they take misinformation seriously and have strict laws which prevent online manipulation of content as well as laws which punish those who spread misinformation
[deleted]
the man is sick of Oprah telling him about the incredible benefits of salt. Can you blame him?
In the age of halfway convincing AI there needs to be restrictions in place for news.
Runs a risk of becoming like 1984 though.
Thank you! Because the US government sure isn’t doing enough! 🙈
So in Covid over here in Australia this story came out that people from the city were taking buses to country supermarkets to “raid” them. There were first name quotes from local witnesses but strangely no photographs. No photos of the buses or people loading groceries in them. No evidence of buses being leased.
This story got traction such that a major figure of the Government issued a statement threatening to crack down on these raiders.
Zero of it was true. There were no buses. There were no raids. The people quoted do not exist.
And yet these stories were spread and amplified on Facebook and other social media.
There were zero consequences for the lying journalists. Zero consequences for the lying publisher. Zero consequences for all those who pushed these entirely false articles online.
Today those articles have been vanished online. They only exist in weird cached pages and random archive sites.
There was no investigation of what should be a crime.
We desperately need to go after fake news from the source to those who spread it. Studies show most fake news comes from an incredibly small number of accounts. Small to the point that a few people with a week and a ban button could wipe out masses of, say, antivaxxer lies on Facebook.
But Facebook will never do this because engagement is advertising dollar eyeballs.
It’s good business to have people ranting about imaginary immigrant crimes and the Governments love it when they can put out their BS tough on crime statements in response.
Some country needs to do it. A truth in journalism law. A law about spreading fake news. It’s vital for the health of all democracies globally.
The current monetization system on the Internet that rewards you purely for views and engagement needs to be radically changed. And unfortunately that’s only going to be possible with a considerate amount of government regulation. These tech companies are NOT going to do it on their own accord.
We have entered the age where young people are now deliberately setting out to create content that enrages, scares, shocks, and misinforms simply because those are the easiest paths to getting views and engagement.
Not only Youtube, but other sites have this issue, too.
8 comments
they take misinformation seriously and have strict laws which prevent online manipulation of content as well as laws which punish those who spread misinformation
[deleted]
the man is sick of Oprah telling him about the incredible benefits of salt. Can you blame him?
In the age of halfway convincing AI there needs to be restrictions in place for news.
Runs a risk of becoming like 1984 though.
Thank you! Because the US government sure isn’t doing enough! 🙈
So in Covid over here in Australia this story came out that people from the city were taking buses to country supermarkets to “raid” them. There were first name quotes from local witnesses but strangely no photographs. No photos of the buses or people loading groceries in them. No evidence of buses being leased.
This story got traction such that a major figure of the Government issued a statement threatening to crack down on these raiders.
Zero of it was true. There were no buses. There were no raids. The people quoted do not exist.
And yet these stories were spread and amplified on Facebook and other social media.
There were zero consequences for the lying journalists. Zero consequences for the lying publisher. Zero consequences for all those who pushed these entirely false articles online.
Today those articles have been vanished online. They only exist in weird cached pages and random archive sites.
There was no investigation of what should be a crime.
We desperately need to go after fake news from the source to those who spread it. Studies show most fake news comes from an incredibly small number of accounts. Small to the point that a few people with a week and a ban button could wipe out masses of, say, antivaxxer lies on Facebook.
But Facebook will never do this because engagement is advertising dollar eyeballs.
It’s good business to have people ranting about imaginary immigrant crimes and the Governments love it when they can put out their BS tough on crime statements in response.
Some country needs to do it. A truth in journalism law. A law about spreading fake news. It’s vital for the health of all democracies globally.
The current monetization system on the Internet that rewards you purely for views and engagement needs to be radically changed. And unfortunately that’s only going to be possible with a considerate amount of government regulation. These tech companies are NOT going to do it on their own accord.
We have entered the age where young people are now deliberately setting out to create content that enrages, scares, shocks, and misinforms simply because those are the easiest paths to getting views and engagement.
Not only Youtube, but other sites have this issue, too.
Comments are closed.