There has been backlash against Facebook after it was involved in a psychology experiment that manipulated the news feeds of 700,000 users without their knowledge to see if "exposure to emotions led people to change their own posting behaviours" (i.e. if being exposed to negative posts meant users were more likely to post negative comments themselves).
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In the wake of the Facebook emotional manipulation scandal [also see earlier story], maybe more ordinary people are starting to think about alternatives to Facebook, and to centralised social media in general.
But what viable decentralised alternatives are out there? It's been four years since Diaspora* launched, and though the open network now has a foundation backing it and claims a million users, there have been few recent stories about how to connect.
Similarly, StatusNet as an alternative to Twitter has been around under various names since 2008, but still seems to remain little known.
Has anyone used these services, and can recommend them or anything similar? Are any open-source, decentralised microblogging and social media services even remotely ready for your parents to switch to?
More and more, it feels like Facebook is a problem that needs solving. How can we solve it?
(Score: 5, Informative) by VLM on Monday June 30 2014, @02:50PM
Term to google for "digital sharecropper"
You don't like how the master runs things on his land, then don't grow his crops for him on his land to make him rich. Sounds simple enough.
Seeing FB changed from private property to a regulated public utility would be pretty hilarious to watch, however. I'd make some popcorn to watch that.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Monday June 30 2014, @05:54PM
What?! Get the popcorn out now.
Facebook feels so comfortable now with its environment, despite its current legal challenges and reputation, that it branched out into actual human experimentation without the subjects knowledge.
There is an anime scene to The Matrix where you see the machines with them testing emotions by watching the face twitch. Nothing to do with this at all, just worth mentioning.
Now.. I'm NOT trying to Godwin this, I swear. However, the last time we saw experimentation like this we called them concentration camps.
This is beyond hilarious to me, for my own reasons. I'm getting popcorn and turning off the lights. This is excellent.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday June 30 2014, @06:47PM
The puzzle for me is I come from a long multigenerational line of railroadmen and when the .gov nationalized the railroads it was very easy to figure out which .gov took over which railroad, what land is the track located upon, etc.
But, say someone in .gov doesn't get their bribe and "they" nationalize FB. The question is... who is "they"? USA fedgov? Some country in the .eu gets grabby? .ru? The UN? Donno.
Theres a long "proud" history of human experimentation in the USA, like that syphilis experiment and some nuclear stuff and other stories. It'll fit right in here, so no need to offshore examples.
I suspect enough money is being spent on "lobbying" that this will not be a serious legal problem, no matter what they do.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @09:38PM
If you're comparing this to syphilis and nuclear experiments done on people, you really need to log off Facebook and go for a walk outside and try to get some perspective back.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by cafebabe on Monday June 30 2014, @02:55PM
Is this what it takes? Everything that came before wasn't sufficient?
Mark Zuckerberg's business associates filed court cases from which the overall impression was that Mark Zuckerberg subcontracted social network development from the Winklevos twins and took money for services not rendered while simultaneously subcontracting work on his own social network and not paying for services rendered. Judges saw it differently but that's a careless situation in which to find oneself.
Then there was a series of privacy infringements by Facebook which was only trumped by the NSA tapping database replication between sites. This led to the hypocritical situation of Mark Zuckerberg telephoning Barack Obama to complain about snooping. (I hope Mark Zuckerberg is remembered for this first and foremost.)
And now we have direct evidence that Facebook intentionally manipulated the emotions of 700,000 users by deliberately withholding information from them. I note that Facebook relied on an argument similar to the NSA when this situation became public. Specifically, the claim that privacy wasn't infringed because they didn't look at individual messages. Unfortunately, this is a specious claim which precludes any meaningful testing.
Anyhow, people are finally beginning to understand that Facebook is not a trustworthy platform or a common carrier. It is run by an unscrupulous, unprincipled psychologist and all users agreed to be lab rats as part of the terms and conditions.
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(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @03:04PM
> Is this what it takes? Everything that came before wasn't sufficient?
Sooner or later there has to come a breaking point. I don't think this will be it though. Not unless it gets amped up another to another level, like connecting it to a teen who committed suicide during the testing period. And even then it would probably have to be a pretty blonde girl.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @03:05PM
Facebook has an algorithm for selecting what items appear in a user's stream, the same way Google has an algorithm for selecting what items appear in search results or what items appear on news.google.com. They're empirical algorithms developed by trial and error.
Who do you think were the subject pool for that trial and error? I don't remember signing or even clicking-through any kind of informed consent document, but I have most certainly been a subject in those experiments. Google monitors what I click (ie, my positive responses) to their carefully manipulated lists and advertisements. They absolutely have a psychological model that guides their selection of stories. I imagine their algorithm incorporates measures meant to indicate information content, tone, and readability, as well as popularity. The only news here is that Facebook has disclosed some of the market research that every other web portal does under the guise of marketing.
(Score: 5, Funny) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Monday June 30 2014, @03:33PM
Yup, Facebook is shit. In fact, it's all shit. Facebook, this site, me, you... everything. I mean it's all just so completely crap and cynical, the whole world, and everything in it. Like dolphins. Fucking dolphins, they're especially shit, jumping about and splashing and clicking all over the goddamn place with their little smiley beak-mouths like everything's fine. I don't trust 'em, no sir. I bet fucking dolphins would like facebook, if they had like, waterproof phones and thumbs and shit, the smug, cetaceous little bastards. I can just imagine them, posting kissy-face selfies of themselves in front of baitballs and "liking" mackerel. What's so fucking great about mackerel? I tried it, it's just fish for crying out loud. Eat a salad or something for a change you aquatic freaks. Not that salad is any better, if I'm being honest. I mean what's a salad but a bunch of stupid overpriced lettuce leaves? And what are lettuce leaves but slightly crunchy water? So why not just drink some godammned water? Oh yeah, that's right, because it's WATER and not, like BEER or something almost worth drinking. Except that beer is all pretentious, cynical, over-marketed bullshit nowadays too. You can't just go and buy a fucking beer now, it has to be craft-brewed from imported mountain spring water and organic recycled Fairtrade Peruvian hops and premium fucking barley lovingly moistened betwixt the thighs of Nepalese maidens before being roasted over the whisky-soaked embers of original rum barrels from the motherfucking HMS Trafalgar. Pretentious much? Get over yourselves and leave me alone you pissgargling narcissistic flipper-loving beer snob bimbos!
Sorry, I'm not normally like this. The negativity of the parent post seems to have changed my posting behaviour... Hmmm, someone ought to do some research on that.
(Score: 2) by metamonkey on Monday June 30 2014, @04:06PM
/slowclap
Okay 3, 2, 1, let's jam.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday June 30 2014, @04:33PM
That's an impressive rant. I wish that I could moderate it +1 Offtopic.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 01 2014, @01:08AM
You better not.... its funny as hell.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday June 30 2014, @04:48PM
You missed the part where male dolphins separate females from the herd and deny them food and sleep until they give in and have sex with them.
Oops...I think I'm reinforcing your point. Or debunking it. Or something...shut up, I'm eating mackerel! :)
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by etherscythe on Monday June 30 2014, @06:24PM
If I'm not mistaken, he's posted a modification of a George Carlin rant. Sounds like him, anyway.
"Fake News: anything reported outside of my own personally chosen echo chamber"
(Score: 2) by redneckmother on Tuesday July 01 2014, @05:04AM
Nah - s/he is proof of reincarnation (of Hunter S. Thompson, Jr.).
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 1) by Horse With Stripes on Monday June 30 2014, @06:02PM
I recommend that you start a Facebook group so others that share your beliefs can become virtual friends, share virtual feelings and all in all give a virtual shit about this.
(Score: 1) by darkfeline on Monday June 30 2014, @09:36PM
This is Douglas Adams, right? I'd go back and re-read it, but I seem to have misplaced by Douglas Adams anthology, much to my dismay.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 01 2014, @08:39AM
I don't recall ever seeing such a density of "shits" and "fucks" in Douglas Adams' work, but I could be wrong.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @06:09PM
Is this what it takes? Everything that came before wasn't sufficient?
And I thought you were onto something a little bit more general than about Facebook.
Media has been used to manipulate public emotions for as long as there has been media. From newspapers to telegraphs to radio to TV. The ones that control it, control the hordes and the hordes don't even know it. People should not be upset at Facebook. On the contrary, they should be upset at themselves for being so stupid. Over 100,000,000 people are dead in last century alone because people are stupid and allow themselves to be manipulated.
Fox News, MSNBC, Bloomberg, Al Jazeera, BBC, etc. etc. are all propaganda mixed with facts and if people stop and think that what they are watching is there to control their emotions, perhaps they would view that "news" with objectivity instead.
So I thank Facebook for conducting said experiment. Now, will people learn anything from it or just rage at Facebook instead?
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday June 30 2014, @06:53PM
I like your argument that Facebook is more honest than broadcast media but they aren't equivalent. I'd like to think that we have a mental barrier propped against broadcasters. Unfortunately, this barrier is insufficient for social media. Social media is more insidious because each snippet of information is endorsed by an individual who we may know in real life or who has otherwise established a reputation. When those channels are moderately lossy, our social faculties for gossip, lies and lies by omission do not handle this case with ease. It is a larger cognitive burden.
With mass media, it is quite easy to discount ongoing bias. It is much harder to discount an intermittent 4% message loss because it satisfies a government agency or an advertiser. Indeed, did any of the 700,000 users detect this bias? Probably not. And now they feel cheated.
As Abraham Lincoln said, "You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time." Well, when all of the people are being fooled all of the time, they go elsewhere.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by sjames on Monday June 30 2014, @10:22PM
We live in a society that finds it perfectly acceptable to have a panel of 12 PhDs devise a plan to psychologically manipulate young children for the purpose of profit (that seems a bit unfair). That manipulation is known to be against the best interests of the children and their parents.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @09:16PM
Facebook is evil in a lot of ways, but I have to give them credit for bringing more people together than any other org ever.
I shunned it for years, but my girlfriend is into Facebook, so I'm now a user, and talk to her on messenger all day long.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday June 30 2014, @09:29PM
"As such, it was consistent with Facebook’s Data Use Policy, to which all users agree prior to creating an account on Facebook, constituting informed consent for this research."
However, that is after a statement about how they gathered the data. Which almost certainly is covered in their agreement - it's just data-mining, no-one's shocked by that. However, in a previous paragraph they talk about the manipulation of the feed. Not having seen the facebook policy, I have no idea if it's loose enough to cover deliberate manipulation of the feed, but it would surprise me. Anyone have any facts to back up or refute their claim?
I normally hate litigious behaviour, but, to be honest, Facebook is a cancer, and I'd like to see them get fucked over by some blood-thirsty lawyers.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @02:58PM
What? All you white mice, lab rats, guinea pigs, chimpanzees etc didn't know you were up for sale/rent?
(Score: 2) by MrGuy on Monday June 30 2014, @03:01PM
The suicide rate in the US is around 7 per 100,000 people per year, so in a population of 700,000, we expect around 50 suicides per year, which is about one per week. This makes it statistically likely that at lease one person involved (without their consent) in the study committed (or attempted, which is probably a larger number) suicide during the experiment. During which Facebook deliberately and knowingly manipulated emotions.
I'm waiting for the trial. Setting aside specifics of liability in this specific circumstance (knowingly manipulating emotions without consent), you could see legal precedent set on a host of wide-ranging issues like whether online companies are responsible for the emotional state of their users, and whether "reasonable steps" should be required to give a positive experience....
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday June 30 2014, @03:22PM
"and whether "reasonable steps" should be required to give a positive experience"
I can't wait for this to hit online MMORPG game design as a legal requirement.
(Score: 2) by MrGuy on Monday June 30 2014, @03:40PM
Or whether they're required to actively take steps to keep people from shouting "learn to play, n00bs!" at other players....
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Monday June 30 2014, @04:50PM
Get the human brain legally designated as a computer, then get them on computer fraud.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday June 30 2014, @04:58PM
Technically, the users consented. They may now have second thoughts now that the specifics of that consent are known. However, they gave consent.
But that doesn't put Facebook in the clear because their actions are contrary to claims that the introduction of the timeline interface was made to improve the user experience. It appears that this claim is not true. Also, it would have been sufficient to maintain a control group and make positive changes to the results seen by a matched group. However, by intentionally worsening results for some users, the lives of vulnerable people have been put at risk. As noted, the scale of the experiment was such that one suicide was statistically likely before it began. The design of this experiment was such that others were brought near or over this threshold unnecessarily.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @07:35PM
> Technically, the users consented.
Technical consent is in no way, shape or form the same thing as informed consent which is the minimum technical requirement to qualify as ethical testing.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Monday June 30 2014, @08:08PM
Legal, moral and ethical are three distinct things. I noted that people would have difficulty seeking legal redress after giving legal consent. However, that is not the only avenue. There are matters such as a duty of care. In such matters, ethics become a legal consideration - especially when the lives of vulnerable people were needlessly put at risk. Overall, Facebook, Cornell, the University Of California, the National Academy Of Scientists and other parties should be ashamed of this "research" and I would support action against them.
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(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 30 2014, @08:05PM
I think you people are blowing this event completely out of proportion. The word "experiment" is being used to evoke connotations of mind control and manipulation, in much the same way that "homeland" has been used to evoke connotations of global threats and imminent danger. I am deeply concerned with how easily the "science is bad" crowd has managed to drum up loud, vocal outrage against measuring the effects of propaganda techniques already being widely used by the media. Do you think Fox hasn't carefully titrated the balance of anti-Obama, anti-immigration, war-hero stories? Do you think NBC hasn't changed its mix of "human interest" and "hard news" to keep visitors coming back? I highly suspect that asking people if they would be willing to participate in a propaganda study would invalidate the results of any intervention.
The only two things facebook has done that every other media outlet has not are 1) publish their results and 2) use two different story mixes simultaneously split to two groups.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday June 30 2014, @10:32PM
I hope it doesn't go that far, but there may be some traction in liability for deliberately creating what was expected to be a negative experience. Particularly since they went out of their way to make the experience more negative.
(Score: 2) by unitron on Monday June 30 2014, @08:43PM
...are apparently incorrect.
something something Slashcott something something Beta something something
(Score: 2) by lennier on Monday June 30 2014, @09:18PM
Yeah, it was the Cornell Chronicle [cornell.edu] which reported that. And has now retracted it.
One *might* think that 'Cornell's primary source of news since 1969', part of the University Relations Office, would actually know the campus activities they are reporting on, and thus be a trustworthy primary source.
But apparently not. Sigh. 'If your mother says she loves you, get a second source.'
Delenda est Beta
(Score: 2) by unitron on Saturday July 05 2014, @05:02PM
"But apparently not. Sigh. 'If your mother says she loves you, get a second source.'"
Right after you get independent confirmation that she actually is your mother.
something something Slashcott something something Beta something something