Below are posts associated with the “Meta” tag.
🔗 linkblog: [Article] Zuckerberg donations – Alex'
Love this framing of using Meta as “making donations to Mark Zuckerberg.” It nicely describes the idea of digital labor that’s been on my mind for a couple of years now.
🔗 linkblog: The Emptiness Of Zuck’s Promise To Move ‘Biased’ Trust & Safety From California To Texas'
This was one of the dumbest parts of all Meta’s announcements and now it’s… basically nothing, too?
🔗 linkblog: Donald Trump Has Mark Zuckerberg By the Balls'
Not the headline I would have chosen, but very interesting argument here.
🔗 linkblog: Meta Is Blocking Links to Decentralized Instagram Competitor Pixelfed'
Directly out of Musk’s playbook. All the more reason to ditch Meta for the fediverse.
🔗 linkblog: Meta Deletes Trans and Nonbinary Messenger Themes'
Meta’s cynicism and groveling is pretty appalling.
🔗 linkblog: Meta’s Moderation Modifications Mean Anti-LGBTQ Speech Is Welcome, While Pro-LGBTQ Speech Is Not'
Some more good writing on a bad situation.
🔗 linkblog: Facebook Is Censoring 404 Media Stories About Facebook's Censorship'
I especially appreciate this article in the wake of Meta’s recent announcements. There are cases in which content moderation is inconsistent or overreaching, and there are cases in which less moderation fixes the problem. However, it’s the arbitrary distinctions and self-serving nature of the changes that make the “free expression” argument so flimsy.
🔗 linkblog: Facebook Deletes Internal Employee Criticism of New Board Member Dana White'
Moderating employees but not users seems telling to me.
🔗 linkblog: Meta abandons fact-checking on Facebook and Instagram in favor of Community Notes'
Personally, I’ve come around to the idea that fewer restrictions, “Community Notes”-style responses, and lots of personal control over what one sees could work better as content moderation. It’s interesting to see Bluesky take some of these approaches, for example!
Here, though, this seems like it’s bending the knee to the Trump administration, and I can’t imagine any of this being done in good faith. What a disappointment Meta continues to be.
🔗 linkblog: Instagram blocked teens from searching LGBTQ-related content for months'
See, this is the kind of content moderation we ought to worry about (and why “keep the kids safe” narratives can go horribly wrong).
🔗 linkblog: Zuckerberg’s Spineless Surrender: Rehashing Old News To Enable False GOP Narratives'
This is one of these stories where I’ve been waiting to get Masnick’s take on it, and he does not disappoint.
🎙️ radioblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme (Series 5)
I really enjoy metahumor, and Finnemore’s talent for it is on full display in this series—even to the extent of calling himself out on overreliance on it. Doesn’t bother me, though!
🔗 linkblog: Adam Mosseri spells out Threads’ plans for the fediverse - The Verge'
I think folks are right to distrust Meta, but Threads with ActivityPub seems to me to be clearly better than Threads without.
🔗 linkblog: Meta May Offer Ad-Free Subscriptions for Instagram and Facebook in the E.U. - The New York Times'
I’m in no way Team Meta, but this may not be a terrible thing?
🔗 linkblog: A Leaked Memo Shows TikTok Knows It Has a Labor Problem | WIRED'
I think this is a much bigger deal than any purported security risk.
quoted in EducationWeek about Seattle Public Schools' social media lawsuit
Yesterday afternoon, I had the pleasure of talking with Arianna Prothero at EducationWeek about Seattle Public Schools’ suing Snap, Alphabet, Meta, and ByteDance, and she ended up quoting me—and colleagues like Jeff Carpenter and Josh Rosenberg—in her article.
I appreciate that all three of us were quoted in the article, because Jeff and Josh both made points that I didn’t articulate as well in my conversation with Arianna. For example, Jeff’s comments summed up a lot of the complexities that have gone through my head:
🔗 linkblog: Facebook Pulls Its New ‘AI For Science’ Because It’s Broken and Terrible'
Very interesting read.