Why was more fake news discussed in 2016 than real news?

[svetz]

TL;DR: Nothing nefarious... humans push the like/dislike buttons on things that are extreme. Algorithms promote things that get a lot of likes or dislikes. Evolution occurs rapidly because people get spun up by it. So the algorithms unintentionally work to divide us.

Perhaps things will get better as the algorithms improve? But then again, that video is 5 years old.

 

[pollenface]

I'm putting it down to sun spot activity...

 

[Diysolar123]

So the algorithms unintentionally work to divide us.

well, this is the chit chat forum and I did ponder a while if I should respond as this is a touchy topic for many people due to, well, what is really happening in the world that most are unaware of hehe
So here are a few thoughts/comments...

social algorithms are not conscious "things" that work to do anything, they are the tools of people in power.
game theory and goal setting interactions are not "unintentional" , the topic is almost always taught at the masters/doctorate level however.
You can look throughout history and see this method of population control; sadly in todays world due to technology the ability to manipulate large groups has been greatly amplified. In the past the control of information to shape the population was done via tools such as a theocracy, monarchy, religion, etc. Who was taught to read and what books could be published was easily controlled. Today we have now evolved from "early internet with complete freedom" into the exact same situation with the rigid control of information flow. The algorithms are not equally pushing "most likes", they are biasing what is "liked"...and suppressing what is in the list of information to be pushed down.

journalists where "suppose" to be the people that took the time to do the critical thinking for the majority. Journalists gave up that role due to profit pressures from alternate message shaping businesses that did not feel the need to even remotely pretend integrity was part of their mission (facebook, twitter, youtube, google, etc.).
In todays world less than 10 people shape all the messaging you are likely to see.
psychological warfare is a very real thing and quite effective... every branch of the military (including executive branch of government since obama via executive order 13707) knows what a major combat multiplier it is. It is a very interesting topic...

The number of "critical thinkers" in any large group is a much smaller percentage of population than the "group followers".
Look at any corporation, government, group event, etc. and what you find is a very small percentage of people controlling the majority, which is normally a good thing, unless, well, you know the answer to that...when the controlling people decide to focus on that which is actually not good for the group they are responsible for.

As a retired chief systems engineer who was in charge of large groups of people (mostly very well educated) I can tell you with absolute certainty that by controlling the flow of information you can easily control the group and make them believe anything you want; they will be completely and totaly committed to their belief in the messaging, without understanding they were completely manipulated (hello SJW's).

I googled around to find some "old" slides so you can see this all pre-dates any "covid/blm" topics and found this 10yr old slide from a joint chiefs of staff presentation on psyops..nothing new here regarding shaping peoples opinions other than its use at home rather than foreign lands hehe

 

[svetz]

I don't doubt that people purposefully try to manipulate the algorithm, but I have hopes that reputable sites will improve them to filter out or lower the fake news or that people will switch to search engines to those that try to be neutral. But just as stations like Fox and CNN are diametrically opposed and keep churning up dissent with yellow journalism (accuracy rate hits two decade low), so web sites will too.

journalists where "suppose" to be the people that took the time to do the critical thinking for the majority.

No offense, but I don't believe that is true. I think they were "suppose" to be those that reported facts so people could form their own conclusions. The Editorial commentary on the news seems more like what you describe.

But, journalists have to turn in stories to their editors and all of them work for a company, and a lot of media companies have agendas that constrain those editors and journalists if they want to keep earning a paycheck. Certainly, they have a lot of tricks up their sleeves to slant the news despite constraints by the FCC on them. For example, when they're not allowed to state a conclusion they want, they just air an interview with someone that says it for them. Or for the times the have to be fair with air-time, they get someone inarticulate for the opposing view.

... by controlling the flow of information you can easily control the group and make them believe anything you want...

I'm not sure information can be easily controlled anymore. Woodward, Snowden, hackers in email servers releasing embarrassing secrets that sway elections. Everyone with an agenda has enemies.

Big organizations realize the truth will come out, so they have contingency plans to damage control to keep their power base intact. The real trick to maintaining power in today's world seems to be around getting someone's confirmational bias so they'll discount anything else as fake news. The real solution is probably to teach people to think more critically (since that's not in the best interest of those with power, it'll have to come from elsewhere).

 

[Primal1]

Fake news has been around and sanctioned for ages, the new attention its getting is due to the fact its become openly weaponized against the people.

Look up "Operation Mockingbird" which was a CIA operation to control the population by controlling the news. Better yet, read this from David Rockefeller's memoirs.

“For more than a century, ideological extremists, at either end of the political spectrum, have seized upon well-publicized incidents, such as my encounter with Castro, to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal, working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists,' and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure - one world, if you will. If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it.

“We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost 40 years......It would have been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subjected to the lights of publicity during those years. But, the world is more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supernational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national autodetermination practiced in past centuries.”
― David Rockefeller

 

[Bob B]

I'm wired in such a way that I immediately recognize thought manipulation .... I find myself amazed on an almost daily basis lately that people can't "see through" the absolute fiction that is usually presented as irrefutable fact .... and then often, a few months later the ones who were feeding people that fiction do a 180 degree reversal .... and the people who believed them still believe them.

There seems to be a significant % of the population that can be brought to believe almost anything .... and there are now a lot of experts who are taking full advantage of that. People have what I call "hot buttons" ... and can be led around by the nose if those buttons are pushed in the correct order.

The term "journalistic integrity" has no meaning to most of the so called journalist these days. They all seem to be fed the same fake news and even identical talking points .... I just don't know who is pulling those strings. I suspect that the ones who have the most powerful influence may have been somehow involved in project mockingbird.

Dan Rather was the first to put the collapse of journalism on full display when he tried to bury George W Bush's presidential run by engineering a completely fake document supposedly from national guard records.

We sent our daughter to a private grade school where a large part of their goal was to teach kids how to think ... not just memorize and regurgitate. But even with that, it was a constant struggle to help her recognize the manipulation. She is now beyond the age where I have much influence. I am afraid that peer pressure has been too great and I may have lost that battle .... time will tell.

 

[time2roll]

Opinions, slanted truth, made up stories and outright lies (all fake news) are better for ratings and profit.

 

[Bob B]

Opinions, slanted truth, made up stories and outright lies (all fake news) are better for ratings and profit.

I wish that was what was driving this .... but it seems like they are willing to sacrifice profitability for the agenda .... There doesn't even seem to be any late night comedians left who aren't willing to sacrifice half their market so they can push a political agenda. CNN's ratings have dropped off the cliff, because all but a very small % now realize you can't believe a word they say ... and they are still spewing out garbage.

 

[time2roll]

Yes I believe the short term profit may fade with time as viewers become disenfranchised to the nonsense.
Has really peaked in the last four years and many people might be done with it.
As ratings drop there could be even more nonsense as the media tries to stay relevent.

 

[Bob B]

The big problem is that it has worked .... they were able to skew and hide enough information that there is no doubt in my mind they affected the last election.
I fear that now that they have had success .... they are going to be drooling for more power.

 

[time2roll]

While there is some influence on how people vote, I don't think the last presidential election would have gone a different way no matter what was said by the media.

 

[Bob B]

The <edited out> was so close ..... if the <edited to remove controversial unproven statement> ... and is still covered up by many media outlets .... and falsely called <edited out> "misinformation" .... I think there would have been enough people who just wouldn't have <edited to remove content that might inflame others> that there would have been a different outcome .... <edited to remove controversial context>.

It is now being discovered that the Delaware Attorney General had a case that was ready to go to the grand jury ... and that got killed also.

If something is just completely hidden by the media .... banned from twitter and Facebook ... and Google won't find it .... people can't make up their own minds about how much weight to give it.

I believe more and more is going to finally come out about this til it is no longer possible to hide it.

Heck, they even tried to label the theory the virus escaped from the Wuhan lab as being "misinformation" <edited to remove controversial unproven statements> All they have to do now is label something as misinformation and it is automatically banned by almost all of them.

 

[time2roll]

No sorry. I do not buy into the coverups, hidden information or banned news. That is all conspiracy theory to me. All wishful thinking for a person's own agenda.

AG ready to go to GJ? Sure until AG decided there was no real proof to be presented in court.

Wuhan lab? Maybe, maybe not. <edited to remove content not germain to the thread topic>. I give that Dr credit for isolating the virus(RIP). I see China as guilty by association only.

 

[time2roll]

Oh yes we can have common ground when the facts are known. That is what real news is about.
I don't get concerned about all the speculation, that is the fake news.

The real source or first case may never be known and I can accept that. And I don't believe it is engineered by a coverup. We simply don't know.

 

[Cdkipp]

<deleted as not germain to the main thread content>

Science uses the scientific method. They create hypothesis and test them. Peer reviewed journals report on them. Read Lancet, Science, Nature, New England Journal of Medicine. Not Rupert Murdoch’s newspaper.

 

[svetz]

So, this is a tough moderation problem.

As is very evident from the moderation, Fake News divides us.
It drives us apart, causes hurt feelings, and does nothing to bring us together or allow us to learn from one another.

The topic is about fake news sure, but that doesn't mean members can post inciteful statements as facts or respond to those posts with their views going farther off-topic. If you're going to say something controversial include a reference link to a confirming legitimate source.
Members cannot be disrespectful toward other members, regardless of how crazy you think the other person or their ideas might be, and doing so earns you points leading towards being banned.

New thread ground rules
The topic is Why is fake news is prevalent. Sub-aspects might be Why it exists, how to spot it, how to combat it... that's all fair game.

Using examples of suspected fake news is also okay, but only in that the discussion centers around the fakeness and not the issue it pertains to. Watch the video, he talks a long time about the topic and never polarizes the audience.

An example of the discussion that might have worked is:

Sally: Fake news influences reality, I heard of an attorney general that had to drop a case against a high-ranking official.​

Mikey: AG's launch their political careers on cases like that, if they had a chance of winning it would have gone to court. If I saw that it got dismissed with innuendo around they "had to" I would have dismissed it as fake news.​

Sally: Perhaps, but it could also have been they believed the fake news would have influenced the courts or hurt them politically.​

So, had to make a lot of tough calls on what to edit and what to delete in order to get the thread back on topic and hated that I had to do it.
If you're not sure, a good rule of thumb is to not mention any political parties, entities, or suspected motives. While harder, it's probably also best to stay with older topics that may have started as fake news but were eventually undisputably proven one way or another. After all, the hot buttons of today are... well, hot.

 

[Cdkipp]

So, this is a tough moderation problem.

As is very evident from the moderation, Fake News divides us.
It drives us apart, causes hurt feelings, and does nothing to bring us together or allow us to learn from one another.

The topic is about fake news sure, but that doesn't mean members can post inciteful statements as facts or respond to those posts with their views going farther off-topic. If you're going to say something controversial include a reference link to a confirming legitimate source.
Members cannot be disrespectful toward other members, regardless of how crazy you think the other person or their ideas might be, and doing so earns you points leading towards being banned.

New thread ground rules
The topic is Why is fake news is prevalent. Sub-aspects might be Why it exists, how to spot it, how to combat it... that's all fair game.

Using examples of suspected fake news is also okay, but only in that the discussion centers around the fakeness and not the issue it pertains to. Watch the video, he talks a long time about the topic and never polarizes the audience.

An example of the discussion that might have worked is:

Sally: Fake news influences reality, I heard of an attorney general that had to drop a case against a high-ranking official.​

Mikey: AG's launch their political careers on cases like that, if they had a chance of winning it would have gone to court. If I saw that it got dismissed with innuendo around they "had to" I would have dismissed it as fake news.​

Sally: Perhaps, but it could also have been they believed the fake news would have influenced the courts or hurt them politically.​

So, had to make a lot of tough calls on what to edit and what to delete in order to get the thread back on topic and hated that I had to do it.
If you're not sure, a good rule of thumb is to not mention any political parties, entities, or suspected motives. While harder, it's probably also best to stay with older topics that may have started as fake news but were eventually undisputably proven one way or another. After all, the hot buttons of today are... well, hot.

Noted.

 

[svetz]

Taking another moderator's advice and just leaving the topic closed as the potential for something useful to come out of the discussion seems marginal, and the potential for harm (e.g., otherwise good folks getting points) is large.