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Would a better way of describing it be: "People Used Facebook to fuel Anti-Refugee Attacks in Germany." You could say that Facebook isn't doing enough to preven

Would a better way of describing it be: "People Used Facebook to fuel Anti-Refugee Attacks in Germany." You could say that Facebook isn't doing enough to prevent people fuelling attacks but you could also say that the police aren't doing enough either.

Miner49er 8y ago
It's a little different then that. The problem here is echo chambers. Echo chambers allow people to push eachother further and further away from mainstream views. Eventually this extremism leads to violence. Facebook's algorithm's seem to be designed to create echo chambers. Not only that, but their algorithms favor posts that lead to strong emotions. This study shows that this creates an environment that breeds violence.
- sornaensis 8y ago
  The internet has been a series of echo chambers practically since its inception. That's how human society works most of the time. You don't need algorithms for that. People will just naturally delete or block people they don't like seeing content from. And they will join communities containing people and content they do like seeing. e.g. Stormfront, which was founded in 1996. The difference now is that it's just a lot easier for the common person to find one for themselves with the expansion of internet access and ease of use. And common people are just honestly not as progressive as the average person involved in computing technology.
  - uRreading2slow 8y ago
    > That's how human society works most of the time. No, that's how it breaks apart and dies.
  - yifanl 8y ago
    Facebook doesn't need to hoist posts up on top with some black-box algorithm rather than let posts show chronologically. If it turns out that said algorithm makes engagement of echo chambers that much easier, then some of the fault does indeed lie with Facebook. (although certainly, the majority does still lie with human nature).
    - candiodari 8y ago
      How is this different from censorship ? Obviously it was still person1 convincing person2 on what is essentially a forum to do something. How is that wrong ? What's next ? Mandatory muzzles that work in real life, and close and shock their wearer when you say something that's not OK according to whatever the current public opinion is ? People have a right to talk to each other. About whatever, really, really whatever. It is not anyone's, and especially not the state's, or some random mob's business to approve or disapprove.
      - yifanl 8y ago
        If it's no one's business to approve or disapprove, then Facebook should not be allowed to display comments sorted any way other than chronological. Facebook is drawing more attention to specific posts, and it honestly doesn't matter whether its done by manual intervention or automatic algorithm. It's not hyperbole to claim that Facebook _already_ approves what you get to read on their site.
        candiodari 8y ago
        Facebook does that so those people would interact more with Facebook. In other words: it's doing exactly what those people want done. Besides, it's not like people wouldn't leave Facebook otherwise. The real reason for increased racism is the abuse low-level workers have to endure in order to make the current Germany "economic miracle", and those fresh migrants undercutting, illegally, their already abysmal wages. Fix that, and Facebook won't matter. Don't fix that, and even going at it like Xinnie the Pooh won't help. Very unfair that immigrants get blamed for economic misery. Of course, they're far from the only ones getting blamed, but they're the only group that the German police doesn't protect.
    - furgooswft13 8y ago
      "HN doesn't need to hoist posts/comments up on top that have the most votes" Sound better? "let posts show chronologically" Raising upvoted/most engaged/whatever posts to the top is social media 101. It's hardly perfect but it's preferable to letting your page become a glorified chatroom. In HN's case you would be browsing /new all the time and sifting through useless spam comments on each post.
- wslh 8y ago
  Google clearly also favors echo chambers nowadays. In the beginning there were discrete resuñts about a topic but now the info layers about super specific topics male difficult to came up with alternative information.
- pjc50 8y ago
  "Echo chamber" seems to be the wrong word; the problem seems to be more like who gets the megaphone. The article talks about "superposters". > "even if only a minority of users express vehement anti-refugee views, once they dominate the newsfeed, this can have consequences for everyone else" Do this kind of thing in the real world and generally it's met with silence; uncomfortable, disapproving silence. Or people organise tiny pro-racist demos and are outnumbered by counter-protestors. On the internet, a silent majority is invisible. To stop these people dominating the newsfeed, you have to actively drown them out, which means being louder and more effectively clickbaity for the algorithm that decides how loud you get to be. (We should also not over-estimate the mainstream; it's probably very mainstream to have misgivings about refugees, but that's a long way from actual violence.)
justwalt 8y ago
Seems to me the wording was chosen to put Facebook as the first word for more clicks.
DanBC 8y ago
We've known, for many years and from millions of dead people, that fascism needs the media. Without the media you don't get the widespread mass dehumanisation of people as vermin or cockroaches, and you get less violence against those people.
MaysonL 8y ago
Here's a statement of the research: places where the Facebook usage was one standard deviation higher than median had a 50% higher than average rate of anti-refugee violence. Based on studying all 3,335 attacks over 2 years. See cstross's tweet: https://twitter.com/cstross/status/1031873629489963008 https://twitter.com/cstross/status/1031873629489963008
- tropo 8y ago
  This is clearly a case where "correlation is not causation" must be considered. Suppose that refugees love Facebook. If so, then places with refugees will have more Facebook usage. Anti-refugee violence can only occur where there are refugees. We thus would expect that Facebook usage would be higher in locations with more anti-refugee violence. Another explanation is that old people are less likely to engage in violence and also less likely to use Facebook.
mcphage 8y ago
> You could say that Facebook isn't doing enough to prevent people fuelling attacks but you could also say that the police aren't doing enough either. Is there a demonstrated positive correlation between the police (what do you mean here—number of police, level of funding, level of civilian support?) and anti-refugee attacks? If not: what's your point?

Miner49er 8y ago

It's a little different then that. The problem here is echo chambers. Echo chambers allow people to push eachother further and further away from mainstream views. Eventually this extremism leads to violence. Facebook's algorithm's seem to be designed to create echo chambers. Not only that, but their algorithms favor posts that lead to strong emotions. This study shows that this creates an environment that breeds violence.

sornaensis 8y ago
The internet has been a series of echo chambers practically since its inception. That's how human society works most of the time. You don't need algorithms for that. People will just naturally delete or block people they don't like seeing content from. And they will join communities containing people and content they do like seeing. e.g. Stormfront, which was founded in 1996. The difference now is that it's just a lot easier for the common person to find one for themselves with the expansion of internet access and ease of use. And common people are just honestly not as progressive as the average person involved in computing technology.
- uRreading2slow 8y ago
  > That's how human society works most of the time. No, that's how it breaks apart and dies.
- yifanl 8y ago
  Facebook doesn't need to hoist posts up on top with some black-box algorithm rather than let posts show chronologically. If it turns out that said algorithm makes engagement of echo chambers that much easier, then some of the fault does indeed lie with Facebook. (although certainly, the majority does still lie with human nature).
  - candiodari 8y ago
    How is this different from censorship ? Obviously it was still person1 convincing person2 on what is essentially a forum to do something. How is that wrong ? What's next ? Mandatory muzzles that work in real life, and close and shock their wearer when you say something that's not OK according to whatever the current public opinion is ? People have a right to talk to each other. About whatever, really, really whatever. It is not anyone's, and especially not the state's, or some random mob's business to approve or disapprove.
    - yifanl 8y ago
      If it's no one's business to approve or disapprove, then Facebook should not be allowed to display comments sorted any way other than chronological. Facebook is drawing more attention to specific posts, and it honestly doesn't matter whether its done by manual intervention or automatic algorithm. It's not hyperbole to claim that Facebook _already_ approves what you get to read on their site.
      - candiodari 8y ago
        Facebook does that so those people would interact more with Facebook. In other words: it's doing exactly what those people want done. Besides, it's not like people wouldn't leave Facebook otherwise. The real reason for increased racism is the abuse low-level workers have to endure in order to make the current Germany "economic miracle", and those fresh migrants undercutting, illegally, their already abysmal wages. Fix that, and Facebook won't matter. Don't fix that, and even going at it like Xinnie the Pooh won't help. Very unfair that immigrants get blamed for economic misery. Of course, they're far from the only ones getting blamed, but they're the only group that the German police doesn't protect.
  - furgooswft13 8y ago
    "HN doesn't need to hoist posts/comments up on top that have the most votes" Sound better? "let posts show chronologically" Raising upvoted/most engaged/whatever posts to the top is social media 101. It's hardly perfect but it's preferable to letting your page become a glorified chatroom. In HN's case you would be browsing /new all the time and sifting through useless spam comments on each post.
wslh 8y ago
Google clearly also favors echo chambers nowadays. In the beginning there were discrete resuñts about a topic but now the info layers about super specific topics male difficult to came up with alternative information.
pjc50 8y ago
"Echo chamber" seems to be the wrong word; the problem seems to be more like who gets the megaphone. The article talks about "superposters". > "even if only a minority of users express vehement anti-refugee views, once they dominate the newsfeed, this can have consequences for everyone else" Do this kind of thing in the real world and generally it's met with silence; uncomfortable, disapproving silence. Or people organise tiny pro-racist demos and are outnumbered by counter-protestors. On the internet, a silent majority is invisible. To stop these people dominating the newsfeed, you have to actively drown them out, which means being louder and more effectively clickbaity for the algorithm that decides how loud you get to be. (We should also not over-estimate the mainstream; it's probably very mainstream to have misgivings about refugees, but that's a long way from actual violence.)

justwalt 8y ago

Seems to me the wording was chosen to put Facebook as the first word for more clicks.

DanBC 8y ago

We've known, for many years and from millions of dead people, that fascism needs the media. Without the media you don't get the widespread mass dehumanisation of people as vermin or cockroaches, and you get less violence against those people.

MaysonL 8y ago

Here's a statement of the research: places where the Facebook usage was one standard deviation higher than median had a 50% higher than average rate of anti-refugee violence. Based on studying all 3,335 attacks over 2 years. See cstross's tweet: https://twitter.com/cstross/status/1031873629489963008 https://twitter.com/cstross/status/1031873629489963008

tropo 8y ago
This is clearly a case where "correlation is not causation" must be considered. Suppose that refugees love Facebook. If so, then places with refugees will have more Facebook usage. Anti-refugee violence can only occur where there are refugees. We thus would expect that Facebook usage would be higher in locations with more anti-refugee violence. Another explanation is that old people are less likely to engage in violence and also less likely to use Facebook.

mcphage 8y ago

> You could say that Facebook isn't doing enough to prevent people fuelling attacks but you could also say that the police aren't doing enough either. Is there a demonstrated positive correlation between the police (what do you mean here—number of police, level of funding, level of civilian support?) and anti-refugee attacks? If not: what's your point?