How #Facebook algorithms impact democracy
▻http://www.rappler.com/newsbreak/148536-facebook-algorithms-impact-democracy
One potentially fatal flaw for democracies? The algorithms don’t distinguish fact from fiction.
This partly explains why Uson’s posts can compete – and, often, beat – news groups. All it takes is for a committed group to organize click farms and trolls, paid or not. Or be outlandishly controversial, quite easy if truth doesn’t matter.
Emotional call-to-action posts in a heated political environment get a lot of engagement, the key metric for social media.
“Facebook’s goal as a company that seeks to make money for shareholders is to make sure that people stay on its platform as long as possible and read as many posts as possible so that they can sell as many ads as possible at a higher price,” Herbst reminded journalists.
