Seattle Times: New Facebook oversight board results to be public, exec says. “A new quasi-independent oversight board will soon make decisions on some of the most difficult questions on what material belongs on Facebook’s platform in a ‘very public way,’ an executive for the social-media company said Friday.”
TechCrunch: Facebook isn’t free speech, it’s algorithmic amplification optimized for outrage
TechCrunch: Facebook isn’t free speech, it’s algorithmic amplification optimized for outrage. “The problem is that Facebook doesn’t offer free speech; it offers free amplification. No one would much care about anything you posted to Facebook, no matter how false or hateful, if people had to navigate to your particular page to read your rantings, as in the very early days of the site. But what people actually read on Facebook is what’s in their News Feed … and its contents, in turn, are determined not by giving everyone an equal voice, and not by a strict chronological timeline.”
Globe and Mail: Facebook reduces transparency of information on political-ad targeting
Globe and Mail: Facebook reduces transparency of information on political-ad targeting. “The company is asking users to complete a ‘captcha’ – a visual challenge that asks people to pick out similar items in a photo or type out a sequence of letters and numbers, for example. These captchas are preventing tools designed to monitor users’ feeds from automatically collecting ad-targeting information. The impact of the captchas on the tool’s ability to collect targeting information is significant. In August, more than 86 per cent of ads collected had targeting information. Since the federal election campaign began, that number has dropped to 16 per cent.”
Kidney for sale: How organs can be bought via social media in the Philippines (Channel NewsAsia)
Channel NewsAsia: Kidney for sale: How organs can be bought via social media in the Philippines. “In the second of a two part series looking at the illegal trade in human organs in the Philippines, CNA’s Pichayada Promchertchoo investigated how social media is an essential tool for many of those involved in the lucrative business.”
NBC News: Anti-vaccination groups still crowdfunding on Facebook despite crackdown
NBC News: Anti-vaccination groups still crowdfunding on Facebook despite crackdown. “Activists planning to line California roadways with anti-vaccination billboards full of misinformation are paying for them through Facebook fundraisers, despite a platform-wide crackdown on such campaigns.”
Washington Post: On Facebook’s live stream, Zuckerberg’s free-speech lecture got a big thumbs up
Washington Post: On Facebook’s live stream, Zuckerberg’s free-speech lecture got a big thumbs up. “During Mark Zuckerberg’s live-streamed speech on the dangers of censorship on Facebook, viewers saw a flood of almost entirely positive comments and emoji. The Facebook chief executive’s speech also received plenty of negative responses, but most were not visible during the talk because of how the algorithms behind a live stream with tens of thousands of viewers work.”
WTOP: Facebook reaches licensing deal with News Corp for headlines
WTOP: Facebook reaches licensing deal with News Corp for headlines. “News Corp. says it has reached a licensing deal with Facebook that lets the social network feature headlines from The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and other publications on its upcoming news section.”
