Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sues Meta, citing chatbot’s reply as evidence of shadowban

jeffw@lemmy.world to Technology@lemmy.world – 343 points –
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sues Meta, citing chatbot’s reply as evidence of shadowban
arstechnica.com
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The rise of alt-right and conspiracies would be a one obvious one.

But how is that a consequence of shadowbanning?

You don't see how opaque manipulation fuels conspiracies and paranoia? Come on dude.

It seems to me that’s it’s often the conspiracy-theorists that get shadowbanned.

You have real stats to back that claim? Because leaving this up to benevolent dictators is kinda silly.

No stats at all, I just got that impression. It’s silly, but it’s often argued that social media are private platforms, that can decide themselves what content they allow. Do you suggest laws against shadowbanning should be a thing? I’m not sure that’s a good idea.

It's unrelated to the current topic but yes. Terms of service should be both ways. We already do that for user data through GDPR and similar laws and inevitably all users will have more rights including right to transparency.

I find it kinda funny that you argue against this on a platform that was founded because reddit was extremely opaque. We even have a transparent mod log here. So you really need more examples that transparency is good?

Nestle is a private company and buying up everyone's water to sell back to them is their choice

Private companies shouldn't get to do whatever they like.

I agree shadow banning should be illegal, along with various other policies which can cause psychological and material damage.

So, you’re suggesting that shadow banning has caused the rise of the alt-right and their conspiracy theories, which implies that they wouldn’t exist without shadow bans.

Or they already exist and are in such a fragile state that even an explicit ban makes them upset (which it does.)

I never said it was a singular cause just a contributor

Again, if you’re already that far down the rabbit hole, anything that tells you, “No, you’re wrong” is going to upset you. That includes a shadow ban, explicit ban, or somebody just telling you that you’re wrong.

If you think I’m wrong and you think shadow bans especially push people towards being alt-right and believing conspiracy theories, then I’d love to see a study that says so because that’s what would likely convince me.

Nah man it's completely different when society regulates itself through transparent rules vs opaque ones. It's more organized and self balancing.