Facebook is sending groups to its News Feed

10/01/2020 Business, Entertainment, Health, Sports, Technology



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Groups have emerged as a key source of participation and a central part of the platform. But they have also come under fire for fueling polarization and extremism, as well as pushing people toward bogus medical cures.

More than half of global Facebook users are members of five or more active groups and more than 1.8 billion people connect with groups every month, depending on the company.

At Facebook’s annual conference for group managers on Thursday, which went virtual this year due to the pandemic, the company outlined several updates, including changes that make it easier for people to find new groups and group content.

Facebook’s biggest update is bringing groups to the forefront: In the coming months, the company will begin testing ways for more people to discover public groups in its News Feed or even outside of Facebook while searching the web.

For example, when a link or post about a popular TV show or sporting event appears in the news feed, users can see what other public groups aren’t saying about the posts, a feature Facebook calls Related Discussions. Users can also participate in the discussion even if they don’t join the group, if the group administrator allows it.

Facebook did not explicitly say whether political posts from public groups would be recommended, but said the topics would include entertainment, lifestyle, sports, consumer and human interest news, important cultural moments and holidays.

Administrators must choose to include their public groups in this role.

Meanwhile, in the groups tab, users will now see recommended content from public groups they are not a part of, based on what’s popular and their interests. So far, Facebook has only published posts from groups that you are a member of and suggested groups that you might like.

In an effort to make sure these new discovery features don’t display misinformation or controversial content, Facebook said it will employ both human curators and technology. The company did not elaborate on how the content would be published and what could be excluded.

Administrative assistant

Facebook also announced Thursday that it is taking steps to make groups easier to manage. A new feature called “Admin Assistant” allows group leaders to set rules to help them automatically moderate posts. For example, administrators can reject posts that include certain words or from users who are new to the group or who have reported its content in the past.

While the move appears to put the onus on administrators to keep groups in check rather than on Facebook moderators and artificial intelligence, Facebook’s vice president of application engineering Tom Alison told CNN Business that the company you are taking a “holistic approach” to moderating groups.

“Proactive enforcement and AI are absolutely critical tools in this,” Alison said. “Of course, administrators and moderators have a role to play. That is why we are investing so much in tools to help groups have healthy conversations and set the tone for what they want to talk about.”

Group problems

As groups have become a key way people engage with Facebook, their recommendations have come under fire. Earlier this month, Facebook announced that it would no longer recommend health groups. While the company did not specifically point to Covid-19 or vaccine misinformation, it did say: “It is crucial that people obtain their medical information from authorized sources.” But users can still search for these groups or invite friends to join them.
On Tuesday, more than a dozen advocacy organizations launched a campaign calling on Facebook to disable group referrals until the results of the US elections are certified.
Alison did not say whether Facebook would consider pausing recommendations for groups in general or those related to politics before the 2020 election. But she said the company does not recommend groups that repeatedly share misinformation and checks links shared on News Feed or in groups. .

“We know there is still a lot of work to do,” Alison said. “One of the scenarios that we are seeing is that if the election results are not clear, we will work with Reuters to make sure that people have an accurate view of what is happening.”

The company previously announced that it removed about 1.5 million pieces of group content for violating its policies on organized hate last year, in addition to removing more than 1 million groups for violating its rules. In the coming weeks, you’ll also begin archiving groups with no active administrators, in another effort to address groups. Archiving a group means that it is no longer active and members cannot post to it, but the old content is still viewable.
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