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- Facebook's best-performing pages in the US often are entirely right and far-right wing publications.
- The data demonstrating as much comes from Facebook's own measurement tool, CrowdTangle.
- In private, Facebook execs have reportedly bristled at the data tool and what it shows.
- Visit the Business section of Insider for more stories.
Despite claims by some Republican politicians led by former President Trump that social media sites censor conservative views, Facebook's data makes it clear: The social network's best performing content is almost entirely from right and far-right wing publications and personalities.
That's according to CrowdTangle, a Facebook-owned and operated service that has reportedly caused Facebook executives to bristle at what the tool shows to the public.
"Our own tools are helping journos to consolidate the wrong narrative," Facebook VP of global affairs Nick Clegg said in an internal company email, according to a new report by The New York Times. Like Facebook's advertising transparency tools, Crowdtangle has been repeatedly used to demonstrate major criticisms of the tech and social media giant - criticisms that Facebook execs would rather not have to defend in public.
Perhaps most prominent is a Twitter tool created by New York Times tech writer Kevin Roose automatically pulls data from Crowdtangle every day that shows, "the top-performing link posts by US Facebook pages in the last 24 hours, ranked by total interactions."
To break that down: Posts containing links to something outside of Facebook that were shared within the last 24 hours by a US-based Facebook page. And the list is ranked from 1 to 10 depending on total "interactions" - which includes "reactions, shares, and comments," according to Roose.
As the data shows, the most-engaged pages top 10 list is consistently dominated by the likes of Fox News host Sean Hannity, conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, and Christian evangelist Franklin Graham.
-Facebook's Top 10 (@FacebooksTop10) July 13, 2021
Before he was banned from Facebook following the January 6 attempted insurrection, Trump's pages dominated the lists.
That, among other metrics, is what led to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg telling Trump he was "number one" on the social media platform in late 2019.
Internally, Facebook execs are reportedly divided over what to do with Crowdtangle and its data. Some Facebook execs are said to have argued for more data transparency, but others are said to have argued against the potential for more negative stories about Facebook to emerge.
"Facebook would love full transparency if there was a guarantee of positive stories and outcomes," former Facebook VP Brian Boland told the Times. "But when transparency creates uncomfortable moments, their reaction is often to shut down the transparency."
Part of the reason Boland left Facebook, he says, is because, "the company does not want to invest in understanding the impact of its core products."
Facebook representatives didn't respond to a request for comment as of publishing, but Facebook spokesperson Joe Osborne told the Times that Crowdtangle, "is part of a growing suite of transparency resources we've made available for people, including academics and journalists" and that the company is, "developing a more comprehensive strategy for how we build on some of these transparency efforts moving forward."
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Read the original article on Business Insider
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By: [email protected] (Ben Gilbert)
Title: Facebook execs weren't happy when their own data showed it perpetuates a right-wing echo chamber
Sourced From: feedproxy.google.com/~r/clusterstock/~3/sBhy02y4LPw/facebook-right-wing-echo-chamber-data-executive-pushback-2021-7
Published Date: Wed, 14 Jul 2021 15:14:12 +0000
