Category: Fortune

After weeks of denying that the spread of viral “fake news” stories was a problem that it needed to be concerned about, Facebook (FB) has finally announced some concrete measures designed to blunt the force of hoaxes and misinformation, including a partnership with external fact-checking organizations who call out fakes. Now comes the hard part.

Within hours of the announcement on Thursday—which involves making it easier for users to flag fakes, as well as alerting readers when the accuracy of a story has been called into question—conservative outlets were already dismissing the move as a conspiracy of left-leaning partisans, designed to smother alternative sources and protect existing “gatekeepers.”

All of this helps explain why Facebook didn’t want to wade into this issue in the first place, not to mention why it resists being defined as a media company so strenuously (although it clearly is one). Facebook likes things that are neat and tidy, like algorithms—not things that are all muddy and gray and complicated, like defining what constitutes fake news.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Facebook Says it Will Fight Fake News — Now Comes the Hard Part”

Every time the topic comes up, Mark Zuckerberg strenuously denies that his creation is as a media company. “We’re a tech company,” the Facebook CEO protests, waving his hands and pointing at the social network’s algorithm, the way a magician waves a handkerchief to try and distract you.

And yet, the evidence continues to pile up that Facebook not only is a media company — or at least acts a lot like one, and should probably be treated like one — but may be the most powerful media entity in the world.

Zuckerberg et al would like to pretend that Facebook is just a platform, agnostic about content, just distributing whatever its users want, and run by an impartial algorithm. But the reality is that the site routinely removes content for its own purposes (often without saying why), and more recently it has begun funding, buying and developing its own content, specifically video.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Facebook’s claim that it isn’t a media company is getting harder to swallow”

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg initially scoffed at the idea that hoaxes, misinformation and “fake news” were a problem on the social network, or that they may have influenced the election of Donald Trump. But now, the company finally seems to be taking some responsibility for the role it plays in spreading that kind of content — and it’s about time.

In a blog post, Facebook announced that it is implementing a series of steps aimed at stamping out the problem of hoaxes and fake news, including a) the ability for users to more easily report fakes, b) a co-operative effort with third-party verification organizations such as Politifact and Snopes that will alert readers when a story’s accuracy is disputed, and c) cracking down on sites that pretend to be legitimate news outlets.

These moves are not going to solve the problem entirely, of course — in part because the term “fake news” includes a host of different kinds of content, from outright fakes and wholly manufactured stories to news reports from reputable outlets that make poorly-supported claims or haven’t been independently verified. But they are an important first step at rooting out what Facebook calls “the worst of the worst.”

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Facebook is finally starting to take some responsibility for fake news”

There was a flurry of interest recently in a lawsuit launched by some Facebook shareholders, who apparently believe that they got the short end of the stick in the company’s recent share restructuring. Here’s a news flash for them: You always had the short end of the stick.

The lawsuit relates to the changes that CEO Mark Zuckerberg made earlier this year, in which he issued a new class of stock that will allow him to maintain control over the company even if he sells or gives away most of his shares.

The plaintiffs argue this could be damaging to their interests, since their shares might drop in value. And the lawsuit alleges that Silicon Valley venture capitalist and board member Marc Andreessen was personally advising Zuckerberg, while also sitting on a supposedly impartial advisory committee overseeing the restructuring maneuver.

As titillating as it might be to read Andreessen’s text messages to Zuckerberg, however — in which the former quotes from a 1950’s movie with Burt Lancaster, and says “The cat’s in the bag and the bag’s in the river” — the whole thing feels like a bit of a sideshow.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Zuckerberg’s control over Facebook is absolute, lawsuit or no lawsuit”

The media world continues to undergo an unprecedented amount of upheaval, with continents slamming into each other, vast chasms suddenly appearing under our feet, and glaciers melting at hyper-speed. But one thing remains largely unchanged, and that is the 800-pound gorilla whose shadow continues to loom over the landscape — a gorilla named Facebook.

The social network’s dominant position at the top of the media food-chain is something that most publishers have already become accustomed to, whether they like it or not. But that dominance was reinforced with the election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States, an outcome that many believe Facebook played a role in, thanks to its distribution of so-called “fake news.”

This phenomenon was like a one-two punch to the solar plexus of the media industry. On the one hand, it drove home just how big a role Facebook plays in the news consumption of large numbers of people. But at the same time, it also made it abundantly clear how little the social network really cares about the news it distributes. So much power, and yet so little responsibility.

As a former Facebook staffer described it, all the network really cares about is whether users find the content in their feeds engaging or not, and “bullshit is really engaging.” The question of whether or not the stories those users share are accurate or not is largely irrelevant.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Prediction for 2017: The media’s Faustian dance with Facebook continues”

A new survey commissioned by BuzzFeed found that most people believed the “fake news” stories they got through Facebook. But the survey also showed something else interesting: Namely, that the vast majority of people don’t remember the news they get from Facebook at all, real or fake.

The survey, which was done by Ipsos, asked more than 3,000 people whether they recalled seeing a random selection of six real and fake headlines. The stories chosen included one about Pope Francis endorsing Donald Trump (untrue), one about the former head of the CIA endorsing Hillary Clinton (true) and nine other selected stories, both fake and real.

Those who took part in the survey included a mix of Clinton and Trump voters, as well as those who said they didn’t vote. They were asked first if they remembered either seeing or hearing about a specific headline, and then whether they believed it was true or not.

The headline on the subsequent BuzzFeed story by media editor Craig Silverman was “Most Americans Who See Fake News Believe It, New Survey Says.”

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Real or fake, most people don’t remember the news on Facebook”

There’s plenty of blame to go around when it comes to the problem of “fake news,” and some of it quite rightly falls on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. It’s not that these platforms don’t care about the truth, however. The problem goes deeper than that. It’s more of a structural problem, and it doesn’t come with an easy solution.

Social networks like Facebook and Twitter started out primarily as ways to connect with friends and other people with similar interests, and they did so by making it easy for you to share bits of text, along with hyperlinks to content worth reading on the web.

Eventually, however, text gave way to photos, with both Twitter and Facebook restructuring their news feeds or streams to allow for larger pictures. Then came video — both in the form of video clips (many of which auto-play because advertisers like it that way) and animated GIFs. Hyperlinks, which social networks noticed were rarely clicked on anyway, started to become less important.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Here’s one reason why social networks are not a good place for news”

When Donald Trump was seen by many in the media as a side-show with no real chance of becoming president, his behavior on Twitter was an amusing distraction. But now that he is on his way to the White House, figuring out how to handle that behavior has become a critical challenge.

A classic example of this occurred on Sunday night, when the President-elect unleashed a tweet-storm about how he won the election in spite of “millions of people who voted illegally.” As with most Trump tweets, these were re-shared hundreds of thousands of times within minutes.

In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 27, 2016

The immediate problem posed by these tweets is that there is absolutely no evidence that large numbers of illegal votes were cast, let alone millions of them. It’s a classic conspiracy theory promoted by fake-news and propaganda sites like InfoWars. Election-monitoring experts have said they have found no sign of any organized illegal voting whatsoever.

Continue reading “The challenge of covering a president who tweets fake news”

One of the themes that has emerged during the controversy over “fake news” and its role in the election of Donald Trump is the idea that Russian agents of various kinds helped hack the process by fueling this barrage of false news. But is that really true?

In a recent story, the Washington Post says that this is definitely the case, based on information provided by two groups of what the paper calls “independent researchers.” But the case starts to come apart at the seams the more you look at it.

One group is associated with the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a conservative think tank that says it has been researching Russian propaganda attempts since 2014.

The second group is something called PropOrNot, about which very little is known. Its website doesn’t name anyone who is associated with it, including the researchers who worked on the report. And the Post doesn’t name the group’s executive director — whom it quotes — because it says he is afraid of “being targeted by Russia’s legions of skilled hackers.”

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “No, Russian agents are not behind every piece of fake news you see”

Facebook may be a global behemoth with 1.7 billion users, but there’s one huge market in which it has virtually no presence: China. Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has made no secret of his desire to enter the country, but so far his desire remains unrequited.

Now, the Facebook CEO appears to be planning to offer the Chinese government a gift, in the hope of winning its affections. According to the The New York Times, his team has developed a tool that will allow the state to censor content. But doing so will open a Pandora’s box that may be difficult to close.

Zuckerberg has reportedly said it is better to be “enabling conversation” even if some of the conversation is censored, and it’s not surprising he would feel that way. His goal is to turn Facebook into a global town square. But what happens when some of the townsfolk suddenly disappear in the middle of the night, and you were the one who gave away their location?

Knowing that this kind of tool exists will also make it more difficult to stop other countries from asking to use it. What will Zuckerberg say if Russia or Turkey wants the same power of prior restraint? What does the global town square look like then?

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

The rise of “fake news” is a topic that is getting a lot of attention lately, thanks to the role that Facebook and other social platforms play in news consumption for a growing number of users. But there are other problems as well, a recent Stanford study found.

According to researchers from the university, a majority of students—more than 80% of them, in fact—could not distinguish between a piece of sponsored content or “native advertising” and a real news article. They also had difficulty determining whether a news story shared on social media was credible, and based their decision on odd or even irrelevant factors.

One example asked middle school students whether they should trust an article about financial planning that was written by a bank executive, and sponsored by a bank. The researchers said that many students did not see the author or the sponsored nature of the piece as a reason to question its credibility or accuracy.

Another exercise asked students to look at the homepage of the news site Slate, and identify whether certain parts of it were news or advertising. They had no problem determining that a standard banner ad was advertising, but more than 80% believed a native ad—which was clearly labeled with the words “sponsored content”—was a real news story.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Most students can’t tell the difference between real news and fake news, study finds”

If you’re AT&T or Comcast, you might like the sounds of Donald Trump’s transition team, but if you are a small content creator or someone who likes a wide range of services being available through your ISP, you probably aren’t going to like it much at all.

That’s because the two advisers that President-elect Donald Trump named to help oversee his telecom policy agenda at the Federal Communications Commission are not friends of net neutrality. And they are likely to have a lot of sway over future FCC policy.

Jeff Eisenach is an economist who once worked for Verizon, and Mark Jamison used to be part of Sprint’s lobbying team. Both men have written about how they are not in favor of net neutrality rules, which keep Internet service providers from giving preferential treatment to certain forms of online content or services.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “President Trump could spell the end of net neutrality”

Donald Trump hasn’t even become President yet, but he has already given us a taste of how acrimonious his relationship with the media is likely to be, after a no-holds-barred meeting with cable executives and off-again, on-again meeting with the New York Times.

The existential problem this poses for the mainstream press is this: Do they accede to Trump’s demands in order to get access to him and his administration, so that they can better report on it? Or do they become even more antagonistic in their coverage, and give up any hope of a working relationship? Both of these options have significant risks associated with them.

The idea that Trump might have an adversarial stance towards the media won’t come as a surprise to anyone who has been following the president-elect on Twitter, or anywhere else for that matter.

Trump has routinely called out the New York Times for being a “failing newspaper,” and slammed both it and the Washington Post for their biased coverage of him during the campaign. At one point, he withdrew the Post‘s press accreditation, as he did for a number of other news outlets.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Trump puts the media between a rock and a very hard place”

Mark Zuckerberg has done his best to get around the problems that his giant social network has created in the form of viral fake news and hoaxes, a problem that many believe may have played a key role in the election of Donald Trump. But he can’t evade the issue much longer.

One of the arguments that the Facebook CEO started with when the fake news discussion first began was that the small proportion of fake news stories couldn’t possibly have affected the outcome of the election. This was “crazy talk,” he said.

But as a number of people quickly pointed out, Facebook’s entire marketing and advertising business — which is worth billions of dollars a year — is predicated on the idea that having your message on the platform can reach and influence hundreds of millions of people. He can’t have it both ways.

Note: This was originally published at Fortune, where I was a senior writer from 2015 to 2017

Continue reading “Facebook needs to act quickly on fake news”