[kick]

...and you go to Facebook for your scientific and world news?

Facebook is a toy. Relying on a platform with a built-in way to reply to posts with nothing more than a laugh-cry-smiley to deliver you accurate news in the first place is ridiculous. They could never be a Ministry of Truth or whatever you're implying, because it's a toy. If they want to fact-check posts on their site, it changes literally nothing of importance. They don't, which is fine, but even assuming they did they'd never be capable of anything resembling anything in Orwell's novels.

[jasonheh]

People do go to Facebook for their news. Whether you like it or not, or think those people are fools, it's true. What Facebook decides is deserving of censorship matters because we have to live with those fools.

[kick]

If you believe that Facebook is something more than a toy, then it seems reasonable that they'd have freedom of expression, press, speech, so on. As such, if people choose to get their news from Facebook, it's no different than them getting their news from Reuters, FOX, the New York Times, or Bloomberg. Surely you wouldn't imply any of them wouldn't have editorial control.

Comment sections on news outlets can remove whatever they want, I don't see why it'd be any different for Facebook, if you genuinely consider them a news outlet.

[jasonheh]

Legally im sure they can do almost whatever they want in terms of filtering/censoring/etc, so I don't think talking about their legal obligations or rights is very interesting.

They have behaved a certain way for their 15-20ish year history, and I'd argue that it was mostly as a neutral platform for communication, not really anything resembling a publisher, and they've gained an enormous userbase under this model. I think this is the correct way for a platform like facebook to operate, and that's in part why I use their platform.

I don't welcome them deciding to fundamentally change how they operate and begin filtering more content, especially due to what I view as partisan political reasons.

[oarabbus_]

>Facebook is a toy.

A toy, is that so? I know quite a number of people (engineers, marketers, companies) that exist solely due to Facebook advertising. You should let them know their livelihood rests on a toy.

>...and you go to Facebook for your scientific and world news?

Why do you frame it as some ludicrous idea? Is this more preposterous than getting your science and world news from an email chain, or from Fox/CNN, or your wonky neighbor next door?

I happen to have some intelligent friends who share thoughtful, measured news articles on Facebook. Perhaps these complaints of junk science and tabloids being passed around is actually a problem of an individual's circle and who they actively follow.

This post seems more about personal dislike of Facebook rather than the parent commenter's point about the dangers of appointing Facebook as a Ministry of Truth.

[kick]

A toy, is that so? I know quite a number of people (engineers, marketers, companies) that exist solely due to Facebook advertising. You should let them know their livelihood rests on a toy.

There are physical shops for LEGO, too. Even third-party ones! Ooh, and King & Supercell are billion-dollar companies! I love toys, I think they're great. I don't think you should be getting news from them.

Why do you frame it as some ludicrous idea? Is this more preposterous than getting your science and world news from an email chain, or from Fox/CNN, or your wonky neighbor next door?

It's just as ludicrous as the idea of people getting their news from Candy Crush, MySpace or a tabloid. Getting news from an e-mail chain is ridiculous if you don't know anybody on it, or who runs it.

I happen to have some intelligent friends who share thoughtful, measured news articles on Facebook. Perhaps these complaints of junk science and tabloids being passed around is actually a problem of an individual's circle and who they actively follow.

Then surely you'd get the same information say, in person. Or using e-mail. As such, Facebook censoring them would just mean you'd move somewhere else. No possibility of a Ministry of Truth there. There are people in Second Life that act as newscasters, too. Still a toy.

This post seems more about personal dislike of Facebook rather than the parent commenter's point about the dangers of appointing Facebook as a Ministry of Truth.

I actually love Facebook. It's a neat toy. I love the research that comes out of it. If you search my HN profile you can see a lot of sentiment to this end.

[dingaling]

> You should let them know their livelihood rests on a toy.

There is an entire global industry of physical toys. Many targeted at adults.

Facebook is only different in that it exists in the non-physical domain. It's still a pass-time toy.

[oarabbus_]

You're right that many people's livelihoods depend on toys, but it's a social network, not a toy. Are netflix twitter and google time pass toys? Hacker News must be a toy/social media site too, then. All social media sites are toys, then?

You know as well as I do that the commenter I responded to attempted to use "Facebook is a toy" as a disparaging remark; this is an unnecessary semantics debate I won't continue further.

[hetspookjee]

I'm afraid the reality is different with an enormous amount of people consuming their news through Facebook. I wish it wasn't so and people would think harder, but nevertheless here we are with enormous amounts of fake news spreading through these platforms. I do think that some form of fact checking would be better for some people their own protection.

[xienze]

> They could never be a Ministry of Truth or whatever you're implying, because it's a toy.

Well apparently not, politicians the world over are frightened of Facebook’s potential for spreading misinformation. Recall that the 2016 presidential election was apparently turned via $100K of Facebook ads that had little or nothing to do with the candidates in question.

[kick]

Politicians continue to be technologically-illiterate. More news at ten.