When Mark Zuckerberg announced dramatic changes to Meta’s social platforms, which include Facebook, Instagram, and Threads, last week, he admitted: “We’re going to catch fewer bad ones.”
Zuckerberg said Meta will eliminate fact checkers, overhaul content moderation and increase political content in users’ feeds (all 3.3 billion pieces). He claimed the company was taking these steps because the political winds had changed. The public no longer sees these safeguards as a means to prevent the spread of misinformation, hate speech, or even real-world violence, but as another form of censorship.
This was a typical move by Mehta and Zuckerberg, argues technology journalist Chris Stokel Walker. The company has been reluctant to introduce moderation to begin with, and has frequently changed its policies depending on who is in power. “He’s nothing if not politically expedient,” Stockle Walker said. In a world where the right has weaponized the issue of online free speech, it is no coincidence that Zuckerberg’s announcement came just days before Donald Trump re-entered the White House.
But what impact will these changes have on the real world? Fact-checker Jesse Stiller speaks to Michael Safi about the impact of the work with Facebook and what’s next for the platform. Masu.
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