Facebook has experienced 2017 in an unprecedented way, but in a less positive direction when its reputation is smeared.
Facebook has experienced 2017 in an unprecedented way, but in a less positive direction when its reputation is smeared. In the US presidential election, Facebook was attacked by Russian pros and conspirators (who have been flooding fake news and postings to blow up the wave of partisan divisions). Surrounded by crises in public relations, Facebook tried to regain the trust of the community, but the results were not as expected.
Beginning, Facebook apologized for letting Russians buy political ads during the US election, then apologized to the Palestinian man after his "good morning" post was translated "attack them. "(attack them) in Hebrew, leading to this person being arrested. The company apologizes to a black activist whose Facebook account is locked for posting screenshots of race threats. Facebook apologized to the LGBT community after blocking sending messages in their accounts on the Pride occasion.
Since September 2016, Facebook has acknowledged that the company misrepresented the reported data to advertisers and publishers 12 times. On Yom Kippur, Mark Zuckerberg apologized, saying: "The ways we work are more divided than bringing us together."
Former Facebook president Sean Parker admitted to helping create a demon
Throughout 2017, Facebook has launched various initiatives, designed to ensure platform integrity. Facebook's CEO has proposed a 9-point plan to protect Facebook against bad factors. Facebook has attempted to prevent fake news, does not allow the purchase of advertising to promote these news. Facebook uses Machine Learning to minimize websites with bad content, and propose other ways for people to report fake news.
How to check fake news on Facebook
But it seems that Facebook's efforts are not enough. Guardian reported in May, an article was deleted on a website about the slave trade in Ireland with traffic soaring after it was marked as a controversy (disputed). By September, the Yale survey showed that only 3.7% of people who read this tagged card believed it to be wrong. Thus, 96% of readers believe in the article about the slave trade.
Let Facebook take the nose, don't make the fish bite
Next month, Facebook said, labeling a post as False / Phishing will reduce that article's impression rate by 80%. But it takes at least 3 days (a period long enough for it to receive most views on this social network) so that the post is labeled False.
After all the scandals above, Facebook's business still goes smoothly. The company ended the last quarter of 2017 with 1.37 billion daily users, up from last year's 1.18 billion. Advertising revenue has increased nearly 50% a year. In the fourth quarter of 2017 alone, Facebook earned $ 4.7 billion in profits.
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By copying some of Snapchat's features, Instagram has had an amazing year of growth, pulling 200 million more users. Instagram is also at the forefront of introducing interesting features like: SuperZoom, Story Highlight and the ability to track hashtag.
At the end of the year, Facebook faced a new threat: The former Facebook leader felt guilty for working at the company. Justin Rosenstein, who helped develop the Like button, complained about the psychological effects of this social network. Sean Parker, Facebook's first president, said, "Only God knows what it (Facebook) is doing with the kids' brains."
Chamath Palihapitiya, who once led the Facebook user development team, one of the most important figures, also told students at Stanford business school: "I think we have created tools that make it possible. Social structure is separated from its way of doing things, ' he also encouraged students, separated from social networks. How did Facebook respond to Chamath Palihapitiya's response?
Was the former vice president of human programming element, this is Facebook's answer
Despite rejecting the former vice president, Facebook itself has to admit that using social networks passively can make people feel worse. But the company does not advise users to give up Facebook but concludes that, having to use Facebook more, commenting on posts, sending messages to friends is better than just reading Facebook and doing nothing.
The best development of Facebook this year is that the company shared about the unintended consequences of its products. In 2018, we will be waiting to see if the world's largest social network can fulfill all the promises they have said.
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