> We rely on third-party fact-checkers to help reduce the spread of false news and other types of viral misinformation, like memes or manipulated photos and videos. We don’t believe, however, that it’s an appropriate role for us to referee political debates and prevent a politician’s speech from reaching its audience and being subject to public debate and scrutiny. That’s why Facebook exempts politicians from our third-party fact-checking program.
Also yes, I know they have had this in place since October 2016 with the whole "newsworthiness" thing.
To me that panders to any politician who wants to lie to manipulate the public through the surgical approach which is demographics marketing that exists on the FB platform (I'm a marketer - it's an outstanding platform). This is what I mean by "bends over backwards to make major figures in politics happy" - LOTS of politicians have taken advantage of this in their advertising. Anecdotally, I believe I have seen it first hand, and I see it as "kissing politician's butts for more engagement".
I think it's wrong - I think they should hold every advertiser to the same standards regardless if it's political or not. I see "newsworthiness" as a cop-out to say "we'll keep it up if we decide to keep it up". It puts FB in a scary position of being the thought police, and I just don't like that.
I'm not taking a side - please don't get my HN account deleted.
So if Trump runs an ad stating "Vote for me, Donald J. Trump, I made the economy boom and the stock market reach all time highs" then it should be banned by Facebook (it's after all provably false)? Is that what I'm hearing?
That would be utterly terrifying if Facebook said their policy was to take down political/campaign ads which contain "misinformation". Ripe for abuse.
https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2019/09/elections-and-political...
Also yes, I know they have had this in place since October 2016 with the whole "newsworthiness" thing.
To me that panders to any politician who wants to lie to manipulate the public through the surgical approach which is demographics marketing that exists on the FB platform (I'm a marketer - it's an outstanding platform). This is what I mean by "bends over backwards to make major figures in politics happy" - LOTS of politicians have taken advantage of this in their advertising. Anecdotally, I believe I have seen it first hand, and I see it as "kissing politician's butts for more engagement".
I think it's wrong - I think they should hold every advertiser to the same standards regardless if it's political or not. I see "newsworthiness" as a cop-out to say "we'll keep it up if we decide to keep it up". It puts FB in a scary position of being the thought police, and I just don't like that.
I'm not taking a side - please don't get my HN account deleted.