Unfortunately, the article provides no insight about the recent allegations regarding political bias in "trending" topics.
> There is no political bias that I know of and we were never told to suppress conservative news.
But then later goes on to say:
> “Facebook relies heavily on just 10 news sources to determine whether a trending news story has editorial authority.” The problem is, even after repeated questions and requests for guidance, no one ever explained what that meant. Much of it was left to interpretation for curators and copy editors. Topics are treated differently depending on who you are working with.
Which leads to a fairly obvious observation: providing insufficient editorial guidelines leaves room for unconscious bias to take over.
Of course, qualified journalists should be aware of their own biases and be able to compensate for them. Unfortunately, journalism in the US is becoming increasingly less valued and more partisan.
I wouldn't be surprised if this whole bias fiasco was an unexpected side-effect of Facebook hiring largely left-leaning editorial staff.
I always assumed that this was exactly what's going on. You don't need a handbook that says "stifle conversative stuff", you just need vague rules, managers playing the world's worst game of corporate telephone, and a bunch of disorganization.
Life at large companies...
If you are unable to see through the looking glass, then why would you ever come to the conclusion that you're biased?
Why do people seem to think all journalists are left-leaning?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2014/05/06/ju...
Without logical points to debate, your comment is just noise.
Unfortunately, so is my reply.
So, average bay area residents...
Fully agree. Things like this tend to be better explained, as a rule, as side effects, without resorting to agency or conspiracies. That specific information, however is not new as of this article ("As the Guardian reported in leaked documents...." precedes the bit you quoted in TFA).
Probably should have immediately said they'd review it, then found that, uninstructed, some editors may have shown a "slight bias".
And coincidentally it comes out coinciding with a US "conservative" candidate that's talking about rigged processes and unfair treatment.
[0]https://fbnewsroomus.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/full-trendi...
[0] http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/16/books/chapters/0316-1st-al...