"Why Facebook Is Desperate for Conservative Allies"

[Dawson Leery]

https://newrepublic.com/article/148245/facebook-desperate-conservative-allies

"That’s because Facebook has been skittish ever since a 2016 Gizmodo report revealed that Facebook employees curating its “Trending Topics” suppressed conservative sites like The Daily Caller and Breitbart. Conservatives screamed bloody murder and Facebook ended up firing all of the curators who worked on “Trending Topics” and replacing them with algorithms—a move that had disastrous consequences. Republicans have since turned this issue into something of a crusade, arguing that tech companies are biased against them—the farce that was last week’s Diamond and Silk testimony before the House Judicial Committee was, in some ways, a culmination of this argument.

In truth, Facebook’s news curators were doing their job by suppressing these stories, which are often poorly sourced or reliant on partisan spin. Suppressing Breitbart, which is sloppy and racist and often flirts with fake news, is a good thing if you really care about highlighting stories that will make your users more informed about the world."

[Abu Pepe]

1. Ironic

RW friends are why I left FB.

[kimbutgar]

2. Left FB a couple of weeks ago

Thought I’d miss it but it was even say. I did keep messenger though because I have a reunion group that I keep in touch with. But I am disgusted with Zukerberg.

[MineralMan]

3. Silliness. There's plenty of conservative content on Facebook.

Hell, I've had to hide a couple dozen people on my own feed. All they did was post conservative crap. Some of them are family members, even. I don't unfriend those. I just hide them.

If anything, FB is way too conservative to suit me. If it leans any farther in that direction, I'll have to bail.

[NewJeffCT]

4. They suppressed the sites

because they were filled with FAKE FUCKING NEWS

If I'm not mistaken, only one person on their panel was an actual Democrat/liberal. The others were unaffiliated. If liberal sites were pumping out fake news stories, those would have been suppressed as well.

[.99center]

5. Facebook's "quality news" algorithm changes recently kicked in

Facebook's "quality news" algorithm changes recently kicked in. So far, looks like CNN, NBC, and the NYT are doing worse, and Fox News and the Daily Wire (Ben Shapiro's site) are doing better.

Link to tweet