Social Media Mistakes

  Did Facebook influence the 2016 election? There are a good many critics who are claiming that fake news, that was spread through the popular social network Facebook, could have had a noticeable effect on the overall outcome. I can't actually say one way or the other. And it's not really my place to, to begin with. The more pertinent issue here is the sway that social media can have on political matters when most social networks are such uncontrolled places as-is. As long as I stay within the general TOS for Facebook I can post just about anything. Just look at all the pictures of college kids ripping on bongs. And not only can I post whatever I want, everyone else can post whatever they want. It doesn't matter if it's true. It doesn't matter if it's practically libel. By the time they track you down on the internet it'll be too late anyways. And that sets a dangerous precedent for our country.

Who could blame you for believing this? It looks completely legitimate.

    If you're like me, you get your news by following the links in the sidebar on your Facebook page. You might supplement that with a Twitter. Some do and some don't. And I would be willing to be that you see at least a few political headlines. Now what if one of them said "Hillary Clinton escaped from prison at the age of 20!"? What if when you followed that link, you found a legitimate looking news site? You might very well believe it. And who could blame you? Or what if you were browsing your Twitter feed and you saw a post advertising that you could now vote for Hillary Clinton by phone. I kid you not. This was an actual hoax that was circulated on Twitter and it was done up well enough to be frighteningly believable. I almost fell for this one. The only reason I didn't was because I saw the picture in the context of an article outing it as a hoax.

  Do you think that's okay? It feels an awful lot like coercion to me. It feels like preying on those who don't have enough experience with technology or the US voting system to know better. And I would bet dollars to donuts that it was aimed at the minority groups who might not commonly vote. It was a cheap trick to try and keep them out of the polling place. Less overt than stationing armed guards outside the voting booth but the same general intent. Thankfully Twitter caught on fairly quickly and banned the accounts that were circulating the image. But I imagine the damage was already done.

Bear in mind that this is not a legitimate news source.

  And let's not forget the kids from Macedonia who made themselves a pretty penny spreading Trump Ideology through the Facebook news stream. For those who are interested I've included a link to one of the sites Worldpoliticus. Go check it out. It's certainly something. I was greeted immediately by an article claiming that Hillary Clinton threw a violent tantrum when she lost. I know she didn't. I know that's ridiculous. But talk like that hurts a candidate and when it's being spread as real news and not the kind of prattle you get from the National Enquirer, well that's a problem. I do have to congratulate those Macedonian teens for their ingenuity though. I'm sure Trump would be proud of their Capitalist, laissez faire mentality about the world of journalism. Caveat emptor and what not.

  I understand the inherent difficulty associated with a task like this. Mark will be straddling a fine line between keeping fake news out and not verging into censorship. It won't be easy and I imagine that a fair few feathers will be rustled in the process. I've said it once and I'll say it again, free speech can be a difficult thing to maintain. When do you prioritize protecting one person's rights over another person's? These media outlets I suppose have a right to spread this information if they want. It's a dirty tactic and certainly unfair, but it is what it is.

  But I think it's pretty clear that Facebook needs to work on their act. I don't know if Mark wanted to influence the election but he certainly managed to. And that's something that cannot happen again. We need more oversight as to whats being passed off as news. And no Mark, an algorithm won't do the trick.