Facebook reveals news feed experiment to control emotions

[TheIrishman]

Facebook reveals news feed experiment to control emotions

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/29/facebook-users-emotions-news-feeds

<< Protests over secret study involving 689,000 users in which friends' postings were moved to influence moods. >>

[TheIrishman]

Facebook emotion study breached ethical guidelines, researchers say

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/30/facebook-emotion-study-breached-ethical-guidelines-researchers-say

<< Lack of "informed consent" means that Facebook experiment on nearly 700,000 news feeds broke rules on tests on human subjects, say scientists. >>

[herzmeister]

Once again, for Facebook you're not the customer, the advertiser is the customer, and you are the product being sold; and now, you're also the lab animal

[sana8410]

If people stopped treating FB like some sort of moaning tool then maybe they wouldn't need to do research like this. FB has died in my eyes, I use Twitter. People are way more positive on Twitter, and I find that folk on FB say things that they wouldn't reveal in face to face conversation. It's a social disaster.

[zolace]

Certainly this experiment was highly unethical, but the response from our government is just a bit amusing, considering they engage in this kind of activity all the time, not even as an experiment but positively counting on the fact that it works.

[umair127]

it’s not a big deal. Our emotions are manipulated all the time by media, advertising and interaction with other humans. Facebook users will not be leaving the network and 99% of them will not change the behavior as a response to this news. Move along, there are more important events taking place in the world. Unethical?

[Rigon]

OMG people are manipulated by other people. Isn't that something? Politicians do it, rich people do it, poor people do it and of course Facebook does it. So politicians feel they have a right to stop facebook. WHY?

[TheIrishman]

How does Facebook decide what to show in my news feed?

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jun/30/facebook-news-feed-filters-emotion-study

<< Controversial emotion study is a reminder that the social network's filters are constantly at work in the background. >>

[Kluge]

"Clay Johnson, the co-founder of Blue State Digital, the firm that built and managed Barack Obama's online campaign for the presidency in 2008, said: 'The Facebook 'transmission of anger' experiment is terrifying.'"
 

[Cicero2.0]

Meh facebook is pretty useless now. I have an account to stay in touch with people but I haven't been an active user in over 2 years. It isn't surprising that they would do something like this. Ethics don't really matter in the facebook world. 

[noviapriani]

It worked for me, i got so fed up with my news feed winding me up with people commenting on their drab lives and me constantly reading it wondering what I’m doing with my life i deleted it off my phone and I'm all the better for it. Thanks facebook, worked a treat for me!

[newflesh]

Stopped using Facefook years ago, never really liked putting all my personal info into a CIA database.

[zetaray]

Everyone should stop using facebook. These "researchers" are not observers anymore, they are actively blocking newsfeeds.

[NapoleonBonaparte]

Still more people joining facebook and leaving.

[bitsmichel]

Once again, for Facebook you're not the customer, the advertiser is the customer, and you are the product being sold; and now, you're also the lab animal

The customer are advertisers, the secret service (NSA, CIA), FBI and your future employers. Apparently, psychologists are also interested in the data now.
Your data (and page views) is the product. Its a model that pays well, but its very unethical and straight in contrast with freedom, if anything, it has made us Americans less free.

[Benjig]

For the well being of society we should demand weekends Internet & TV FREE! There will be no NHS problems and people will be less obese and will start actually see each other more since they will have to do something about their weekends rather than sit and scroll through FB or watch TV. It will benefit all of us. It is that simple!

[halfawake]

I have to confess I'm kind of addicted to Facebook.  But seeing this is kind of the last straw.  I'm planning on quitting FB after getting contact information for all the people I want to stay in touch with.  I guess the only frustrating thing about quitting is that it's so ingrained amongst my friends for inviting people to events and such that I'm positive I'll miss out on social engagements if I quit.  So I'm torn, the company is highly unethical, but I am getting a benefit out of it.  I wonder if I could persuade the 20 or 30 people on FB whose posts I really care about seeing to decamp to Diaspora, probably not though, FB has the network effect going for it, just like bitcoin does.  That's the only social network that's actually good in my opinion.  

[bitsmichel]

I have to confess I'm kind of addicted to Facebook.  But seeing this is kind of the last straw.  I'm planning on quitting FB after getting contact information for all the people I want to stay in touch with.  I guess the only frustrating thing about quitting is that it's so ingrained amongst my friends for inviting people to events and such that I'm positive I'll miss out on social engagements if I quit.  So I'm torn, the company is highly unethical, but I am getting a benefit out of it.  I wonder if I could persuade the 20 or 30 people on FB whose posts I really care about seeing to decamp to Diaspora, probably not though, FB has the network effect going for it, just like bitcoin does.  That's the only social network that's actually good in my opinion.  

You could invite everyone to Daispora https://www.diasp.org/ or a similar network I even have a basic social network software I made on my computer, that I could put online. - but I don't think anyone is interested. The main problem users have (I never used it) is that their friends are on it.

[TheIrishman]

Facebook apologises for psychological experiments on users

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jul/02/facebook-apologises-psychological-experiments-on-users

<< The second most powerful executive at the company, Sheryl Sandberg, says experiments were "poorly communicated". >>

[halfawake]

You could invite everyone to Daispora https://www.diasp.org/ or a similar network I even have a basic social network software I made on my computer, that I could put online. - but I don't think anyone is interested. The main problem users have (I never used it) is that their friends are on it.

You're right, I could, but I doubt they'd bother joining.  That is the Catch 22 that new social networks and people like me who want to move to another social network.  Any other social network doesn't have the critical mass of people that Facebook has, and people aren't terribly inclined to join until it does have that critical mass.  This is why I didn't join FB until getting peer pressured into joining.  I knew about it long before 2008 when I setup my account, but I knew I'd get addicted to it, so I didn't join until that point.  But this whole news feed experiment they did annoys me enough that I'm inclined to quit anyway despite the events that I'd miss.  I mean, we do still have phones and email, there are old fashioned ways of communicating with people, they just take a tiny bit more effort.