
Facebook launches petition feature, its next battlefield - jamesg_oca
https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/20/facebook-community-actions/
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philipodonnell
> Community Actions could unite neighbors to request change from their local
> and national elected officials and government agencies. But it could also
> provide vocal interest groups a bully pulpit from which to pressure
> politicians and bureaucrats with their fringe agendas.

Or, hot take here, Facebook really doesn't care too much what the petitions
are about, but is mostly interested in gathering more data on its users'
political beliefs so they can allow domestic and foreign campaign spending
groups to better target advertisements meant to change or reinforce those
beliefs (or suppress civic participation of those with such beliefs) and
increase FB's total share of campaign-related ad spend.

~~~
everdev
So bots and fake accounts now have a direct line to influencing local
politics.

~~~
drusepth
Regular hat:

The immediate solution to this (assuming the feature stays) seems to be a
stricter sign-up / verification process that ties your account closer to your
real-world identity before you can use political features like this, to make
bots and fake accounts more difficult to create and/or influence politics
through these direct lines.

Tinfoil hat:

Fortunately (or unfortunately), that's also a step closer towards (but not at,
yet) the verification necessary to start, I don't know, actually voting
through Facebook. I wonder if giving bots a direct line to local politics
would actually result in people/lawmakers _begging_ more verifiability to
Facebook accounts, instead of Facebook trying to implement such a
process/feature without the inevitable backlash they'd no doubt get if they
said "you can now link your social security number to Facebook!". Being
verified as a real human on Facebook ultimately helps Facebook get closer to a
potential goal of giving petitions (or votes) on Facebook more weight.

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koboll
I've given up on the idea that political engagement on social media can make
society better. It seems to be a one-way ratchet toward political extremism,
because it encourages people to immerse themselves in communities that respond
with adulation whenever someone sinks deeper into their ideological wing and
respond with cold silence whenever someone hesitates or questions the wing's
narrative.

In case this isn't already obvious, I don't think it's a coincidence that we
are in the midst of a global crisis of populist uprisings, most of which leave
their countries worse off than they were before.

This is not only going to have the direct effect of intensifying the above,
it's going to be mined for data used to crank up political ad targeting to
partisans on Facebook. It should be fought, violently. It is poison enacting
the slow death of democracy.

A good form of effective action would be to create and popularize to the top
of the list a petition like 'Dismantle Facebook' or 'Fire Mark Zuckerberg'.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _It seems to be a one-way ratchet toward political extremism, because it
> encourages people to immerse themselves in communities that respond with
> adulation whenever someone sinks deeper into their ideological wing_

It's more nefarious than that. Social media lets you curate not only your
message, but who sees and gets to react to your message. Anger is–by far–the
most viral emotion. (Second place, if I remember correctly, is awe.)
Previously, deploying anger in politics was constrained by the opposition
objecting. But if they see your message long after your base has reacted,
that's no longer a problem.

In a world with Facebook, if you want to get people to show up to a rally, you
piss them off. How? Take exaggerated pot shots at a totem of your enemy.

The irony is all sides are hiring–and friendly with–similar people at similar
lobbying and activist engagement shops. But on the ground level, hyper-
targeted AE is (a) an effective way to re-position policy priorities
(particularly at the state and local levels) and (b) more cost and time
effective than traditional door-to-door knocking.

~~~
bertil
Your comment explains well the anger against Facebook.

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jimmytidey
This does seem like something of a hostage to fortune, I can't imagine how
they intend to moderate it. Obviously people are going to poll their echo-
chamber in support of toxic ideas.

Even more alarming for Facebook, what if their polls come to be seen as having
legitimate democratic force - what Government is going to be comfortable with
that?

I suspect a dogmatic belief in the goodness of Facebook triumphed over
reasoned reflection on the likely uses of this feature.

~~~
fwn
People are going to poll their connections in support of all kinds of ideas.

Some of those ideas will be perceived as toxic by some while some others will
be perceived as toxic by others.

I think that it's a strange idea to argue against collaboration with the
argument that everyone can do it. As if there were something immoral in
providing unmoderated collaboration.

I'm sharing your second criticism though. The feature is probably designed to
gain legitimacy by being the petition platform people actually use. Would be
very unwise for a bueraucracy to allow anything like that provided by a
private company.

~~~
jimmytidey
You are correct, 'toxic' is a value judgement, I should have said extremist.

One problem is that it will be impossible to know if a Facebook poll is
representative; most likely it will not be, and will instead be taken mostly
by people who already have similar views to the author of the poll.

However, the polls may help convince users their views are actually mainstream
(even if the "mainstream media" is ignoring them). Such users may feel free to
take an even more extreme position if they believe their current views are
actually about average. This is one mechanism Cass Sunstein has identified for
driving extremism is groups.

Voting isn't intrinsically democratic or empowering for voters - North Korea
has elections. Presenting informed people with meaningful choices is what
matters.

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kace91
Just what we need from a platform known for manipulation of users: For them to
enter the field of politics.

~~~
ardy42
> Just what we need from a platform known for manipulation of users: For them
> to enter the field of politics.

From Facebook's perspective, the solution to every problem is more Facebook.

~~~
moate
Including too much Facebook.

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Jaruzel
In the UK at least we already have official petitions - the UK one is
[https://petition.parliament.uk/](https://petition.parliament.uk/)

This is the ONLY one that impels the UK government to debate, and ultimately
vote on each petition (providing the petition has garnered enough signatures).

However a LOT people in the UK use the change.org system, which has absolutely
NO legal standing, and they get upset when the government ignores them. I can
see this Facebook system being exactly the same. If Facebook REALLY cared
about fair democracy, they'd just highlight and link to each countries
existing online petition systems (if one exists) instead of building their own
system. Of course they can't data mine the official petition systems can
they...

~~~
claudiawerner
Isn't it true that not a single petition on the UK gov website has resulted in
a change in the law? Isn't it also true that most petitions are quickly
dismissed with the claim that the topic has already been debated?

The petition system actually just made me think how futile and dysfunctional
this [bourgeois, if I may use the word] democracy is.

~~~
Jaruzel
Alas, yes and yes. :(

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renholder
What happens when, say, Iran wants and - legally - requests the identities of
everyone that supports the "Democracy in Iran" group?

~~~
SiempreViernes
I don't think facebook is very used in Iran, at least it was blocked in 2015.

The interesting question is what happens when Turkey asks for the members of a
"justice for unfairly sacked teachers" petition, or Saudi Arabia asking for
the supporters of the local "End discrimination of Shia" petition.

~~~
atomwaffel
Yes, Facebook is blocked in Iran, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not being
used. Just about everyone I met in Iran was on several supposedly blocked
social media platforms, mostly through dodgy VPNs. Apple isn’t allowed to sell
phones in Iran either, but I’ve never seen so many second-hand iPhones.

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gnicholas
> _Facebook is purposefully trying to focus Community Actions to be more
> narrowly concentrated on spurring government action than just any random
> cause._

So you can’t use this feature to ask FB to fix problems with its own platform?
My first thought about this feature was: well, most organizations can ignore
these petitions, but at least we can use them to get FB to quit doing
bad/annoying stuff. Apparently not!

~~~
oddevan
What if we started a FB petition for the government to regulate FB?

~~~
ardy42
> What if we started a FB petition for the government to regulate FB?

You'd motivate this months-dormant user to engage with the platform for a few
minutes.

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netsharc
Well, at least this will hasten their death. Hopefully people are leaving FB
because of their toxic "political discussions" (more like insult-flinging),
and with this crap, they'll stay away even more from it, because every time
they log in, they'll see Wendy is telling them to support her cause of vegan
lipsticks, or similar.

~~~
renholder
>Hopefully people are leaving FB because of their toxic "political
discussions" (more like insult-flinging)...

If that were the case, reddit should be suffering the same mass exodus plight
but - it seems to me - that people (predominantly in the states) revel in that
sort of behaviour.

~~~
jsemrau
One could argue that the anonymity of Reddit in addition to the mods
encourages a civil discussion

~~~
kace91
People aren't exactly nicer to each other when they're anonymous...

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thecatspaw
Interesting approach from facebook, though its has its issues.

Its nice that they make it easier to get involved in local issues, for example
adding bins to a park. However, if you do not like this, you cannot voice your
concerns in the comment section of that petition, that is restricted to
supporters of the petition. So you have to create your own "Please dont put
bins into the XY park"

~~~
Ajedi32
Yeah, that's a problem with petitions in general; they're really only useful
for demonstrating _some_ minimum level of support or public interest in a
particular issue.

They can't be used to gauge public opinion on anything remotely controversial,
both because they're heavily influenced by selection bias and because it's
much harder to express opposition to a petition than it is to express support.

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fmjrey
And how are we supposed to trust the results and privacy?

Also I'm not on fecebook and don't want to create a user account, please don't
force me to create one.

~~~
pavlov
The point of this feature seems to be that Facebook knows the signatories are
real people, which makes the petition more valid. Allowing votes from outside
the FB user graph would defeat that.

~~~
fmjrey
The problem is that FB is a business, not a public service providing proof of
identity. It is wrong to force people to get into a commercial agreement with
a private company to carry out civic duties. Same issue as authorities
publishing only word documents that can only be read with MS Word.

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sametmax
A petition feature provided by a centralized proprietary system that has an
history of censorship and selling political data doesn't seem like a good
deal.

But again, most facebook users don't even think about that kund of issues, so
it might work.

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nemoniac
Also on the hn front page today:

Decidim: Free Open-Source participatory democracy for cities and organizations

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18952328](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18952328)

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shay_ker
It feels like no matter what Facebook does, its brand will impede the efforts
of any new product they build. TBH, if I were Snapchat, I'd see this as a huge
opportunity, since I'd doubt Instagram would get into the political space.

Another option for Facebook would be to have something similar to Google X,
where projects can eventually spin out to separate companies and own their
brand.

~~~
rchaud
Snap has its own brand to think about, it wouldn't bother trying to enter this
arena. People don't talk politics on Snap, mainly because they skew younger
and because it's photo-based, not text-based.

~~~
shay_ker
Cardi B did a video on Instagram about the government shutdown that got a lot
of attention. I wouldn't count it out for Snapchat. Besides, no one thought
Facebook was going to become a tool for politics when it first came out.

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m0zg
Similarly to indignant FB posts, reshares, and likes, petitions do jack squat
in the real world. So this seems right up FB's alley.

~~~
leppr
They serve the very important purpose of giving citizens a feeling of agency.
Without this, motivated citizens of democratic republics would have to resort
to concrete action, eventually resulting in revolutions.

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mogadsheu
The general sentiment of the thread is pretty negative. I’d offer the contrary
and say that this (provided that it’s moderated with some integrity) feature
is one of the great potentially empowering uses of the platform. Bringing
people together and connecting them to other likeminded individuals who would
otherwise be strangers, I love that.

~~~
okmokmz
>provided that it’s moderated with some integrity

Given what I've seen on and from Facebook, I would be absolutely shocked if
that happened

>Bringing people together and connecting them to other likeminded individuals
who would otherwise be strangers

Yet another avenue for bigots and the uninformed to receive support in their
social media echo chamber

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hugh4life
I want a block all petitions feature.

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SmellyGeekBoy
Facebook is already full of pointless petitions (at least it was the last time
I was on there), it makes sense they'd want to bring this functionality in-
house.

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buboard
Why not full-on elections?

~~~
bcuzFaecbook
Because then we’d actually have to use Facebook.

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introing111
That's interesting. I see that Facebook develops more feature to support
different initiatives (FB groups, charity pages) and even petition pages.

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randomacct3847
I’m predicting they will acquire change.org

~~~
pxndx
They probably tried, failed, and are building their own petition platform now.

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balabaster
Er... did anyone see the movie Circle? I'm pretty hard to creep out, but this
seems to be walking down that path...

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vuln
Disrupting Democracy 2.0

