
Report: Facebook omitted conservative topics from trending list - Jerry2
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/279192-report-facebook-trending-list-omitted-conservative-topics
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adrenalinelol
This isn't good for FB. People trying to compare this to Rupert Murdoch
influencing WSJ, FN, FBN, etc... are drawing a false comparison. Those outlets
are actually presented as "news", FB is an entirely new paradigm which
presents itself as organic, user-generated content (hence social media). If
there becomes a widespread belief that the content is in some way
deceptive/altered, users will become more reluctant to share their personal
information on the platform (who would want to post information on FB, then
have FB show said content to your friends after it's deemed the parts of it
that are appropriate?), thus removing the largest single variable that
contributes to FB's value.

I know Mr. Zuckerberg has strong opinions on immigration (see the pop-up here:
[http://www.fwd.us/](http://www.fwd.us/)), but he should separate his
political views from his business.

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andrewfong
> Gizmodo reported that it could not determine whether curators took the same
> steps for stories from liberal news outlets.

Seems like an important detail. There's a difference between "we omitted
conservative topics because we don't want to be too political" and "we omitted
conservative topics in favor of liberal ones".

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krapp
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11659676](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11659676)

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supercanuck
A lot of a what passes as conservative topics these days is quite bigoted and
racist. I think it isn't a stretch to say that there is quite a fight going on
as to what it means to be "conservative" at this point and what the "soul" of
the movement is.

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Overtonwindow
This is not surprising in the least. Corporations control the news, and
corporations have an agenda unto themselves. It matters not what the news is,
it matters what the corporations allow you to know.

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shepardrtc
A better title would be, Report: Facebook contractors omitted conservative
topics from trending list

The report says that it was the contractors own personal bias, not anything
passed down from the company.

