Social media networking giant Facebook Inc (FB) has been under a lot of scrutiny recently after tech blog Gizmodo published a report claiming that the company has a history of hiding or suppressing conservative views and news from its Trending Topics news module. And with so many people active on this site every day, this alleged bias obviously has some major impacts.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has denied the allegations, stating that the site is “a platform for all ideas” that prominently features conservative voices:
“We have rigorous guidelines that do not permit the prioritization of one viewpoint over another or the suppression of political perspectives.”
Launched in 2004 by Zuckerberg and his Harvard friends, Facebook has grown into a global giant. The site now has more than 1.6 billion active users, 66% of which are active daily, but as its popularity has grown so have its abilities.
No longer is Facebook simply a site used to connect friends and family. It’s also considered an important news outlet and marketing tool and could also be viewed as the world’s largest publisher.
Americans increasingly rely on the social media site for their daily dose of news, whether it be sports, current events, gossip or politics. In fact, according to polling firm Morning Consult, 55% of registered voters now get their news from social media companies like Facebook, Twitter and even Snapchat. This makes Facebook’s Trending Topics module a very powerful political influence.
FB Stock: How Trending Topics Works
Here’s how the Trending Topics module functions: Facebook’s algorithms generate a ranked list of trending topics, then a group of news curators decide what content appears in the trending section and what doesn’t. That’s where the problem lies. According to Gizmodo, these curators have purposely left out articles from politically conservative outlets.
I don’t think it’s any surprise to see how the claims have snowballed. What was originally reported by a single technology blog was eventually picked up by The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The New York Times and others, leading to a public outcry for answers. Recode even reported a 68% decline in Republicans’ perceptions of the company since the news broke.
Facebook was thrown into damage control mode, so to address the allegations Zuckerberg invited some higher-profile conservatives to meet with him and other company executives at their Silicon Valley headquarters on Wednesday.
Among those in attendance were radio host Glenn Beck, Fox News co-host and former White House press secretary Dana Perino, Targeted Victory co-founder Zac Moffatt, American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks and Donald Trump’s senior campaign advisor Barry Bennett.
Many believed the meeting was simply a publicity stunt on the part of Facebook to get back into conservatives’ good graces, and whether that’s true or not, it appears to have done its job. Those who attended the meeting left convinced that the company is serious about wanting to repair its relationship with the right.
After all of the fuss, FB hasn’t taken much of a hit in the market. The stock climbed to a new 52-week high two days after the first article was published, and while it’s since pulled back about 3%, what we’re seeing could simply be the result of weakness throughout the overall market. It has come a long way — more than 200% — since its botched IPO four years ago.
We’ll find out over time whether Facebook’s relationship with conservatives was truly damaged, but I will say this: Algorithms are programmed by human beings, and they sometimes do have agendas.
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