Does Facebook Suppress Conservative News Outlets and Topics?

Ex-staffers of the social media behemoth claim stories written by and about conservatives are deliberately kept from "Trending."

Flickr/Brian Solis

Facebook prevents conservative stories and news outlets from appearing in its hugely influential "Trending" section, according to several ex-staffers who requested anonymity when speaking with Gizmodo's Michael Nunez.

Though the site has pushed the idea that an in-house algorithm detects news stories which are being organically shared by users, and then promotes them as trending, it appears the human element is plenty significant. If true, this would make Facebook more akin to a traditional news outlet, rather than a social media portal, complete with its own value system which allows it to promote some ideas and exclude others. 

According to one self-described conservative ex-Facebook news curator, "Depending on who was on shift, things would be blacklisted or trending." The former curator, who reportedly provided notes to Gizmodo containing logs of suspiciously omitted topics, cited news stories relating to "CPAC or Mitt Romney or Glenn Beck" which were popular at the time but did not appear in the Trending section because of the "bias" of certain curators. 

Another ex-curator (whose political affiliation was not described by Gizmodo) said if stories by right-of-center news sites were popular enough to be recognized as trending-worthy by the Facebook algorithm, staffers had to "find the same story from a more neutral outlet that wasn't as biased" or the story wouldn't make it to Trending. 

It is important to note that Gizmodo writes "there is no evidence that Facebook management mandated or was even aware of any political bias at work," and that they "were unable to determine if left-wing news topics or sources were similarly suppressed." But last week in a profile laying out how the Trending sausage is made, Gizmodo presented a rough bio of the news curators in charge of the U.S.' primary source for online news:

The trending news section is run by people in their 20s and early 30s, most of whom graduated from Ivy League and private East Coast schools like Columbia University and NYU. They've previously worked at outlets like the New York Daily News, Bloomberg, MSNBC, and The Guardian. 

Facebook's news curation is not limited to just picking and choosing which political points of view are promoted or excluded. Stories like the missing Malaysia Airlines plane were reportedly "injected" into the Trending section when the algorithm wasn't picking them up fast enough to compete with more breaking news-friendly sites like Twitter. The ex-curators also told Gizmodo that stories about Facebook itself were to be kept off the Trending section. One ex-curator told Gizmodo that the Black Lives Matter movement, which is publicly supported by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, was given its own trending topic and subsequently received huge media traction. 

Predictably (and understandably), conservative websites are howling at this news today, but this story carries bigger connotations than just the usual "left-wing media bias" chatter. If Facebook is just another left-of-center newsroom, will conservatives flee the site? Or is the social network simply too big and ubiquitous for people to do without?

Also, in an increasingly consolidated new media world, clicks equal revenue which equal compensation. Even if you're not a conservative writer, merely covering conservative topics could leave you at a pronounced disadvantage if Facebook's news curators are excluding your stories from the site's biggest driver of news traffic. This could lead to editors and journalists being disincentivized from covering conservative topics, which would stand a worse chance of generating a large audience. 

Ultimately, Facebook is a big business, one that has survived repeatedly alienating an even infuriating its customers. If what the former curators told Gizmodo is accurate, the company would have a hard time selling itself as a neutral portal for news. But in the long run, will it matter as long as the baby photos and cat memes remain?

Comments

[Rich]

Though the site has pushed the idea that an in-house algorithm detects news stories which are being organically shared by users, and then promotes them as trending, it appears the human element is plenty significant.

Well, to be fair, the human element could be a component of an in-house algorithm.

[Hyperion]

We're just a sub routine in the simulation, so yeah, something like that.

[arbitrary wavefunction]

According to the article last week , some of the "curators" seemed to think they were the training set for some machine learning algo.

This is the training set:

The trending news section is run by people in their 20s and early 30s, most of whom graduated from Ivy League and private East Coast schools like Columbia University and NYU. They've previously worked at outlets like the New York Daily News, Bloomberg, MSNBC, and the Guardian. Some former curators have left Facebook for jobs at organizations including the New Yorker, Mashable, and Sky Sports.

The bias in the algorithm will be incredible.

[AlexInCT]

I am surprised it isn't worse to be honest...

[shainamlop]

my co-worker's sister-in-law makes $66 /hour on the computer . She has been without a job for nine months but last month her income was $18212 just working on the computer for a few hours. browse around this site ++++++++++++ http://www.elite36.com

[shainamlop]

my co-worker's sister-in-law makes $66 /hour on the computer . She has been without a job for nine months but last month her income was $18212 just working on the computer for a few hours. browse around this site+++++++++++ http://www.elite36.com

[Quo Usque Tandem]

"...a small group of young journalists, primarily educated at Ivy League or private East Coast universities, who curate the "trending" module on the upper-right-hand corner of the site. "

I KNEW it!!!

[esteve7]

From the Gizmodo comments. Fascists, indeed

"Honestly? Conservative new/views should be suppressed. I am against censorship but do think that if you have a conservative viewpoint you shouldn't be allowed a platform that could be used to influence others."

[sarcasmic]

It's not censorship when they do it because they have good intentions.

[Hyperion]

You wrong thinkers have to be nudged, or else you'll never come around to right thinking. Is that better, or do you want us to just get right on the the camps?

[Suell]

It's not just that the left has good intentions but that they are correct. It is proven by science and so if you disagree then you hate science. And if you hate science then you don't even deserve to have a say. Just get on the train to the camps.

[Kongming]

Most of my friend are liberals (I live in Chicago). This is pretty much the opinion of them all at this point. The right wing is an enemy, and anyone who espouses those views is to be shunned and shamed.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

"Most of my friend are liberals (I live in Chicago)"

Chicago libertarians are legion.

[brokencycle]

A legion not producing results.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

In fairness, both Nicole and I haven't been sober since the Clinton Administration and it's hard to have a political impact when most of your time is spent getting high with illegal Mexican immigrants in the back of a tapas restaurant.

[Rasilio]

Is that when the Buttsecks happens?

[Pan Zagloba]

If you are too high to remember remember, did it really happen?

[Kongming]

Where? Show me where these rare beasts gather, that I may finally being among my own kind!

[gimmeasammich]

There was a get together here a few months ago on the north side of the city. I wasn't able to make it, but will try for another.

[Kongming]

Damn, I need to be on the lookout for these now.

[Citizen X]

Chicago libertarians are legionnaire's disease patients?

[Bra Ket]

"I am against the means BUT the ends justify the means."

[Loki]

I am against censorship but do think that if you have a conservative viewpoint you shouldn't be allowed a platform that could be used to influence others.

How the fuck do people say/ think shit like this without their heads exploding from the cognitive dissonance?

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

And the it happens to them and suddenly they think differently.

Very dull and dimwitted people them.

[DarrenM]

Practice.

[Zunalter]

You have to be an expert in Doublethink in order to be a progtard...I thought we knew this?

[Francisco d'Anconia]

She does get slammed pretty hard for it by the other commenters, however.

[Greater Questions of Carl]

Yeah, I was going to point that out as well.

And yet, she doubles down:

Not allowing conservatives to spread their views, aka misinformation and anti-science opinions, is NOT censorship. It's called promoting education.

Correct. The uneducated half of the country should not be allowed to spread their ignorance. [To someone indignant at the proposition of censoring half the country]

You aren't a liberal because you don't believe in facts or science. [To someone saying they were no longer a "liberal" because of such fascism]

I can believe that she is for real, but I'm leaning slightly towards troll with the last one.

[Tornado16nb]

Yea i think troll as well. I don't see an actual liberal saying "you aren't a liberal"....perhaps denier

[If-by-whiskey]

Pleasantly surprised at the ass-kicking she took down-thread

[DesigNate]

I enjoyed the one that tried to compare conservative news to Goebbels.

Seriously.

[Francisco d'Anconia]

Goebbels?

[RonnieNM]

This is on par with a conversation I had with some acquaintances this weekend. The superiority of those on the left knows no bounds and acknowledges no principles. Yup call it fascism...because that's what it is.

[4thaugust1932]

"Media does not spread free opinion; it generates opinion." --Oswald Spengler http://goo.gl/KXNf9

[db]

"Print is dead."
--Egon Spengler

[If-by-whiskey]

"Eternity is really long, especially near the end"
--Woody Allen

Off-topic. Sorry

[Lee G]

"Life's tough, it's even tougher if you're stupid."

- John Wayne

[gimmeasammich]

"Life is short, life is shit, and soon it will be over." Cabbie from Brain Candy

[sarcasmic]

It's called "Promoting Tolerance." Duh.

[Kongming]

And this is the whole problem, isn't it? Liberals have gotten to the point where they think their positions are a matter of morality, and that to disagree with them ipso facto makes you immoral. Thus, of course you should censor conservative viewpoints. To contemplate or hold them make you a bad person by default.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Conservatives have never claimed moral superiority?

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

Yes, saying liberals have become a new morality police means he's saying conservatives have never done anything similar.

You nailed it.

[tarran]

It's not sentient! By rewarding it with a response you are merely training its neural net to be more likely to produce a similar sequence of letters the next time it comments.

[DenverJ]

Isn't that how human infants start off? Do you think at some point it achieves sentience?

[Citizen X]

I think shreek is more of a Benjamin Button situation, except he skipped the part in the middle where he was competent at anything.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Conservatives perfected moral superiority, as you well know.

The fact that progressives (not liberals) have stumbled into the sewer with conservatives should not surprise anyone.

[WTF]

Pay your bet, fuckstick.

[Held Many Mics]

"fuckstick" is inexplicably hilarious invective IMHO. I LOLed out loud. I am a stupid man, but emotionally self-sufficient.

[Greg Loves His Woodchipper]

It sounds even better with an adjective in front of it too

[Kongming]

They sure have, but libs used to mock them for this, and (correctly) use this as evidence of failing on the right. Interesting that they've gotten around to hating the right with the same fervor now.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Hey, did you,ever pay your debt?

[tarran]

It can't pay anything. It literally doesn't understand any of the concepts contained in its comments.

Why you guys just refuse to accept this truth despite all the evidence that it isn't sentient is kind of scary.

[Random Axe Of Kindness]

Wait, can it be trained like the IBM bot Tay? Because that would be way more fun than the tired, incoherent crap that spews out of that handle right now....

[Random Axe Of Kindness]

Wait, can it be trained like the IBM bot Tay? Because that would be way more fun than the tired, incoherent crap that spews out of that handle right now....

[Hyperion]

They pretty much do it every day. But I doubt most of them are willing to use the gestapo tactics the left are in favor of, including ending the first and second amendments.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Don't forget the current president said he has no time for the Fourth when it comes to assassinating American citizens that hadn't been charged with a crime. And their kids too.

[Palin's Buttplug]

The authorities in Yemen should indict him immediately.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Laugh away your natural rights in the name of partisanship, fuckhole. That's just done wonders throughout man's history.

[Held Many Mics]

Sloopy are you going to the LP convention this year? Will you fall in line and #FeelTheJohnson?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Can't do it. Just,bought the house, my daughter's high school graduation is in a few weeks, m gonna buy an RV soon so I can attend football games in style, and I'm not a big fan of public accommodation laws.

[Held Many Mics]

I hate public accommodation laws, too. Personally I think GJ is pandering--he's too craven, not too stupid, to understand freedom of association--but I'm excited to see if LP can break out and hit 5% this year...

[Loki]

I see you still think Tu Quoque is a valid form of argumentation. Never change, shithead, never change.

Pay your bet yet, asshole?

[sarcasmic]

Without fallacies, leftists would have no arguments.

[AlexInCT]

Without double standards they wouldn't have any standards either. Nothing progressive about progresivism...

[commodious spittoon]

I think progressive fits the bill quite well. Much better than the alternatives. They're Democrats only insofar as Democracy appoints their preordained candidates. They're certainly not liberals. Yes, they're terribly regressive, but progressivism isn't a belief in progress, it's a belief in perfectability and a fundamental denial of the limits of their power to recreate society in their image. Progressivism is utopianism by another name.

[sarcasmic]

It's all about intentions. Leftists have good intentions, so they assume that anyone who disagrees with them must have bad intentions. After all, to disagree with a position born of good intentions is to disagree with those good intentions, and the only way that is possible is with bad intentions. Leftists want to eliminate inequality because they have good intentions. They want to help the poor (and tear down the rich who don't deserve their wealth). If you disagree then not only do you want to keep the poor down, but you want to prop up the rich at their expense. In short: you're evil.

[Kongming]

This deserves ten thousand likes. Well-said. It is no longer possible to merely be wrong anymore. If you disagree with me, it must be because you have some sinister secret agenda.

[Ron]

I go to face book to stay in contact with family and friends. I've never paid attention to their news feed so it must not be very effective. of course I also ignore the news feed on my iphone. Which tells me that some tech companies maybe instead of wasting their time and money on trying to control the news should stick to providing technology to view the news provided by others.

[Loki]

some tech companies maybe instead of wasting their time and money on trying to control the news should stick to providing technology to view the news provided by others.

But then how will they brainwash the great unwashed masses for the Greater Good that way? /sarc

[Enjoy Every Sandwich]

I simply don't engage in politics on Facebook, because that's not why I'm there or what I use it for. It's just another tool, and as long as it does what I need it to do I'm fine with it. I do have to hide some people's posts because they have a tiresome habit of constantly reposting crap from political websites, but other than that I just ignore it. Everything isn't about politics for me.

[The Last American Hero]

It doesn't seem to be preventing me from seeing posts by "friends" and "friends of friends" regurgitating Breitbart or Fox News memes.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

They don't have a human element in whether you see friends memes. This is purely about the trending news topics.

[DesigNate]

The human element to not see friends meme's is to scroll past them and roll your eyes.

[Kongming]

Let's see if this ends up trending on Facebook

[Brochettaward]

Reason isn't on the Facebook's list of 'credible' news sources to begin with. So if we look at the list of who is authoritative in the media, you already have a built in leftwing bias.

[Hugh Akston]

Or is the social network simply too big and ubiquitous for people to do without?

Nope.

[WTF]

Like "MySpace"?

[Citizen X]

Friendster is coming back. You'll see!

[sarcasmic]

O.T.:

Look at those abs! Jessica Jones superhero Krysten Ritter shows off her stunning figure in frilly bikini top and tiny bottoms as she vacations in Mexico

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvs.....ikini.html

[Chipper Morning Wood]

She got naked on a sitcom she did a while back. I forget the name.

[Free Society]

I truly appreciate that you post the Daily Mail links showing hot actresses wearing bikinis. This way I don't actually have to peruse through the mounds *pun intended* of Daily Mail articles to find the hot women. If you ask me you're serving the public good and you should be able to write off your efforts on your taxes.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Found on FB:

Donald Trump Taps Chris Christie to Lead Transition Team

Donald Trump is looking beyond the convention, the fall campaign and election itself to begin to plan for a massive takeover affecting four million employees: the governing stage.

In a new role, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will serve as chairman to assemble a transition team of experts on domestic and foreign policy to begin the organizational architecture for a future Trump administration.

Christie's team will conduct a search for candidates to fill top cabinet level positions and the roughly one thousand executive branch job openings that require Senate confirmation.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politic.....am-n570581

[db]

Doesn't sound "conservative" to me at all.

[Citizen X]

Boring. You got anything on Jeb's transition team, shreek?

[Hyperion]

That's a pretty horrible decision. But who expected better?

[Palin's Buttplug]

I see a future for Bernie Kerik after all.

[Loki]

Donald Trump Taps Chris Christie

*vomits uncontrollably* Couldn't make it past those words... *continues vomiting uncontrollably*

[Chipper Morning Wood]

"C'mon Christie, squeal like a pig!"

[Held Many Mics]

You're a silly goose!

Trump Asks Son-in-Law, Jared Kushner, to Plan for Transition Team

http://www.nytimes.com/politic.....tion-team/

[Hyperion]

That was the plan before Christie ate Kushner.

[esteve7]

Fuck, I read the comments.

The cognitive dissonance is off the charts. In the same sentence they rip conservatives for being closed minded, unwilling to consider other viewpoints, they talk about how great it is to be a liberal. You could find/replace conservative with leftist and their comment would make more sense

We will never reach peak derp.

You guys are right when it's now a moral crusade, so any challenge to anything they believe in is a heretic and must be thrown into the volcano.

[Hyperion]

Where's my HT, fuckers?

[mr simple]

You have to email them to get a hat tip. There's too much microaggression and othering of the writers going on in the comments for them to venture in to retrieve stories.

[Hyperion]

too much microaggression and othering of the writers

Wait, is this not our job? I've emailed them stuff before, they mostly just ignore that also. So why waste time? I mean I know, I know, there are cocktail parties to attend.

[mr simple]

Then I've got nothing. Maybe they just don't like you?

[Hyperion]

I exposed their cocktail parties!

[Slumbrew]

You exposed your what now?

[Playa Manhattan.]

WHY ARE THEY IGNORING YOUR EMAILS

[Hyperion]

BECAUSE THEY ARE STATIST COMMIES!

[Demoted Comment (Slammer)]

"Like"

[Hugh Akston]

Five stories down on Google News' US section.

[Loki]

Hat tips are for winners.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

Standard libertarian disclaimer: They should be allowed to do what they want with their own site and if you don't like it you don't have to use it.

However, it's really precious how often progressives basically argue "It's wrong to discriminate against anyone...unless you're doing it because you dislike their political beliefs."

[Kongming]

When Bruce Jenner became Caitlin, anyone who dared question her decision was immediately branded the worst bigot in the history of bigotry (I had more than one friend on Facebook brag that they had unfriendly a bunch of people for posting wrongthink about Caitlin). But then it turned out that Caitlin was a republican, and was backing Ted Cruz, and the gloves came off. Suddenly she was fair game. Being trans is ok, but being right wing is unthinkable.

[Lurker Kurt]

Didn't Caitlin "herself" say she got more flack for coming out as a Republican than for coming out as trans?

[Hyperion]

If you can call going from being adored and almost worshipped as a goddess on earth, to being hated and detested 'getting more flack', then yeah. I don't remember any negative comments about it. I remember all of the adoration from the progs and then pretty much nothing from everyone else. Until the supporting Ted Cruz thing happened.

[Kongming]

Actually, my favorite part of the whole Caitlin Jenner saga was the contrast with Rachel Dolezal. The same people that defended Cailtin brought out the long knives for Dolezal. But I've still not had a Progessive explain to me why its ok for someone to change their gender, but not their race.

[Hyperion]

The common proggie knowledge, which you must become familiar with and keep up on if you are to keep from running afoul of the outrage machine, is that ALL minorities, that is anyone who is not a white male member of the patriarchy, is an ally. Anyone who is a white male member of the patriarchy is automatically the enemy. So you can still be a proggie if you're a white male, but you have to hate yourself, confess your privilege, and become a sort of lower class citizen. Everyone else is automagically a member. UNTIL that person steps out of line by aligning themselves with something really icky, like Republicans, conservatives, libertarians, etc, etc.

That's the way it works. Caitlyn didn't take time to read the golden rules and now he/she is a tranny without a country.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

They're hypocrites. And they are free to be just as I'm free to not use FB except for posting on ESPN and a few other places.

[Hamster of Doom]

Or is the social network simply too big and ubiquitous for people to do without?

*giggles*

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

Yeah, that's ridiculous. I don't know who annoys me more, people who can't do without Facebook or people who need to constantly tell you they don't use Facebook because that's the new version of telling everyone 'I, like, don't even own a T.V.'

[Mustang]

Hey!

[Loki]

Smugsplain to us again about how all TV is shit and you replaced yours with a fish tank, that never gets old! /sarc /i keed, i keed

[Greater Questions of Carl]

The latter.

Also: "antisocial media".

[Rhywun]

I still use FB occasionally for birthday parties and such & I didn't even know there was a news section much less that it's "the U.S.' primary source for online news".

?\_(?)_/?

[Francisco d'Anconia]

See! It's Face Thingy's fault Rand didn't get the nomination.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Facebook has news curators?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

That's the one shocking fact from the story, I mean, people actually go on FB to get their fucking news?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

The only thing I see on facebook are reposted viral videos (usually vertical), life affirming quotes, pictures of their kids' soccer tournaments, unappetizing pictures of food and constant reminders they're not voting for Trump.

[Loki]

The same people who used to get their news from The Daily Show.

[Hammer of liberty]

I think they're talking about the trending news FB feeds into your normal stuff.

[This Machine]

See me? This is my shocked face. I am shocked.

[Nativist, Racist & Xenophobe]

Meh. Faceberg displaced MySpace, and when people get fed up with Faceberg, something else will displace it. No biggie.

[Hyperion]

By the time Derpbook is replaced, the driving force behind the new social media giant will be image links for printing giant posters of dear leader to place around your living unit, which will be exactly like all the other comrade's living unit.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

It's my understanding the Derpbook has been replaced, which is why Facebook owns other social networking platforms (smart move). Because social networking has the most fickle audience since Max Ficklestein went to Fickletown.

[Rasilio]

My kids basically don't use FB at all and have little to no interest in it

[Domestic Dissident]

Faceberg will never go away, for two main reasons:

1) It's the pre-eminent tool used by middle aged women who are unhappy in their marriages to cheat on their spouses, usually by hooking up with old high school flames.

2) Zuckerturd and Sandturd are joined at the hip with Obama, Hillary and the rest of the democratic party.

It's only a matter of time until one or both of these lowlife turds either run for office or get appointed to a cabinet position. Write it down, and remember you heard it from me first.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

"Zuckerturd and Sandturd "

If anything, your nicknames are actually getting less creative

[Hugh Akston]

Fuck you Eyerash, Mike is under a lot of pressure to come up with bizarre non sequiturs and idiotic conspiracy theories. He's had to outsource his nicknames to kids from the local junior high.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

You sound like Weigel

[Hugh Akston]

I assume you mean Weigturd.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

That's Der Weigel.

[waffles]

Well, no one who speaks German could be an evil man.

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

+1 "the Bart, the"

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

1) It's the pre-eminent tool used by middle aged women who are unhappy in their marriages to cheat on their spouses, usually by hooking up with old high school flames.

Really?

*starts making account on facebook*

[Playa Manhattan.]

Just because it happened to Mike, he assumes that it happened to everyone.

[Domestic Dissident]

Not me, I'm a lucky guy, but it has happened to two of my buddies. I'll bet you probably know a guy who got Facebooked too.

[Warty]

Faceberg

This seems...suggestive.

[mr simple]

OT: "Everyone gets a tax cut," says Trump. He says he meant increase on the rich from his tax proposals, not current rate.

[Call Me Conrad]

YOU get a tax cut! And YOU get a tax cut! And YOU get a tax cut!

[Palin's Buttplug]

Since when is BENGAZI!!!!! news anywhere but on wingnut sites?

[DesigNate]

Never change demfag.

[Notorious UGCC]

Using human beings to decide what news stories to cover is standard practice in media outlets - but Facebook pretends it's some kind of algorithm picking the stories.

It's as if the New York Times were to pretend that its choice of topics to cover was based on a nonpartisan computer program.

[Loki]

But in the long run, will it matter as long as the baby photos and cat memes remain?

Nope. Because that's all the Derpbookers really care about.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

I saw a list of questions about Zuckerberg on a website called "Quora". The best question was "Why doesn't Mark Zuckerberg date supermodels?"

[Palin's Buttplug]

He must be a true nerdy gearhead.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Want a good, hearty belly laugh? Try reading this retardation.

Trigger warning: you might end up crying as well.

[mr simple]

I live in a political bubble. A lovely, liberal, northeastern bubble.
...So yes, I understand how deeply racism and bigotry run through American culture ? as much as any educated, white, Protestant person can really understand it ? even if I don't hear it in my home or my backyard.

It's hard to hear actual racist remarks when there are no minorities that live near you.

[mr simple]

Well, I took northeastern to be New England. I guess they could mean NYC or something. Either way, don't read the comments.

[Playa Manhattan.]

I hear more coming from that particular political bubble than anywhere else.

[Loki]

No shit. Massholes are some of the most racist motherfuckers on the planet. Just go to south Boston and wait a few minutes, you'll hear shit that would make a Klansman blush.

[Rhywun]

wait a few minutes, you'll hear shit that would make a Klansman blush

Same in Buffalo.

[Rhywun]

I might add that the racism in a city like Buffalo comes from all sides - nobody seems to like each other there.

[Horatio]

Because it's miserable there

[Loki]

I suspect a lot of the old rust belt cities are like that.

[Rhywun]

Two lines later he says

I live in a diverse community with a mix of political and social viewpoints

Uh... which is it? Bubble or diversity?

[Rasilio]

Oh it is definitely diversity, they have both Marxists AND Lenists there. Rumor has it there might even be a few Maoists and Trotskyists milling about too.

How much more diverse can you get?

[Loki]

Elwood: What kind of music politics do you usually have here?

Claire: Oh, we got both kinds. We got country Communism *and* western Marxism.

[DesigNate]

My wife's family is from Connecticut. Some of the most racist motherfuckers I've ever heard about (New Englander's not necessarily my wife's family.)

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

"I live in an echo chamber. And I know aaallll about how the other, scummy half lives, let me tell you!"

[Palin's Buttplug]

Conservative "news" is what ever narrative they are trying to push on their open-mouth guppies that day.

For instance, Fox News ran with an anti-immigrant narrative about Kate Steinle for months. One murder became a Big Story about sanctuary cities, open borders, Mexican rapists, repeat felons, and drug runners.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

I'll see your Kaye Steinle and raise you a Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown.

[Irish, Target-Bathroom Rapist]

Dude, you don't need to actually use dead people as your example. Liberals freak out if something that vaguely looks like a noose is discovered on a college campus. When it's inevitably discovered that the "noose" was actually a cord used in an art project or something, they just slink back into the shadows and wait for the next time they can hysterically proclaim that a resurgent Klan has nothing better to do than leave nooses around left-wing liberal arts colleges.

[Loki]

Repeat a lie often enough and people will assume it must be the truth. That's just Propaganda 101.

[AlexInCT]

Don't forget Obama & Clinton killing people in Benghazi so they could win an election a few months out..

[Palin's Buttplug]

"Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown".

They were big news here on Reason. Not just their deaths but also what they represented.

Personally, the Buttplug never commented on them.

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

Referring to one's self in the third buttplug.

Illuminati confirmed.

[Glide]

Hey, it's their right to editorialize against the right if they want.

Pretty crappy business practice for an aggregator to pick a side if you ask me, but c'est la vie.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

If Facebook is just another left-of-center newsroom, will conservatives flee the site?

Were conservatives ever there? I mean, the brief few minutes a month I spend on facebook doing what every red-blooded American boy does on facebook (cyberstalk hot chicks from work), the whole thing feels like a big lefty-social-signal fest.

[Uncle Jay]

RE: Does Facebook Suppress Conservative News Outlets and Topics?
Ex-staffers of the social media behemoth claim stories written by and about conservatives are deliberately kept from "Trending."

Of course Facebook conservatives are deliberately kept from "trending."
It's Facebook's option to do so.
Just like its my option not to use Facebook.
Facebook is only following the trend of many rich socialist elitist hypocrites in Amerika by restricting free speech on their social network.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Best young-person's quote on Facebook:

"It's dead to us. Facebook is something we all got in middle school because it was cool but now is seen as an awkward family dinner party we can't really leave."

Wee, millennials aren't all bad. Well, then he says this, which is strange:

But, he mentions, everyone is on it and it's "weird and annoying" if you're not.

Then:

"Instagram is by far the most used social media outlet for my age group." He says that even though not everyone is necessarily on Instagram, everyone who is on it, uses it. He said that people like the anonymity of liking and tagging on Instagram (as opposed to Facebook where your friends will see every Like or Tag you're involved with) and he loves that there are no links (no spam or BuzzFeed links).

I like the sound of this Instagram thingy. Might have to take a look.

"To be honest, a lot of us simply do not understand the point of Twitter."

You and me both, buddy.

Because there's no searching past photos/videos (and everything gets deleted after a view), kids can post drinking, smoking, or whatever risqu? shit they get into without fear of a future employer finding it.

As social networking goes, Snapchat makes the MOST sense to me.

[Playa Manhattan.]

It's owned by Facebook.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

I know that and I indirectly referenced that in my comment above.

Even I, a complete social-networking retard understands there's a difference between Facebook the product and Facebook the company. When I make fun of facebook, I'm largely making fun of the product. As a company, if they're going to survive, they're going to have to purchase every product that "trends", because they'll never come up with something innovative on their own, ever again. Ever.

[Brochettaward]

In terms of Twitter, I still haven't figured out how it's supposed to work exactly. People follow each other, Tweet, and argue. But the way this all gets displayed is absolutely moronic and needlessly complicated. It's the simplest damn platform in the world in theory. I refuse to use it.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Twitter seems largely useful to celebrities where there's a one-to-many ratio. One message out, hundreds, thousands or millions of people take that message in. People have explained the whole hashtag thing and I think I get it now. But still, when I find myself reading someone's twitter page, it's so cryptic as to make it difficult to read. Did this guy say that, oh, wait, he re-tweeted it. (in dim, grey, small font above). So all the @ names in there, is that a response? Oh wait, there's a response in the tweet that was retweeted... what is this relating to?

[Rhywun]

I thought Instagram was a celebrity thing, too. I'm always hearing about Bieber caught drunk on Instagram or some shit. I'll never visit to find out, though.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

I spend very little time on Instagram but from what I've seen, it seems to be centered around photography and pictorial displays. Lot of hipsters now have access to top quality photography in their smart phone, so it seems when I'm looking at Instagram pages with ANY theme, it's a lot of softened photos with earth-tone palette or surreal, slightly muddy colorizing.

http://www.intimateweddings.co.....r-wedding/

[GILMORE?]

I have learned that its completely useless as a platform for "dialogue"; its about making 'competing statements' and see who gets the more likes/shares.

which is actually bleeding over into how people actually *talk*, imo. They don't actually respond to each other so much as simply state their own position repeatedly in different ways, hoping one will "Destroy" the other and prevent anyone from ever having to think.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

+1 Hit & Run thread.

[GILMORE?]

H&R is an endless buffet of informed and witty tete-a-tete compared to social-media meme-slinging sewers

[Citizen X]

It's meme-slinging sewers all the way down.

[Rhywun]

I've used Twitter three times, successfully, to locate a sports stream when my cable fucks up again and the game is only in Spanish or something.

I have never used it for anything else, ever.

[mr simple]

Unless someone takes a screenshot of the snap (or whatever it's called) and then posts that to the internet. For example, see many reddit porn subs. Er, I mean, so I've heard.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

My phone let's me take screenshots. So done and done.

[Je suis Woodchipper]

its hugely influential "Trending" section

that there are no quotes around hugely influential is the most controversial thing i've read here.

[Je suis Woodchipper]

facebook this weekend and running into today has been one huge mothersdayapalooza.

[GILMORE?]

from a more neutral outlet

Like HuffPo

[GILMORE?]

people in their 20s and early 30s, most of whom graduated from Ivy League and private East Coast schools like Columbia University and NYU

IOW, "Worldly" people with an appreciation for a wide-variety of perspectives.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Not that I know a whole lot about Silicon Valley but from I do know, read and heard this isn't surprising and par for the course. I can totally see them being a bunch of narcissistic ignorant twits and twats where freedom of speech and expression are concerned.

I briefly worked for an internet company (who basically were scam artists) doing web copy for them. Well, they'd come to me with a website and tell me to 'write the same thing but differently'. They weren't very bright people with a whole lotta 'whoa' and 'dude' going on whenever you pointed out something very simple and basic. Anyway, in just a couple of months I saw them morph from a 'cool hip' company where everyone wore flip flops to increasingly paranoid and authoritarian. I soon left because the stupid was just too much plus I didn't like whatever it was they were up to. When you have lawyer visiting you every day, it can't be good.

They had no clue how to run a business but they figured out a way to make millions. Go figure.

[GILMORE?]

in just a couple of months I saw them morph from a 'cool hip' company where everyone wore flip flops to increasingly paranoid and authoritarian.

Its sort of a cliche, isn't it?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Susan: We made the mistake of thinking we could
actually take on and help people before we were
even helping ourselves, before we had enough for
our own families. Some of that came from one of
Stephen's main spiritual teachings: Believing your
kid is better than anybody else's is one of the roots
of racism.

Funny how we have to keep learning this over and over and over and over...

[waffles]

Thanks for sharing that. It's amazing how I see people my age and younger (those damned millennials) making the same kind of mistakes, but somehow even dumber for it. We are in some kind of cultural eternal September.

[waffles]

But many people my age are the second generation of these experiments or as in the words of someone I met named "Che", "fuck my stupid hippie parents".

[Loki]

They had no clue how to run a business but they figured out a way to make millions.

I think you just described the vast majority of "web companies." I'm surprised there hasn't been another big "tech bubble" to clear out some of the chaff.

[Rhywun]

My god how we are due for one. Only this time, it will be accompanied by the burstings of an education bubble and another housing bubble.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Douchebags with money are a threat to civilization.

The three kids each owned BMW's and Audi's and would walk in as if they just came back from the fucking beach acting too cool for the world. The hilarious part was when they put on their 'serious' faces to act as if they were running a substantial business.

Fucking boneheads.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Instagram star Essena O'Neill highlighted the false sense of reality that social media creates when she unexpectedly quit social media after amassing 700,000 Instagram followers, explained that it had made her "miserable." She recaptioned her photos with captions like "NOT REAL LIFE ? took over 100 in similar poses trying to make my stomach look good."

Huh. Don't know who this is but yeah, that sounds exhausting. Especially as you age. Because when you're young and genetically gifted, it only takes 100. But as you age, that's going to go to 150, 200, then 300 etc.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

There are no number of photos that will make my stomach look good.

There is only photo-shop.

[lap83]

Instagram is not real life?!? /universe shatters

[Karinka]

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[Rhywun]

Do YOU have 700,000 followers? I think not.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

"...a small group of young journalists, primarily educated at Ivy League or private East Coast universities, who curate the "trending" module on the upper-right-hand corner of the site. "

I KNEW it!! My stereotype holds true!

[Bubba Jones]

14 totally insane Japanese inventions!

[John]

15 Celebrities who used to be insanely hot but are not now.

[Citizen X]

Number 8: John Ritter

[TheZeitgeist]

Number 3: Anna Nicole Smith

[John]

I don't care about this. It is their platform. The only issue would be the fact that they were not upfront about it. But, its not like it is that big of an issue.

[jolenesshelton]

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[jolenesshelton]

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[Richie]

You guys see a liberal agenda behind this.

I see a conservative one.

[TheZeitgeist]

The Ivy snowflakes can't keep Trump off the feed. They're stuck going where clicks are like everyone else; and I wouldn't be surprised if Trump being so personally engaged with social media and the press (making his own content constantly) compromises any passive management by Facebook via Fourth Estate sources.

[toolkien]

Just about newsfeed is slanted left. My Windows 10 news is as slanted, if not more, than facebook.

When I speak of corpora-fascism, it isn't some narrow statement that is hollow of value because nobody sees those uptight guys in those black uniforms with red arm bands running around. It's business in bed with the State to promote its ideals. MSM and autofeeds would have made those at Pravda or the Volkischer Beobachter tingle with delight.

It all falls into line. Twenty five years ago, the Sunday magazine insert in my local paper went from slight right to medium left. The business section went soft left. About then, Time magazine, which was moderate, went medium left. It's just moved into the modern technological age.

What I find fascinating is that they ARE the establishment, but they've successfully maintained the "outsider" cred.

[Whatever Farm Animal Of War]

"Or is the social network simply too big and ubiquitous for people to do without?"

No. It's not

[Real American]

Nazis

[american socialist]

"staffers of the social media behemoth claim stories written by and about conservatives are deliberately kept from "Trending.""

Yawn. So what? FB is a private entity that makes money hand over foot. Why can't they do whatever the fuck they want? You mean the world will get less exposure to Steven Crowder's tranny videos if people with Ivy League educations block them? This is a bad thing?

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

So....you're tired of looking at "tranny videos", is what you're saying.

[american socialist]

More like incredibly, awesomely, profoundly tired of watching right-wingers work the ref. When does that shit get old?

[Vapourwear]

When it stops pissing people like you off.

[ranrod]

Facebook is a commercial enterprise and has every right to censor it's content. Just as its subscribers have every right to find some other social media outlet that has a better grasp of the necessity of the public discourse, which, by nature, must be free from restriction. But, what Facebook has decided is that it wants to control the debate, allowing one side to freely express itself and restricting the other side. It is a poor business model, because if they were intellectually honest, they would wind up disposing of nearly all of their accounts save for the Mother Teresas of the world.
This is exactly the sort of behavior exhibited by those who must not be trusted with leadership. They are incapable of responsible use of power. To them, if they can silence those with whom they disagree, they will.
The United States is quickly turning into everything the Soviet Union represented as evil, albeit with more resources and wealth, but essentially, in all ways that matter, we have become the enemy we feared.
Laugh now, while you still have the freedom to do so.
http://christianmerc.blogspot......yrant.html

[josh]

when i suggested on another site that maybe the reaction might been a little less "nothing to see here" if the censoring had gone in the other direction, i was told that you can't believe four anonymous "politically motivated" individuals, and -by the way- they're obviously politically motivated to say such things.

that, or it's being blown off because it's nothing that any news organization doesn't already do and it's perfectly ok. apparently there's so much actual liberal bias that they think deciding which stories are newsworthy is the same thing as deciding it's politics isn't appropriate for larger circulation.

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[Love Status for Whatsapp]

This lends an ambiguity and curiosity to them which urges readers to read them and respond to them unlike Facebook where the long status messages are not being read by most people.