Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook must leave news in responsible hands

There is a message here for Mark Zuckerberg. Given that he has put all his strength behind democratisation of communication, I think it is only fair that this message goes out to him though social media.

My submission is simple. Opening up of communication is welcome. But when it comes to the business of news, there is only a hairline difference between democratisation and laissez-faire. The practice of professional news gathering is very different from vested rumour-mongering.

Facebook must leave news in responsible hands and focus only on personal networking.

This, because being a journalist, is serious business. The responsibility of a byline bears very heavily on a journalist’s career. You are as good as the credibility and accuracy of your last story. But this does not hold true for individuals peddling news with seasonal agendas, which most of the time can’t even be traced back to them.

On the same lines, a media house takes years to build trustworthiness. But today, an inane website like EndingtheFed.com, which does not even mention an editor or an owner, can get its fake story about Megyn Kelly being fired from Fox News in the Facebook trending box.

If that be the democratised news ecosystem, how does credible, neutral news, bereft of agenda, even stand a chance?

If Facebook's algorithm is not intelligent enough to crawl and push only authentic news sources into your newsfeed, it is a business they must exit.

Let us admit it. When Facebook's algorithm serves the most “engaging” news (irrespective of the source) as the most readable (credible) one to an unsuspecting reader, it is not democratisation of information. It is breach of trust and there is no exaggeration here.

Sample this. In America, Facebook is the most trusted source of political news for about six-in-ten internet-using millennials. It is also a complete flip from the internet-using baby boomers, for whom local TV is still the top source for political news (Pew Research).

We don’t suspect the numbers to be very different for India, if not more (given the smartphone penetration and access to both English and vernacular content on Facebook).

What that means effectively is that millennials don’t just use the platform for social networking, but they also bank on Facebook to keep them informed about what is happening in the world around them. It also means they put their trust in the sources that Facebook trusts. Serving them fake news from unverified sources is a breach of this trust.

So when these people read stuff like the "Pope endorsing  Donald Trump" or "a Democratic operative being murdered after agreeing to testify against Hillary Clinton", they lap it up as true and authentic, even while it is a pack of lies. Facebook will have to be sensitive to this reality (read responsibility).  

Closer home, it started with doctored videos released during the JNU students’ unrest and more recently, we witnessed fake news of a matrimonial alliance between RBI governor Urjit Patel and the Ambanis. There was also misinformation about a robber, who got cornered in a bank and hung himself, which was touted as a suicide due to demonetisation. Such misinformation has far reaching repercussions on perception building about some very important positions and decisions.

Facebook has been clarifying its advertising policy to emphasise it won’t display ads for sites that run information which is “illegal, misleading or deceptive, which includes fake news". The catch here being that the company seems to be primarily depending on making it easier for people to report “misinformation”. 

There is very little hope here as the unsuspecting user will never know what is fake. And only the affected party reporting it will not give enough traction to the request for it to be brought down. So if the onus of garnering support to pull content down by reporting it is on the readers, the situation may not really be any better than it is now.

It is also important to note that Facebook started initially, with the claim that for news, it is only a distribution platform. However, with the rollout of Instant Articles, it has evolved into a publishing platform.

While the company vehemently denies the next move of it transforming into a media major, recent developments have pointed the needle to the other extreme. If Facebook controls the news feed and pushes content based on the algorithm (controlled only by its team) into the newsfeed, it has effectively transformed into a media company for all practical purposes.

But that makes it even more unpalatable. Facebook cannot masquerade as a pseudo-media company without any responsibility and accountability for the content that it is distributing and publishing. That would not be a great place to be in for a company that claims to put society’s interest first.

Hope Mark Zuckerberg is listening.

Also read: Are we foolishly lapping up lies and misinformation on social media? 

Also read: How to survive social media