On Tech: How to fix Facebook groups

Facebook groups spread conspiracy theories and shield abuse. Here are ways to make them less toxic.

View in browser|nytimes.com Continue reading the main story February 2, 2021 How to fix Facebook groups Sean Dong By Shira Ovide The QAnon conspiracy theory, promotions of bogus health treatments and calls for violence based on false claims of election fraud have a common thread: Facebook groups. These forums for people with a shared interest can be wonderful communities for avid gardeners in the same neighborhood or parents whose children have a rare disease. But for years, it's also been clear that the groups turbocharge some people's inclinations to get into heated online fights, spread engrossing information whether it's true or not and scapegoat others. I don't want to oversimplify and blame Facebook groups for every bad thing in the world. (Read my colleague Kevin Roose's latest column on suggestions for how to target polarization and engage people in purposeful activities.) And mitigating the harms of Facebook is not as simple as the company's critics believe. But many of the toxic side effects of Facebook groups are a result of the company's choices. I asked several experts in online communications what they would do to reduce the downsides of the groups. Here are some of their suggestions. Stop automated recommendations. Facebook has said it would extend a temporary pause on computerized recommendations for people to join groups related to politics. Some experts said that Facebook should go further and stop computer-aided group suggestions entirely. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT It's nice that Facebook suggests a forum about growing roses to someone who posts about gardening. But for years, Facebook's group recommendations have proved to be easily manipulated and to have pushed people toward increasingly fringe ideas. In 2016, according to a Wall Street Journal report, Facebook's research found that two-thirds of people who joined extremist groups did so at Facebook's recommendation. Automated group recommendations was one of the ways that the QAnon conspiracy theory spread, my colleague Sheera Frenkel has said. Ending these computerized suggestions isn't a silver bullet. But it's nuts how often activists and academics have screamed about how harmful recommendations are, and Facebook has only tinkered at the margins. Provide more oversight of private groups. The social media researchers Nina Jankowicz and Cindy Otis have proposed not allowing groups above a certain number of members to be private — meaning newcomers must be invited and outsiders can't see what's being discussed — without regular human review of their content. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT "A lot of truly toxic groups are unsearchable and invite-only, and that's hugely problematic," Jankowicz told me. Jankowicz and Otis have also pushed for more-consistent descriptions of groups and more transparency into who manages them. Political discussion groups are sometimes intentionally mislabeled by their hosts as "personal blogs" to avoid the extra attention that Facebook applies to political forums. Target the habitual group offenders. Renée DiResta, a disinformation researcher at the Internet Observatory at Stanford, said that Facebook needs to "take more decisive action" against the groups that repeatedly engage in harassment or otherwise break Facebook's rules again and again. Facebook did take some steps in this direction last year. Jade Magnus Ogunnaike, a senior director at the racial justice organization Color of Change, also said that Facebook should stop using contractors to review material on the site. It's more fair to convert those workers to employees, she said, and it could help improve the quality of oversight of what's happening in groups. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Add some … librarians? Joan Donovan, the research director of Harvard University's Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, has suggested that big internet companies should hire thousands of librarians to provide people with vetted information to counter groups wallowing in false information. If you don't already get this newsletter in your inbox, please sign up here. Superstars are not brilliant at everything Jeff Bezos is fond of saying that failure is healthy because people and companies learn from it. But sometimes failure is a result of a company's weaknesses, and it's not a good thing. There have been news articles in the last few days about both Amazon's and Google's utter inability to create their own successful video games despite having infinite cash and smart people at their disposal. The roots of their failures are complex, but two problems came to my mind about what happened: cultural soft spots and hubris. (And in Amazon's case, an overreliance on Bezos's distilled wisdom in "Jeff-isms," like the one above.) Here's what happened: Google this week said it was closing down its group devoted to making video games. And Bloomberg News detailed the reasons behind Amazon's repeated flops in making its own high-powered video games. Describing Amazon's struggles as a reflection of its Amazon-ness, it reported that an obsession with data made people lose focus on making games fun. Executives confident in their company's expertise forced staff to use game development technologies of Amazon's making rather than industry-standard ones. Google, too, for all of its successes has ingrained habits that sometimes make it hard to break into unfamiliar areas. The technology news publication The Information reported this week on the struggles of Google's business that sells cloud computing technology to companies. Google engineers are treated like kings, and it has been hard to convince them to come up with rigid three-year product road maps that corporations tend to like. The Google Cloud business has struggled for years with the same basic problem — shoehorning Google's ways into the prosaic habits of its business clients. The magic (or annoying) thing about cash-rich superstar companies is that they can often turn failures into success. But Amazon's and Google's difficulties in businesses outside their core expertise are a reminder that being rich and smart sometimes blinds companies to their weaknesses. Before we go … Robinhood needed money fast: In the eye of frenzied stock trading, the stockbroker app Robinhood has been forced to take in billions of dollars to steady itself and meet legal requirements of maintaining a cushion of cash, my colleagues reported. (Related: My colleague Andrew Ross Sorkin has six ideas to make the stock market more trustworthy and fair.) India versus Twitter: Twitter temporarily blocked people in India from viewing numerous accounts critical of the prime minister after receiving a government order, BuzzFeed News reported. These tugs of war between local laws and social media companies' standards of free expression typically receive far less notice when they happen outside the United States. "I give it five sinks." Sink Reviews is a TikTok account that — you guessed it — opines about sinks in public places in New York City, like museums, restaurants and stores, Time Out New York reported. Hugs to this Apparently baby octopuses sometimes ride on top of jellyfish, and they look marvelous. We want to hear from you. Tell us what you think of this newsletter and what else you'd like us to explore. You can reach us at ontech@nytimes.com. If you don't already get this newsletter in your inbox, please sign up here. Continue reading the main story Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance. You received this email because you signed up for On Tech with Shira Ovide from The New York Times. To stop receiving these emails, unsubscribe or manage your email preferences. Subscribe to The TimesGet The New York Times app Connect with us on: Change Your EmailPrivacy PolicyContact UsCalifornia Notices The New York Times Company. 620 Eighth Avenue New York, NY 10018

Covid relief and the Mae West principle

Why we shouldn't worry about overdoing it.

View in browser|nytimes.com Continue reading the main story February 2, 2021 Natanael Evangelista, an undocumented cook who decided to become a delivery worker after losing his job to the pandemic, waits to complete his final delivery order of the morning.Jose A. Alvarado Jr. for The New York Times By Paul Krugman Opinion Columnist My latest column is about the Republican counteroffer to Joe Biden's proposed rescue package, and why it's grotesquely inadequate. I guess I got a bit fire-and-brimstone on the topic, but I'd argue that G.O.P. bad faith deserves it. While the Republican offering is criminally underpowered, however, is it possible that Biden's plan overdoes it? Could the extensive aid to families, businesses, and state and local governments end up being more than needed? Yes, it could, although we don't know that for sure; it depends on how long the pandemic lasts, and how quickly the economy rebounds once we get herd immunity. Maybe we're overdoing it, maybe not. But this seems like a good time to invoke the Mae West doctrine: "Too much of a good thing can be wonderful." Seriously, while an inadequate response to the pandemic would mean vast suffering, there don't seem to be major risks associated with an economic program that turns out, in retrospect, to have been bigger than necessary. To see why, think about what it would mean for the Covid-19 package to have been "too big." The story would go like this: vaccination proceeds rapidly, and the new strains of the coronavirus don't prove as problematic as some fear; meanwhile, infection rates come down rapidly, perhaps in part because with the change in administrations the federal government is finally enforcing mask-wearing where it can and encouraging it where it can't. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT As a result of all this, affluent consumers — who have, on average, done fairly well during the pandemic, but have been saving at very high rates because of limited opportunities to spend — release a lot of pent-up demand. Consumer spending is further boosted by all the aid in the Biden rescue package. And so the economy booms. How much might it boom? Some of the bank newsletters I get are suggesting something not far short of the "morning in America" boom of 1983-84, when the economy briefly posted growth rates of around 8 percent. And it wouldn't take much of that to push us all the way to full employment and beyond, into the realm of inflationary overheating. If that happens — which is by no means guaranteed — we might look back and say that the rescue package was, in hindsight, bigger than it needed to be. But how much of a problem is that? Everything we know says, not much. First of all, fiscal policy — trying to steer the economy with changes in spending and taxes — isn't the only game in town. Monetary policy — changes in interest rates, which the Federal Reserve can achieve (roughly speaking) by changing the money supply — is also in the mix. And while the Fed can't cut rates from here, because they're already zero, it can easily raise them to head off excessive inflation. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Now, the Fed probably won't rush to do that, for good reason. Very low unemployment rates do seem to lead to a rise in inflation (the famous Phillips curve), but there's a lot of research indicating that this curve is "very flat" in the short run. That is, running the economy hot will lead to rising inflation, but it's a slow process, and there's plenty of time to rein it in. Also, we won't know how hot we can run the economy until we try it. Few economists thought 3.5 percent unemployment was achievable until it actually happened. As Ms. West said, too much of a good thing can be wonderful. So yes, the rescue plan might overshoot, but there's not much harm if it does. On the other hand, an inadequate plan would lead to vast, unnecessary suffering. So we actually want the plan to be bigger than we expect we'll need, just in case. I joined my colleague Ezra Klein on his podcast last week to discuss the current state of America's economy and why, as I tell Ezra, this is not a conventional recession. I hope you'll listen. Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Quick Hits About the Phillips curve. The new Treasury secretary has been advocating a "high-pressure," low unemployment economy for years. Consensus views about how hot economies can run are generally worthless. I was going to write about GameStop; until I do, this is good. Feedback If you're enjoying what you're reading, please consider recommending it to friends. They can sign up here. If you want to share your thoughts on an item in this week's newsletter or on the newsletter in general, please email me at krugman-newsletter@nytimes.com. Facing the Music Giving a new meaning to world musicYouTube Soumaya Keynes of The Economist has a musical side, which isn't sufficiently separate from her day job. IN THE TIMES Biden Wants the Biggest Stimulus in Modern History. Is It Too Big? Supporters of a 'hot' economy see a chance to correct the mistakes of the last recession. Others see danger. By Neil Irwin The Most Important Thing Biden Can Learn From the Trump Economy A "hot" economy with high deficits didn't cause runaway inflation. By Neil Irwin U.S. Economy Is Healing, but Budget Office Says Workers Have a Long Way to Go New projections from the independent Congressional Budget Office fuel Republicans' calls for "targeted" economic aid — and Democrats' push to go big. By Jim Tankersley The conversation Raise Your Hand if You Were Expecting Biden to Be a Revolutionary The president has been much more left-wing out of the gate than many predicted. What comes next? By Gail Collins and Bret Stephens Read the full Opinion report here. Continue reading the main story Need help? Review our newsletter help page or contact us for assistance. You received this email because you signed up for Paul Krugman from The New York Times. To stop receiving these emails, unsubscribe or manage your email preferences. Subscribe to The TimesGet The New York Times app Connect with us on: Change Your EmailPrivacy PolicyContact UsCalifornia Notices The New York Times Company. 620 Eighth Avenue New York, NY 10018