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Thought it may be my post Kelvin, it vanished (for me) when i edited.
So in summary.
None of this is new, it's a 21st century method version 1st century practice.
Should i/we be surprised. No.
Should the practice be changed. Yes.
Is the method to blame. No.
Given this has (imho) largely grown out of the other two it's difficult not to reference/talk about them. Mea culpa.
> , it is about changing our society and politics, using modern tools, while avoiding transparency.
Is there any evidence they did effect any significant change? I don't doubt they have loads of data, but how effective that really was is still TBD.
Just because they boast they can swing an election doesn't mean they actually can....
I think it was pulled from YouTube, once the story started to blow up, but about a year ago there was a video online where Nix was explaining at a conference exactly how Analytica targeted individual voters and delivered different (and potentially contradictory) political ads to different people.
The contradictory advertising/campaigning is nothing new though, see promising tax cuts and more spending simultaneously.
.....and I’m currently dong an online handstand course
😂 Liked and Shared.
The contradictory advertising/campaigning is nothing new though
In the past though it was in the paper or tv. So if they gave contradictory messages I saw both and think lying sods and vote for someone else.
Targeted advertising on social media is different. Since they can look at you and decide you would be in favour of tax cuts based on their demographic info and so show you an ad promising that. However they can then look at me and display an ad promising no tax cuts based on my data. You dont see my ad and I dont see your ad so they dont appear to contradict themselves.
Both of us think what splendid chaps they are and vote for them.
Both of us think what splendid chaps they are
I think that unlikely 😉
The thing is you put the adds that said tax cuts in the ft and the ones that said double your benefits and more for the NHS in the star, you never saw both.
On telly you ran with a middle ground (which is why tv and radio is largely "but you said" not "I say" as everyone firmly tries to say nothing at all) or peddled one thing on bbc and another on ITV back in the day when posh people wouldn't watch commercial tv.
You sent activists round to sink estates to discuss one thing and to Mayfair to talk about others.
The issue here is that more and more people choose, quite deliberately, to live in an echo chamber, what propaganda they're served is by and large, served them by choice. Of the outliers i know most of them would stop buying the guardian if it said "Slash public services" and the others wouldn't buy the mail again if it said "vote Corbyn, open our borders".
Swingers (ooo-er) are of course going to be targeted by both sides so will see misinformation (actually more likely to be correct as you'd point out things the other candidate said they "will" do your target isn't likely to like as well as made up stuff.) From both sides [likely produced by the same company].
Online handstand course? Looks risky.
>Targeted advertising on social media is different. Since they can look at you and decide you would be in favour of tax cuts based on their demographic info and so show you an ad promising that. However they can then look at me and display an ad promising no tax cuts based on my data. You dont see my ad and I dont see your ad so they dont appear to contradict themselves.
This isn't that different from canvassing in person. They listen to what you say and then try a line they think will work on you.
In the past though it was in the paper or tv. So if they gave contradictory messages I saw both and think lying sods and vote for someone else.
Targeted advertising on social media is different. Since they can look at you and decide you would be in favour of tax cuts based on their demographic info and so show you an ad promising that. However they can then look at me and display an ad promising no tax cuts based on my data. You dont see my ad and I dont see your ad so they dont appear to contradict themselves.
Both of us think what splendid chaps they are and vote for them.
Exactly what I was going to post, every living in their own personal echo chamber is not healthy and can be easily manipulated.
They listen to what you say and then try a line they think will work on you.
Thats harder to do though since you do to get the volunteers out and also ensure they are competently trained.
Plus, for certain activities, you dont have those volunteers at all. For example if you are a PAC as opposed to candidate it is unlikely you will get the people out. Its also quite hard to do the smear ad part of things on the doorstep.
That said yes there is a certain overlap. New technology rarely gives something completely unseen in the past. However it does often make it a lot cheaper and easier to do.
The old trick of the fake voter questionnaire with some nice leading questions for example was expensive to do over the phone.
How often do you log into FB and do you remain logged in whilst doing other browsing?
If so they will have a shitload more information than you think
Right, so you are telling me that if I remain (natch) logged in on FB that somewhere in that app it’s now tracking me whilst I’m on STW, sitting on the bog having a shit?
Is that what you are alluding too?
Because.. I’m going to refute that.
Google on the other hand, as a browser I use, does know I’m on STW, at an IP Address I’ve used previously and that I’m logged in on google and I use google mail too.. now that I would believe totally.. and I’ve not received adverts trying to sell me bog roll, cleaning products nor actually anything.
Back to FB for a moment.. FB does know who my “friends” are, I don’t care about that. What it doesn’t know though is who my family is, my work nor my cleaner, nor my wife nor anyone immediate to me because I’ve simply either not included them in my network or they’re not on FB.
The group I’m on is teeny, 35 hairy arsed blokes and women who like dressing up in rubber and partaking in salty showers. Even if 25 of them use FB for posting pics of thier kids or dog or thier whole family network, or them scoffing burgers I fail to see how a small network would be influenced by targeted advertising for a) any product b) political groups c) burger joints.
Whilst I agree with your statements about Data Sharing and Online presence, controlling who you contact and what you share.. all valid points, the main point I think you miss is that fact that 2.2billion people use FB and the sheer volume of Data is so vast even capturing and accurately targeting individuals or small groups is way out of proportion.
If MrBurgerJoint wants to target a small proportion of that vast amount of users, it would cost $bns and no one has that kind of cash.. So all FB do is saturate the data to massive blurred profiles and spew a broad range of adverts to them..
Its all perspective, and I think you are getting wound up by this latest Cambridge Analytica issue and assuming that algorithms are specifically designed to pick You Alone out.. they’re not.. they are a scatter gun effect not a sniper on a hill.
Good topic BTW, needs more realism than fanaticism.
Go teach your kids and grandparents about data sharing, don’t kick FB because they’re just making available what YOU are allowing FB to share.
Facebook is only one part of the problem. Just about every service you use will be harvesting data on you without you even knowing it and using that data to make more profit out of you. Supermarkets even track your shopping habits when you don't even use a loyalty scheme as they will use your debit or credit card to do so instead. So good are they at this, some of the large supermarkets can now tell when a female customer is pregnant (sometimes before she even knows herself) due to the change in shopping habits. If it isn't possible yet, this could progress to picking up something like a type of terminal illness and considering the lack of morals from these companies they could exploit that knowledge by targeting you to squeeze every last penny they can out you before you find out yourself and die.
Because.. I’m going to refute that.
Unfortunately you failed to do so. If the website you visit has a Facebook widget (for likes/shares etc) then if you are logged in they are tracking you unless you take some specific countermeasures.
If MrBurgerJoint wants to target a small proportion of that vast amount of users, it would cost $bns and no one has that kind of cash
eh? Its the exact opposite.
>Thats harder to do though since you do to get the volunteers out and also ensure they are competently trained.
Agreed, but it's essentially the same thing, hence difficult to get upset about one if the other is perfectly OK at the same time....
If MrBurgerJoint wants to target a small proportion of that vast amount of users, it would cost $bns
No it won’t!
It costs a few quid a month. I used to do it all the time on Facebook ads.
Targetting was very specific, location, interests, income, family, etc etc.
I just chose who I wanted, picked a budget for each month, and let them do the rest.
I could target people who lived within 5 miles of my house, with a minimum income of £xxx, who had children but no pets and were into surfing and ate burgers. (For example 😂)
It was an incredibly cheap way to advertise a service to EXACTLY the right people, and nobody else.
And it costs buttons.
Do the women have hairy arses? I'm not sure I'd want anyone to know that......
>Targetting was very specific, location, interests, income, family, etc etc.
Shame you can't see what your profile (as sold to advertisers is). I'd love to know....
Of the FB ads I see, they seem to fall into three groups.
- Completely inappropriate ones which claim to be based on 'because I live in the UK'.
- Reasonably targeted ones for PTs and gyms in Cambridge (which is probably 1/3 of what I follow in my feed)
- Arbitrary ones based on 'because I live in Cambridge'
Does seem a long way from 'laser targeted' though.
The other really odd thing is the way they feed them to me. I won't see an ad for a week or two and then suddenly, for one day, every 1 in 3 posts on my mobile is an ad, all of which I just block. Then I'll go for another 2 weeks not being shown a single one. Really very odd, be much smarter to just feed them at a drip rate....
A little off topic but related as such (and i liked the quotation)
[url= https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/21/russia-propaganda-skripal-britain-churchill ]“Propaganda carries to many minds an unpleasant connotation,” Bernays wrote, “yet whether [it] is good or bad depends upon the merit of the cause urged, and the correctness of the information published.”[/url] (guardian link)
A lot of what's being said is, i appreciate, to do with the latter part of that quote, so a question it raises. If it's an outright lie say "shooting a rhino will cause you to spontaneously combust" but works to a good end, (e.g. no more rhino poaching) is all this data mining and the targeting of advertising/propaganda a bad thing. Or is it (and I'd say it is) largely benign. The whole CA and Facebook thing strikes me attacking the means as we don't like the ends, rather than trying to fix the ends themselves.
Agreed, but it’s essentially the same thing, hence difficult to get upset about one if the other is perfectly OK at the same time
I am not aware of the door to door types acquiring information in quite the same way. Which is a major part of the problem. If they had done the same data acquisition and then popped round my house specifically with one message it would be a closer match.
The other is just because something is okay on a limited scale, at least in part because it would be rather difficult to monitor, doesnt mean something running on a different scale should be.
A better comparison would be there are quite a few laws around political advertising on tv and other traditional media. So why not ensure social media matches those?
>I am not aware of the door to door types acquiring information in quite the same way. Which is a major part of the problem. If they had done the same data acquisition and then popped round my house specifically with one message it would be a closer match.
Still very unclear if this data was actually of any value and whether it made any difference in the end.
Just because CA claim they can throw an election, when touting for work, doesn't mean they actually can.
I get enough random adverts on FB to be highly dubious of the laser targeted profiling claim.
Right now, the whole thing does seem a bit 'storm in a tea cup' IMO. People agreed to share information about themselves. It was shared, maybe a bit wider than expected. A company touting for work for electioneering claims to be able to swing elections if you give it millions (with no proof it can achieve anything). People gave it millions. Trump got elected, people voted for Brexit. I just don't see FB as being the root cause. Austerity + 25 years of politicians blaming Europe for everything lead to Brexit. The end of the American dream led to Trump.
Right, so you are telling me that if I remain (natch) logged in on FB that somewhere in that app it’s now tracking me whilst I’m on STW, sitting on the bog having a shit?
There's FB tracking code on every page on this site. Here it is
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<td class="line-content">n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};</td>
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<td class="line-content">'https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js');</td>
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<td class="line-content">fbq('init', '138020686821732');</td>
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Are we now on the cusp of a post-privacy world? What would that mean?
Apologies for the previous quoted code. Here's a description of Facebook's Pixel code:
The Facebook pixel, also know as conversion or tracking pixel, is a piece of code that helps you track the same person's actions across multiple sites.
Are we now on the cusp of a post-privacy world?
That and (ironically, for those that voted to take back control, and democracy 😉 ) a post-democracy world 😉
There’s FB tracking code on every page on this site. Here it is...
These are the kinds of reasons I use apps that block dodgy tracking. Chromium inspector is telling me that all the scripts from criteo, skimresourses and facebook were blocked by the client (UBlock Origin, basically).
Out of curiosity, in the unlikely event that one of those in power is reading this thread... how much money do those 3 companies pay ST to track me? or does STW add in all that shyte as an investment in giving users all kinds of value added features?
There's a reason I do all fb interactive activity in a different browser, in incognito mode.
There’s FB tracking code on every page on this site. Here it is
And here it is:
footflaps
>Thats harder to do though since you do to get the volunteers out and also ensure they are competently trained.
Agreed, but it’s essentially the same thing, hence difficult to get upset about one if the other is perfectly OK at the same time….
The canvasser / newspaper ad analogies are not exactly accurate. If the Lib Dems run ads with conflicting messages in the FT and The Star they are still identifiably ads by the Lib Dems so someone/anyone can identify the lie. The Facebook ads are completely anonymous - the information they are targeting you with is not explicitly a party political broadcast.
The canvasser shows up at your house and has a very rough idea of who you are and they can perhaps tailor their message somewhat to you, but most importantly they are declaring who they are, what party they represent, what their policies are etc. The Facebook targeted ad is the equivalent of someone stalking you for a year, monitoring your emails and friends then showing up on your door pretending to be a friend of a friend or someone who's just moved in next door.....they just happen to have a lot of facts and information that seems to resonate with things you've been interested in recently oh and by the way, did you know.........
I think that unlikely
In his presentation, Nix said that is exactly what they were doing. At the time, Analytica had been working for Pence (and were about to start working for Trump, after Pence dropped out of the race). He pointed out that the potential conservative voters they were targeting were not a homogenous group. Some of them were actually quite liberal on some social issues, so they would avoid serving them anti gay marriage ads which were being shown to the more hard line homophobic conservatives. They did similar targeted and divergent marketing for other trigger issues like gun laws.
If some people are eager to share what they had for lunch, or what their best friends next door neighbours cousin said to then in ASDAs ... then sharing any other information is unlikely to bother them.
In fact - the thought of someone wanting to use their data will probably make their mundane social media life seem almost interesting.
As others have said; using our data from online activity is no surprise, but what is surprising is people using real names on such things as FB etc when there have been so many sinister related incidents.
The other story still to play out is whether Analytica influenced the EU referendum. The Guardian alleged that several of the Leave campaign organisations made payments to a Canadian company that appeared to be part of Analytica, and potentially broke UK laws about coordinated political campaign spending by different political organisations.
>The other story still to play out is whether Analytica influenced the EU referendum
There's no evidence they can influence anyone to do anything.
Just because they claim to be able to (when touting for business) doesn't mean they actually can...
Robert Preston has a pretty down to earth take on it all....
<div id="js_31" class="_5pbx userContent _22jv _3576" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}">
Here are a few thoughts about the furore over whether Cambridge Analytica subverted the US presidential election by improperly exploiting data about the preferences and habits of tens of millions of Facebook users.
1) The serious data scientists I know are sceptical that so-called micro-targeting and the use of details psychological profiling in political campaigns - that is designing propaganda minutely customised to an individual's characteristics, as CA claims to do - is terribly effective (yet).
2) So even if CA tried to do this on behalf of Trump - and CA denies this - chances are it would have had or in fact had negligible impact.
3) But as Vote Leave demonstrated in the EU referendum, as indeed all elections and plebiscites have done since time immemorial, it certainly helps to send messages to those who may be more susceptible to them.
In Vote Leave's case, it created a target group of 6m to 9m persuadable voters, using new polling techniques and mathematical modelling (called Multilevel Regression and Post-stratification, or MRP), and also by persuading punters to reveal their EU leanings via a clever online football game. Vote Leave then "zapped" the target group (in the words of a source) via Facebook. And what voters were zapped was typically a broad message, like "£350m for the NHS" or "a Turkish invasion looms",
The important point is that Vote Leave barely used micro-targeting, except when there was a message linked to concerns about emotional issues such as animal welfare - which, to state the obvious, tend to be effective with voters who've revealed on social media their love of animals. But Vote Leave was still much smarter than the Remain campaign in devoting almost all their campaign resources to a digital and social-media strategy.
4) One puzzle is that if CA is as brilliant in data analytics and AI as both it and its arch critics claim - if it is using cutting edge science to brainwash voters and subvert democracy - why on earth would it waste time offering clients old-fashioned dirty-tricks ruses to secure election, as its suspended boss Alexander Nix was recorded doing in a Channel 4 sting (though later CA denied it in fact does any of this). If it's possible to bring down a political opponent by online special ops, why would its then boss talk of the firm's expertise in honeytraps and bribes (even if he was swaggering rather than making a serious proposal)?
5) None of which is to say that the New York Times's and Observer's scoop, that Cambridge Analytica, allegedly had access to personal data about tens of millions of Facebook users was anything other than explosive. What it has highlighted more than anything is the potential for businesses to make a ton of money out of finding out as much about each of us as they can from social media and the internet - though usually businesses use this data to flog us stuff, rather than influence our votes,
6) For what it's worth, one of the drivers of the unprecedented accumulation of wealth by founders and early investors in digital companies is that they have been able to exploit personal information about each of us for free (to target relevant ads at us, for example).
7) In theory we now have to give permission for details of our private lives to be exploited by others for commercial or political gain. But it is clear that many of us give that permission without thinking through the implications.
8) Arguably the best way to ensure we won't reveal who we are too readily or naively would be for governments to force digital companies to pay us for our most personal of property - our tastes, convictions, prejudices, loves, hates and so on. Were that to happen, we'd all be a bit better off, in all senses, and the owners of the likes of Facebook would be quite a lot poorer (in fact the CA furore, and the threat that FB's freedom to use our data will become more constrained, has already dented the Facebook owners' fortunes by an amount greater than the respective GDPs of Croatia, Bulgaria and Costa Rica).
It would be a market solution to what many see as the cancer of widening inequality, perhaps.
</div>
kcr
The other story still to play out is whether Analytica influenced the EU referendum.
Too late now isn't it! And apparently no one cares because we all share our data, and anyone who does care is just paranoid.
This isn’t that different from canvassing in person. They listen to what you say and then try a line they think will work on you.
It's completely different. You give information to a canvasser by consent.
pass, i don't think majority of the user just don't care about those stuff.
1) The serious data scientists I know are sceptical that so-called micro-targeting and the use of details psychological profiling in political campaigns – that is designing propaganda minutely customised to an individual’s characteristics, as CA claims to do – is terribly effective (yet).
2) So even if CA tried to do this on behalf of Trump – and CA denies this – chances are it would have had or in fact had negligible impact.
Maybe so, but there seems to have been clear intent.
(bad analogy for current times maybe, forgive me if so); not meaning to be controversial but if i get a gun and start taking shots at people in the high street, but because I'm not actually very good at it don't manage to hit someone...... is that alright then?
>It’s completely different. You give information to a canvasser by consent.
Most people seem quite happy to share their information online, hence FB, Twitter, Google etc all build up profiles of us and there is no massive outrage. The number who use Ghostery / DuckDuckGo and don't have FB etc are in a very small minority.
>Maybe so, but there seems to have been clear intent.
Intent to do what?
Intent to defraud political parties by taking huge sums for a completely unproven technology and no verifiable benefit? That would appear to me to be the only crime CA have committed.
As for the political parties paying $m to try and influence an election, that happens at every election and has done for decades.
The other story still to play out is whether Analytica influenced the EU referendum.
Any more than the bullshit spouted by the leave campaign all over the TV & newspapers? I doubt it very much.
>Any more than the bullshit spouted by the leave campaign all over the TV & newspapers? I doubt it very much.
Exactly, was it:
a)
25+ years of politicians from all parties blaming the EU for everything bad in the UK.
25+ yeas of all the major tabloids blaming the EU for everything bad in the UK.
10 years of Austerity
or b)
a few very poorly targeted FB ads...
Not sure if its come up after my skim read, but those who "aren't worried" by all this should look at https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-enabled-advertisers-to-reach-jew-haters
It shows what sort of groups were generated by facebooks own algorithms for advertising.
It enabled anti-semitic groups to target people more likely to agree with them.
Facebook was forced to fixed its algorithms, but imagine what you could do with the same information, and zero accountability?
If you think this doesn't matter for you then you lack imagination.
I am aware that, on twitter for example, I live in an information bubble where my preferences are catered for, and conflicting views are largely invisible (except to the extent that I make an effort to follow people with views that I dislike).
When that bubble becomes your "society" and then actively targets your emotional red button issues (everyone has them .. see an amusing take on this from http://theoatmeal.com/comics/believe ) to make your views more amenable to their political ends then we all lose.
By the way, some people seem in doubt whether Cambridge Analytica were involved in the brexit campaign. i guess thats partly because much of the media don't seem to be mentioning it for reasons I fail to understand (and leave.eu denials). But heres a link to a pretty specific tweet by Arron Banks. https://twitter.com/arron_banks/status/696410417569120256
Have a look while its still there.
If you don't know who he is then you're part of the problem whether you realise it or not 🙂
Most internet savvy folk understood this eventuality about a decade ago.. whereupon you either locked down your security settings or looked forward to a more personalised browsing experience.
Who is this panic being generated by?
>By the way, some people seem in doubt whether Cambridge Analytica were involved in the brexit campaign
Still absolutely no evidence they can influence their way out of a paper bag, let alone anyone else.....
Most people seem quite happy to share their information online, hence FB, Twitter, Google etc all build up profiles of us and there is no massive outrage
Most people are unaware of how their information is being used to manipulate them. If you can't see why it's very different to voluntarily talking to a canvasser, I give up.
Who is this panic being generated by?
Harvested data allegedly helps Obama to win. ORSUMNEZZ!
Harvested data allegedly helps Trump to win. #deletefacebook
>Most people are unaware of how their information is being used to manipulate them.
There's no actual evidence that anyone has been manipulated at all (there may have been intent to do so, but every politician has the intent to persuade people to vote for them).
>If you can’t see why it’s very different to voluntarily talking to a canvasser, I give up.
That's your prerogative.
CA/FB seems to be completely the wrong target. I'm much more concerned that a handful of billionaires control 85% of the UK printed press and use it to push their political agenda with total impunity. I honestly don't GAS about a few poorly targeted FB ads.
Harvested data allegedly helps Trump to win. #deletefacebook
There are a few subtle differences between the two.
footflaps
There’s no actual evidence that anyone has been manipulated at all (there may have been intent to do so, but every politician has the intent to persuade people to vote for them).
And there won't be, because Facebook won't reveal what external sites were marketed, who they were marketed to, or the content therein. So whilst print is a physical record of who said what the nature of these campaigns (it has been alleged) is that they are pedaling messages that conform to no journalistic or legal standard whatsoever.
footflaps
CA/FB seems to be completely the wrong target. I’m much more concerned that a handful of billionaires control 85% of the UK printed press and use it to push their political agenda with total impunity. I honestly don’t GAS about a few poorly targeted FB ads.
Ah right, so Facebook ads are poorly targeted and innocuous but the big bad newspapers are the problem. There are some laws regarding print, and someone puts their name to it, there were no such checks and balances with the aleged hacking of the US election and Brexit. Oh and $40million dollars spent on Facebook reaches a lot more than it does in print. 60% of adults in the US are on Facebook. I wonder if any newspaper has that reach. To put it in context, the most watched news network in the states (Fox) gets 2.3 million viewers.
Ah right, so Facebook ads are poorly targeted and innocuous but the big bad newspapers are the problem.
Well yes essentially, and for the very reasons that you stated about regulated press.
People look at propaganda on facebook and take it with a pinch of salt. Another bitchy meme about Corbyn or trump? Another shouty badly photoshopped rant.....? Another post that originated from one slightly radical group or another? More fake news? yaaaaaaaaaaawn, NEXT! If it ever worked, the cat has been well and truly out of the bag for some time and only the most dull-witted consumers ever fell for it at all.
We expect better of the regulated press. We expect truth and insight. We trust the regulators to ensure that we are delivered a quality product. We are lulled into a false sense of security and then we forget that most choose to only tell us that side of the story which best suits their owner's corporate agenda.. we sleepwalk into a future of their choosing.
There was a programme on BBC4 last night about a potential pandemic and how it would spread, etc. The team built a tracking app that passed the contagion on if they came close to someone else with the app on their smartphone - a bit like an STI version of Tinder 🙂 One age group that have been under-represented in previous modelling scenarios were the under 25s and they were looking at ways to improve that so they turned to social media and had some group come up with a video to push/promote through FB.
The rough numbers were:
Just over 1 million people had the video appear in their feed.
About 250,000 actually watched the video.
Just under 3,000 installed the app.
So they influenced about 1 in 3,500 of those who had chance to view the video. Obviously this was a single route of influence and a fairly up front message and subtler messages might have more impact. But apply that 1 in 3,500 to a parliamentary constituency of around 70,000 voters and that's roughly 20 people assuming everyone turns out to vote.
and only the most dull-witted consumers ever fell for it at all
so yeah about 1.9bn of the world's population, or 60% of the US population (and probably similar % of UK population) then 😉
Judging by the robotic nature of auto-liking practically anything and everything shared on the book of farce, a very siginificant proportion clearly do believe anything. Even those that are clearly well educated, clever, tech savvy.
Propagate a lie enough times and it becomes accepted truth. The papers are 100% guilty of that. Farcebook is 100% guilty for providing a very fast moving means for that.
yunki
Ah right, so Facebook ads are poorly targeted and innocuous but the big bad newspapers are the problem.
Well yes essentially, and for the very reasons that you stated about regulated press.
People look at propaganda on facebook and take it with a pinch of salt. Another bitchy meme about Corbyn or trump? Another shouty badly photoshopped rant…..? Another post that originated from one slightly radical group or another? More fake news? yaaaaaaaaaaawn, NEXT!
This isn't the issue though, not even close, and I suppose that's why it works, you spot the lazy generic meme material and think you're savy. It's all just blown out of proportion, meanwhile another source which you think is completely legitimate, above board or even A-political is the one that's carrying the core message.
We expect better of the regulated press. We expect truth and insight.
Two wrongs don't make a right. The fact that the press is flawed doesn't mean Facebook is harmless/blameless.
I suppose that we're maybe not the target audience.
Some people will believe anything though.. even that facebook has been controlling our minds without our consent.
French newspaper owners were particularly concerned by the uptake of
the new medium, as they faced up to the challenge radio posed to the
political influence and economic viability of the press. One response,
prefiguring that adopted by press groups in adjusting to the legalization of
private local stations in the 1980s, was to acquire their own stake in
radio. In 1924, for instance, Le Petit Parisien was the first newspaper to
establish a radio station, Le Poste Parisien. As competition between public
and private stations intensified, news bulletins became part of the
programme output of radio, raising issues of political balance and
impartiality. Worried about losing readership, the press in general was
opposed to coverage of politics on the radio. However, as newspaper
owners were unable to prevent this development, they adapted to the new
circumstances by encouraging listeners to purchase their company’s
newspapers so as to complement their audio news diet. Radio also began
to make an impact on French political debate, with the medium first being
formally used in an election campaign in 1936. Before the outbreak of the
Second World War, however, French politicians were only just beginning
to appreciate the potential of radio as a means of mass persuasion.
I think we maybe need to just admit that the waters around us have grown.
yunki
I suppose that we’re not the target audience.
You personally might not be. If your social media behavior showed that you were extremely vocal and proactive for one party, constantly liking and sharing material for that party or one candidate then you (or your demographic) are probably not going to have your mind changed. A person could be quite evidently stupid, gullible even for one particular flavour of news or politics but it's not worth the time or money trying to change their mind and make them do a 180.
However if you've shown to be on the fence, or even disinterested and you're part of a demographic who could influence the outcome in a given state or county then you're of much greater interest. It's much easier to convince people to do nothing than to take action so you sow seeds of doubt about your opponent, rather than push your own message. This message can appear completely A-political and constructed around something you are interested. This doesn't mean that you, the target, is stupid, or that the message is simple or obvious, quite the opposite. It's leading you down a path that they already know you're interested in, sport for example, and tying a very subtle poilitcal message to that article, video, community etc.
Small gains to influence key constituencies and win the narrow margins.
What? Sorry, I got distracted.....
No you're right of course.
I like to hope that maybe it's going to have a very short-lived success rate though, as people wise up. The next generation of voters might even be a lot more politically motivated as they are aware of having to sift through the noise and static.
Labour party membership: 600,000, average age 52
Tory party membership: 100,000 average age 72
Labour has a lot of younger and enthusiastic new recruits. Tory membership is much less likely to be out on the stump or on the knocker but the Tories have very wealthy backers. Consequently their focus is and will be to work on people via the mass media and the net. Also interventions on their behalf will not be included in election expenses.
>So they influenced about 1 in 3,500 of those who had chance to view the video.
Well 1 in 3,500 may have watched the video, which is not the same as saying they were influenced by it to any measurable effect.
>And there won’t be, because Facebook won’t reveal what external sites were marketed, who they were marketed to, or the content therein.
Completely missing the point. Just because you see one 10 sec advert (or part thereof more likely) doesn't mean it changes your behaviour. I'd be more worried by the constant barge of overtly racist material eg we have pretty much all the red-tops spewing out racial hatred / anti-EU messages 7 days a week for years on end. And to cap it all, the PM responds to it all, thus reinforcing the message as legitimate.
>Oh and $40million dollars spent on Facebook reaches a lot more than it does in print.
Reach figures for adverts on social media are a joke. There's a huge push back from the likes of Martin Sorrel and WPP etc as Google et al count 1 sec of a video playing in the corner of your screen as you scroll past it as a 'full play'. Essentially ripping off the companies paying for advertising. On top of that you have bots watching videos to get the numbers up for the social media platform.
You've misread what I wrote 🙂
I said 1 in 3,500 (actually, I'm a factor of ten out - it should be 1 in 350) of those who had the chance to watch it, i.e. of the 1 million plus impressions/reach or whatever the term is there were around 3000 downloads. The "watch the full video" rate was roughly 1 in 4 of the reach. The "conversion rate" of those who watched it in full was about 1 in 80.
Of course some of those who downloaded the app may have done so because they already knew about it and the video jogged their memory so not "influencing" as such.
As flasheart said, old news....obama's team used this data on his campaign trail and nobody raised an eyebrow...trump's team use it and it's suddenly another stick with which to beat him...the losers from the US election really are bitter, it's this kind of fixation on the mundane that will see Trump get reelected....while CNN and the rest focus on alleged Russia links, data harvesting, the size of Trump's hands and whatever porn stars he has or hasn't slept with...Trump will merrily cruise back into the White House in 2020...monkeys learn faster than the left leaning media.
....in more bleeding obvious news, those voice activated search/shopping devices people are clamouring to install in their homes (Alexa, Echo, Google Home, Apple Homepod etc) all have mics and log your searches, history, commands etc like your phone and laptop do...it's obvious what's coming next but it'll be funny anyway in a couple of years time when people get the hump that the listening device they've voluntarily installed in their home is...listening to everything.
Why you would choose to bug yourself is beyond me but it takes all sorts I suppose, Facebook, Apple and Google have shown themselves to be in cahoots with governments and slap dash with your information...don't just give them an easy time of it.
I attended a course recently whereby it started by all of us taking our places at the table, in front of us was a stack of A4 paper of varying heights...the tutor began by telling us that the information in front of us was our entire internet history...skeptical I dived in to have a look; he was right, stuff I'd long forgotten about was staring right back at me...passwords, websites I visited once about 10yrs ago, regular forums, pics I'd thought were secure in the cloud etc...
...this was all accessed in their offices with just my name as the starting point...nobody had to break into my house, nobody bugged my phone etc...and yet people seem surprised this information exists and is used by governments...weird.
Deviant
As flasheart said, old news….obama’s team used this data on his campaign trail and nobody raised an eyebrow…trump’s team use it and it’s suddenly another stick with which to beat him…the losers from the US election really are bitter, it’s this kind of fixation on the mundane that will see Trump get reelected
That's not a valid comparison though, Obama's Facebook campaign was an app which people downloaded willingly with the intention of prompting other Democrats in their friend list to go out and vote - the privileges they okay'd within the app required deliberate, conscious permission. I agree with the latter half of your paragraph though.
footflaps
>And there won’t be, because Facebook won’t reveal what external sites were marketed, who they were marketed to, or the content therein.
Completely missing the point. Just because you see one 10 sec advert (or part thereof more likely) doesn’t mean it changes your behaviour. I’d be more worried by the constant barge of overtly racist material eg we have pretty much all the red-tops spewing out racial hatred / anti-EU messages 7 days a week for years on end. And to cap it all, the PM responds to it all, thus reinforcing the message as legitimate.
Well obviously we'll just go back and forth telling each other we're missing the point but the racism and racial hatred spread by Trump was individually targeted and directed at people's "hot button" issues.
>Oh and $40million dollars spent on Facebook reaches a lot more than it does in print.
Reach figures for adverts on social media are a joke.
Yeah, everything's a joke apart from newspapers. Newspapers and tv news is the real serious business. Remember how they accurately predicted the US election and Brexit? I'm at a loss as to why you think social media is a piffling matter or that print media is somehow more effective. You can reach thousands of people for $10, so I'll just re-iterate that $40 million on Facebook gets a lot more attention than it does in print, and this is before we get into fake Russian accounts and bot farms.
Everyone making the comparison with the previous Obama campaign use of facebook is either a) totally unaware of the differences and therefore should be ignored or b) trying to mislead you and should be ignored. It's another one of those useful diagnostics, like saying "snowflake" unironically.
>Remember how they accurately predicted the US election and Brexit?
What is the relevance of that wrt the racial hatred etc they spew out daily. Virtually no one corrected predicted the elections, so what? That's not proof by any means that FB/CA somehow influenced them.
The main difference with newspapers (bar the odd free one) is people willingly buy them and I guess read them to some extent. The data on how effective social media ads are is zero. The stats on number of views are fraudulent which is why WPP etc are kicking up such a fuss (as they realise they're being charged for 10-100x as many views as there actually are). So, in my mind, there is a big world of difference between the two. If the Mail leads with a controversial headline, it can very often dictate PMQs the next day, you get no such effect from FB ads.
Here is great fact (only one data point) on social media advertising effectiveness. One of the biggest advertisers cut their ad spend by $140m, over concerns about fake viewing figures, and saw no noticeable dip in sales figures. http://adage.com/article/cmo-strategy/p-g-slashe/309936/
To be honest, when the post starts with:
deviant - Member
you can just ignore it anyway. He just copies and pastes shite he’s read elsewhere.
Anyway, this tweet went a bit viral today - I read through a bit of it, but didn’t have time to go through it all. Anybody else come across it?
https://twitter.com/dylanmckaynz/status/976368845635035138?s=21
>somehow it has my entire call history with my partner's mum
I'm guessing from WhatsApp call records.
I think you need to read further through the thread. But yeah, it’s just like a canvasser knocking on your door.
But apply that 1 in 3,500 to a parliamentary constituency of around 70,000...
How can you use the conversion rate on a single viral campaign designed to persuade people to install an app, to make an estimate of how many people's voting intentions were influenced by individually targeted political ads?
Different techniques, different conversion outcome, different everything!
I can believe targeted ads have an effect, because people are dangerously influenced by the most incredible nonsense on the internet. I had Canadian relatives emailing to tell me that the UK had "erased the Holocaust from the curriculum to avoid offending Muslims".