutrally, which is exactly what Facebook wanted everyone to think in the first place.&lt;p&gt;The real issue with Facebook is the editorial decisions they make about promoting some content over others. It’s totally optional and is also a powerful form of censorship. A link that shows up in no one’s “algorithmic timeline” is worthless, even if it is not actually removed from the platform.&lt;p&gt;The essential lie is that the algorithm is neutral. It’s not; it is intentionally biased to favor Facebook’s goals: increase ad inventory and the data used to target ads.</text></item><item><author>gunapologist99</author><text>Facebook seems to be censoring so much because Facebook believes that most people will actually believe whatever bits of misinformation are floating around out there.&lt;p&gt;But is everyone that easily manipulated? More importantly, does everyone actually believe that they can be easily manipulated, or do they just think that everyone &lt;i&gt;else&lt;/i&gt; is so easily manipulated, but somehow they&amp;#x27;re above the fray?&lt;p&gt;And at what point does the censorship to protect me from manipulation become manipulation itself?&lt;p&gt;Facebook is fighting a losing battle if they think they will survive a battle with their own users. This is way past censoring Alex Jones. You can&amp;#x27;t possibly censor every crackpot conspiracy theorist. Actually, we&amp;#x27;re probably &lt;i&gt;all&lt;/i&gt; crackpot conspiracy theorists in some way. We probably all believe some conspiracy about 9&amp;#x2F;11 or the NSA or elections or vaccines or masks or aliens or royal families or whatever.&lt;p&gt;The rate of censoring is almost certainly accelerating faster than facebook&amp;#x27;s growth, and once you&amp;#x27;ve been censored once, you&amp;#x27;re likely to radically curb your use of that platform. I can&amp;#x27;t imagine that FB doesn&amp;#x27;t have stats on how many people keep using FB after they&amp;#x27;ve been censored just once.&lt;p&gt;FB only works when you and 99% of your social group are on there.&lt;p&gt;And the network effect works in reverse, too.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>13years</author><text>Excellent post!&lt;p&gt;Yes, Facebook has found itself wielding power that it could have never imagined.  Nobody is prepared or qualified for that kind of power.  That&amp;#x27;s why it took 700 years from the Magna Carta until the US Constitution to formulate a reasonable contract to limit such power.&lt;p&gt;Now you have the most dangerous combination of all.  The two ingredients which when combined has resulted in horrific atrocities.&lt;p&gt;The paradox of tyranny
1) The desire to make the world a better place
2) The power and means to actually do so</text></comment>