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Why are people downvoting the MediaBiasFactChecker bot?

I know MediaBiasFactCheck is not a be-all-end-all to truth/bias in media, but I find it to be a useful resource.

It makes sense to downvote it in posts that have great discussion – let the content rise up so people can have discussions with humans, sure.

But sometimes I see it getting downvoted when it’s the only comment there. Which does nothing, unless a reader has rules that automatically hide downvoted comments (but a reader would be able to expand the comment anyways…so really no difference).

What’s the point of downvoting? My only guess is that there’s people who are salty about something it said about some source they like. Yet I don’t see anyone providing an alternative to MediaBiasFactCheck…

rtxn ,

IIRC, it lists a zionist/anti-Palestine news website as highly trustworthy. I can’t tell which side is right, I have it blocked.

hddsx ,

What does Zionist mean? It hasn’t affected my life enough to actually look it up but I see it on every other article in the Israel/Palestine conflict.

FuglyDuck ,
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

wikipedia has a fairly neutral article on it.

Today, it usually refers to one of two groups- the far right political faction in Israel that believe there can be no peace with a two state solution (i.e. no Palestine,) and that it’s their god-given right to murder all palestinians to acheive peace…

Or the christian zionists that support them because their own faith says their god won’t come to save them until they- the jews- rebuild their temple. or something. Fundies get weird.

hddsx ,

What? Wasn’t Israel originally the Palestine before a part of Palestine was designated Israel?

Lemminary ,

Precisely. Wtf.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/3966c698-c155-401a-9a68-cf270503790b.png

FuglyDuck , (edited )
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

How far back do you want to go?

If we’re talking Bronze Age, then the exodus didn’t happen. Or rather, only a small handful of refugees showed up and their story eventually became assimilated into Judaea’s and Israel’s cultural narrative.

Tracing ancestry back that far is problematic, but both cultures have equally valid and long standing claims to the region.

It’s like the Hatfield and McCoy feud, except it’s existed since the start of the Bronze Age (or earlier,)

In more modern history, Palestine was a British colony taken during ww1 as the leftovers of the Ottoman Empire, when the Palestine Mandate was done in an attempt to back out, and Jewish militants attacked everyone involved eventually leading to the creation of the current State of Israel.

gedaliyah ,
@gedaliyah@lemmy.world avatar

No, but that’s a common misconception. Palestine has never previously been a country, but was a region of the Ottoman Empire, then a part of the British Empire that more or less consisted of modern day Israel, Palestine, and Jordan.

Under the Ottomans and the British, there was a Jewish minority, mostly in the region of Palestine, but also in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, etc.

Starting in the 1800s, Jews living in Europe began to move to the region in larger numbers (as well as Jews living in other parts of the Middle East and Africa). This was primarily motivated by antisemitic events in Europe, but also similar to the national movements that led to Prussia becoming Germany, the pan-Arab movement, re-establishing Poland, etc.

Here is a photo of the 1931 Palestinian football team that included Palestinian Jews as well as Palestinian Arabs.

warm ,

Zionism is an ideology that believes in a Jewish state consisting of mainly Jews and which claim the land of Palestine. So Zionists want to take over Palestine to extend their Jewish state as they believe that land to be theirs.

(Correct me if I am wrong)

AbouBenAdhem ,

Sites can be biased and tendentious without being factually inaccurate, though.

my_hat_stinks ,

It’s possible to factually accurate with heavy bias, but since that would require selective reporting to enforce a single worldview I wouldn’t consider that “highly trustworthy”.

Consider the following hypothetical headlines:
“Teen Killed by Islamic Group During Shooting”
“Terrorist Shooting at Mosque, 20 Dead”

Both are technically factually accurate ways to describe a hypothetical scenario where a teen shoots up a place of worship before being stopped by one of the victims, but they both paint very different pictures. Would you consider both sources “highly trustworthy”?

Rottcodd ,

The alternative is to use your own brain.

The fact that people are so often so ignorant and/or ideologically blinkered that they can’t see plain bias when it’s staring them in the face is the problem, and relying on a bot to tell you what to believe does not in any way, shape or form help to solve that problem. If anything, it makes it even worse.

SteveFromMySpace ,

If you think you’re “immune” to the influence of biased sources you’re wrong.

imPastaSyndrome ,

I don’t think that’s what they’re saying at all, but I’d say if you think the bot’s source is then I don’t know what to tell you

SteveFromMySpace ,

No I think MBFC is very questionable at times

Rottcodd ,

Of course I’m not “immune” - nobody and nothing is perfect.

But I pay attention and weigh and analyze and review and question, which beats the shit out of slavishly believing whatever I read.

SteveFromMySpace ,

So you have a very high opinion of your own discretion but assume everyone else is trash or what?

Where would you put yourself as a percentile? Let’s get granular here.

Rottcodd ,

The only competition here is between relying on ones own judgment vs. relying on a third party.

SteveFromMySpace ,

I didn’t say it was a competition or anything remotely like that. Please show me where I did if you believe otherwise.

I am just asking for an honest assessment of how you perceive your own judgment. So are you going to answer or not?

Rottcodd ,

I didn’t say it was a competition or anything remotely like that. Please show me where I did if you believe otherwise.

Okay

So you have a very high opinion of your own discretion but assume everyone else is trash or what?

Where would you put yourself as a percentile?

Right there. Obviously. In fact, that’s the exact point of a percentile - it’s a ranking system, which is to say, a competition.

So are you going to answer or not?

No.

14th_cylon ,

But I pay attention and weigh and analyze and review and question

and you do all that based on facts.

you can analyze, review and question facts and then form an opinion, but first step is to be able to trust the facts you read and that is where the rating of the source may be useful (if you are not already familiar with said source).

unless “using your own brain” is euphemism for discarding facts which doesn’t fit your opinion, then you indeed don’t need to know anything about trustworthiness of the source 😂

Rottcodd ,

No - actually I do the bulk of it based on presentation.

“Facts” fall into two categories - ones that can be independently verified, which are generally reported accurately regardless of bias, and ones that cannot be independently verified, which should be treated as mere possibilities, the likelihood of which can generally be at least better judged by the rest of the article. In neither case are the nominal facts particularly relevant.

Rather, if for instance the article has an incendiary title, a buried lede and a lot of emotive language, that clearly implies bias, regardless of the nominal facts.

That still doesn’t mean or even imply that it’s factually incorrect, and to the contrary, the odds are that it’s technically not - most journalists at least possess the basic skill of framing things such that they’re not technically untrue. If nothing else, they can always fall back on the tried and true, “According to informed sources…” phrasing. That phrase can then be followed by literally anything, and in order to be true, all it requires is that somebody who might colorably be called an “informed source” said it.

The assertion itself doesn’t have to be true, because they’re not reporting that it’s true. They’re just reporting that someone said that it’s true.

So again, nominal facts aren’t really the issue. Bias is better recognized by technique, and that’s something that any attentive reader can learn to recognize.

14th_cylon ,

In neither case are the nominal facts particularly relevant.

Double facepalm.

14th_cylon ,

It sounds like if the bot did not like your favorite source…

Rottcodd ,

No it doesn’t. That assumption just fits the strawman living inside your head.

Eutent ,

Bias can be subtle and take work to suss out, especially if you’re not familiar with the source.

After getting a credibility read of mediabiasfactcheck itself (which I’ve done only superficially for myself), it seems to be a potentially useful shortcut. And easy to block if it gets annoying.

Rottcodd ,

The main problem that I see with MBFC, aside from the simple fact that it’s a third party rather than ones own judgment (which is not infallible, but should still certainly be exercised, in both senses of the term) is that it appears to only measure factuality, which is just a tiny part of bias.

In spite of all of the noise about “fake news,” very little news is actually fake. The vast majority of bias resides not in the nominal facts of a story, but in which stories are run and how they’re reported - how those nominal facts are presented.

As an example, admittedly exaggerated for effect, compare:

Tom walked his dog Rex.

with

Rex the mangy cur was only barely restrained by Tom’s limp hold on his thin leash.

Both relay the same basic facts, and it’s likely that by MBFC’s standards, both would be rated the same for that reason alone. But it’s plain to see that the two are not even vaguely similar.

Again, exaggerated for effect.

just2look ,

MBFC doesn’t only count how factual something is. They very much look at inflammatory language like that, and grade a media outlet accordingly. It’s just not in the factual portion, it is in the bias portion. Which makes sense since, like you said, both stories can be factually accurate.

xmunk ,

Some people are pissed that the format is spammy? That’s the complaint I’ve heard.

I’d certainly prefer something like post tagging/labels but within the current feature set of lemmy I think it’s about as good as it could be.

Don_Dickle ,

I have never seen a bot that does good. Got sick of them on reddit and other sites. So when I see it here which is my safe haven. I will downvote or report it because it has not place here.

mp3 ,
@mp3@lemmy.ca avatar

Or you can just block it to hide it…

Don_Dickle ,

Fuck that…not getting on admins or anything but sites need to get rid of bots unless they pay the site. And also get rid of clickbait shit that I saw on reddit but not here yet.

mp3 ,
@mp3@lemmy.ca avatar

The bot is made by the instance admins themselves, so don’t expect the bot to go away.

Bob_Robertson_IX ,

So, because you don’t like bots, they shouldn’t be made available to others who appreciate them? Fuck that.

The beauty of Lemmy is that you are in control of what you see, but that makes that you have to control it. Stop trying to dictate that I can’t have bots from instances that allow them.

Lemminary ,

There’s a setting you can toggle on the web UI. I hope it’s supported on mobile apps.

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/75ff4159-b691-41aa-adee-41c5f4df22e5.png

mp3 ,
@mp3@lemmy.ca avatar

Enabling that option will also have an effect on mobile apps.

tyler ,

The bot was literally added by the instance admins. You think they should pay themselves???

Crazyslinkz ,

That’s what I said and was down voted for it. Oh well, that’s life on lemmy.

Also did that, blocked the bot.

Carrolade ,

!remindme 1 week

MindTraveller ,

I like the converts to metric bot on Reddit

ShepherdPie ,

That’s my gripe with it. Its single comment fills the entire screen of my phone when scrolling past and it uses gigantic font, a big separator line (?), and links mixed with text mixed with more links.

Additionally, it fucks with the “new comment” and “hot” sorting, depending on how active Lemmy is at the time, by spamming post after post with a comment even though there is no actual discussion happening.

NewNewAccount ,

You should use a client that supports all of the text formatting. On Voyager the bot’s comment is smaller than most when collapsed (which it is by default).

idiomaddict ,

And because it uses spoilers, when I click it to collapse the comment, it just expands

treadful , (edited )
@treadful@lemmy.zip avatar

I for one, appreciate that bot.

Lemminary ,

Same here, it’s becoming a habit to check every source.

imPastaSyndrome ,

Other people clearly don’t think it’s a helpful resourcem

You don’t have to have an alternative in order to disagree.

That’s not how life works.

Just because I don’t know the formula of Hydrochloric acid doesnt mean I can’t disagree with someone saying it’s Barium and Oxygen

ccunning ,

Other people clearly don’t think it’s a helpful resourcem

They should block it.

It gets weird when folks start trying to keep everyone else from having it available as a resource.

Carrolade ,

Unless your goal is to spread misinformation. Anyone that knowingly wants to spread propaganda is going to severely dislike it and be forced to come up with some excuse to be against it, that is more acceptable than “it keeps telling me my russian propaganda is bullshit”.

We do have a small pro-Russian contingent on here after all. We also occasionally get a MAGA type.

Personally I do appreciate it, the wikipedia and Ground News links are convenient, I would occasionally manually google those anyway. News consumption is one of the main reasons I’m on here in the first place though, so I might be an outlier in that regard.

ccunning ,

Unless your goal is to spread misinformation

EXACTLY
This is why anyone vehemently opposed to it is an instant 🚩for me

ShepherdPie ,

Can you even point to a post where the bot calls the source out as propaganda (in whatever choice of words it would use to indicate this) or highly untrustworthy? I’ve literally never seen it say anything but left, left center, or center on any source and usually always highly trustworthy or trustworthy.

Carrolade ,

No, it will not specifically identify propaganda. Could just check their entry for RT if you wanted, I’ve never bothered to look. That’s a Kremlin funded publication though.

ccunning ,

Some folks are just angry it exists and downvote it no matter what.

I’ll downvote it sometimes, early in the discussion, to get other comments above it and get it out of the way, but only if the source is a reliable one. I only ever really upvote it if I think the source needs attention called to it.

SpeakinTelnet ,
@SpeakinTelnet@sh.itjust.works avatar

“Oh, this new post already has a comment, let’s check it out! … Dang it!”

After the third or fourth time it’s just spammy, and the bot formatting just doesn’t work on connect.

mp3 ,
@mp3@lemmy.ca avatar

the bot formatting just doesn’t work on connect.

That fault lies with the Connect dev though… the formatting used on the webUI works as intended.

SpeakinTelnet ,
@SpeakinTelnet@sh.itjust.works avatar

Probably, still remains that out of all the bots I’ve seen this is the only one with format issues. I believe a minimalist approach to be preferable for bots since their goal is spreading information over a large userbase with various client, from CLI to native web page.

goldteeth ,

“Oh, this new post already has a comment, let’s check it out! … Dang it!”

That’s pretty much my gripe. One time I saw a post with maybe six, seven comments, opened it up, and they were all either the bot, or replies to the bot.

And even if you block the bot the post still shows up as having comments. So you’ll open up a post boasting the aforementioned six or seven comments expecting to find a lively debate, or at least a wisecrack about global affairs, and leave with a bunch of tumbleweeds and the lingering knowledge that somewhere, two or more people are arguing with a machine about whether or not it thinks the newspaper is any good.

mp3 ,
@mp3@lemmy.ca avatar

It would be nice if bot comments weren’t counted, at least as an option.

HottieAutie ,

“Oh, this new post already has a comment, let’s check it out! … Dang it!”

Downvoting doesn’t address this. You can try hiding bots tho.

FuglyDuck ,
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

What’s the point of downvoting? My only guess is that there’s people who are salty about something it said about some source they like. Yet I don’t see anyone providing an alternative to MediaBiasFactCheck…

To express dissatisfaction.

There’s a lot of people that view the MBFC reports as themselves being biased, and to be fair, their process for generating the reports are opaque as fucking hell so we have no way to know how biased or not they are.

it’s also kinda spammy, and- IMO- not really all that useful.

just2look ,

Why do you say they’re opaque? They detail the history of the publication, the ownership, their analysis of bias within their reporting, and give examples of failed fact checks. I’m not sure what else you could want about how a publication is rated? I’m not saying it’s perfect, but they seem to be putting a solid effort into explaining how they arrive at the ratings they give.

FuglyDuck ,
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

Because their methodology is nothing but buzzwords:

The primary aim of our methodology is to systematically evaluate the ideological leanings and factual accuracy of media and information outlets. This is achieved through a multi-faceted approach that incorporates both quantitative metrics and qualitative assessments in accordance with our rigorously defined criteria.

Despite apparently having “rigorously defined criteria”, they don’t actually say what they are.

just2look ,

They literally publish their methodology and scoring system.

mediabiasfactcheck.com/methodology/

So they do say exactly what their criteria is, and how it is scored. None of that is buzz words, it’s just a summary that fit in a few sentences. You can look at the full methodology if you want more than just that small bullet description.

I’m not saying that you have to agree with their scoring, or that it is necessarily accurate. I just think if you’re going to critique a thing, you should at least know what you’re critiquing.

Artisian ,
@Artisian@lemmy.world avatar

Bravo for bringing the notes. On a first glance, some of these feel like they require subjectivity (like, do we really believe the political spectrum is 1d?), but I agree I could run the computation myself from this.

just2look ,

There is definitely some subjectivity. Language isn’t something that is easily parsed and scored. That is why they give examples on the actual report about the kind of biased language they saw, or whatever other issues led to the score given.

I don’t think they mean for their website to be the end all bias resource. More of a stepping off point for you to make your own judgments.

protist ,

It’s crucial to note that our bias scale is calibrated to the political spectrum of the United States, which may not align with the political landscapes of other nations.

But what even is this false left-right, liberal-conservative, Democrat-Republican one-dimensional scale? The first thing they state on this page is that all this is inherently subjective. Who is MBFC to determine where the middle of this scale exists? If people want to seek out their opinion, that’s fine, but this is inherently a subjective opinion about what constitutes “left center” vs “center,” for example. I don’t get how MBFC deserves their opinion on every news post.

Also the formatting of the bot is awful as displayed on most Lemmy apps. On mine it’s a giant wall of text. Other posts/bots don’t look bad, just this one.

just2look ,

They cover what they consider left and right. This way you can judge whether it aligns with what you believe. And it allows you to interpret their results even if they don’t follow the same spectrum you do.

And if you know of a way to discuss political spectrum without subjectivity I would love to hear it. Even if you don’t use a 2d spectrum, it’s still subjective. Just subjective with additional criteria.

mediabiasfactcheck.com/left-vs-right-bias-how-we-…

protist ,

And if you know of a way to discuss political spectrum without subjectivity I would love to hear it.

Of course that doesn’t exist, my point is why does this specific subjective opinion get promoted on here?

just2look ,

Why does any opinion get promoted on here? Because somebody posted it. And then there is a voting system and comments for people to express their agreement or disagreement.

I honestly don’t care either way if the bot exists. I just think it’s silly that people are claiming that MBFC is terrible based on basically nothing. You can disagree with how they define left vs right, or what their ratings are, but they are pretty transparent about how their system works. And no one has given any example of how it could be done better.

tyler ,

Also if you actually read and understand their system, then even if you dont agree with it, you can recalibrate the ratings based on what you know their system works like.

superkret ,

It shouldn’t be done on Lemmy at all, which is why I downvote the bot every time I see it.

FuglyDuck ,
@FuglyDuck@lemmy.world avatar

Oh look. You copied my link!

Sorry. No they don’t.

That’s not “rigorously defined”. It’s a bunch of weasel words and vagaries.

For example. In “factual reporting”, to get a “very high” score:

A source with a “Very High” rating is consistently factual, relies on credible information, promptly corrects errors, and has never failed any fact checks in news reporting or opinion pieces.

What does “consistently factual” mean? What qualifies as “a credible source”? What does “prompt” mean?

Those are all nice sounding words, but they don’t really tell you anything. Prompt could be anything from seconds to weeks. (And let’s be honest, probably varies from researcher to researcher.)

Oh they go into more detail….

A questionable source, for example:

Questionable sources display extreme bias, propaganda, unreliable sourcing, or a lack of transparency. They may also engage in disseminating fake news for profit or influence. Such sources are generally unreliable and require fact-checking on an article-by-article basis. A source lacking transparency in mission, ownership, or authorship is automatically categorized as questionable. Additionally, sources from countries with significant government censorship are also deemed questionable.

Who defines their extreme bias? What is propaganda?

Voice of America is literally a government ran propaganda service yet they assign it high factual, least-biased and high credibility.

Sorry, but their methodology isn’t a methodology, and the only thing that’s inherently reproducible is their fact check rating. Everything else relies on what their subjective analysis.

just2look ,

Consistently factual is exactly that. Both of those words mean actual things. And they go on to say that they can’t fail fact checks. And prompt corrections likely means that as a story develops, that if there were incorrect things reported, they are corrected as soon as the new information is available.

As for who defines extreme bias, it’s literally them. That is what they are saying they are doing. And they spell out what their left vs right criteria are. And how they judge it. Of course this is subjective. There isn’t really a way to judge the political spectrum without subjectivity. They do include examples in their reports about what biased language, sources, or reporting they found. Which allows you to easily judge whether you agree with it.

As for VOA, they say in the ownership portion that it is funded by the US government and that some view it as a propaganda source. They also discuss the history and purpose of it being founded. And then continue on with the factual accuracy and language analysis. You may not agree with it, but it is following their own methodology, and fully explained in the report.

Again, there isn’t anything saying you have to agree with them. It is a subjective rating. I’m not sure how much more transparent they can be though. They have spelled out how they grade, and each report provides explanations and examples that allow you to make your own judgments. Or a starting point for your own research.

If you can define a completely objective methodology to judge political bias on whatever spectrum you choose, then please do. It’s inherently subjective. And there isn’t really a way around that.

finley ,

On each page, they describe, in detail, exactly how they come to their conclusions.

While you may disagree with what they have to say, to claim they’re hiding anything or that they aren’t being transparent or arbitrary is just untrue.

Toes ,

I really like it, but I can see people being upset if it doesn’t align with their world view.

aleph , (edited )
@aleph@lemm.ee avatar

I used to be a fan of it, but in the past couple of years I’ve seen MBFC rate sources as “highly credible” that are anything but, particularly on issues involving geopolitics. That, plus the inherent unreliability of attempting to fix an entire news outlet to a single point on a simple Left <-> Right spectrum, has rendered it pretty useless, in my opinion.

There days I’m much more of the opinion that it’s best to read a variety of sources, both mainstream and independent, and consider factors like

  1. is this information well-sourced?
  2. is there any obvious missing context?
  3. is this information up to date?
  4. what are the likely ideological biases of this writer or publication?
  5. What is the quality of the evidence provided to support the claims made in the article?

And so on. It’s much better this way than outsourcing your critical thinking to a third party who may be using a flawed methodology.

Artisian ,
@Artisian@lemmy.world avatar

Would you then be posting your conclusions? Like, if you’re gonna do that work on some of these posts anyway… may as well share.

aleph ,
@aleph@lemm.ee avatar

When I was on in Reddit I used to do it all the time, but writing everything out, organizing it and including citations etc. can be rather time-intensive.

These days, I’ll leave a quick comment on a post if I have enough time, but nothing major.

Wrench ,

I find it useful at a glance, specifically when I don’t recognize a niche source. There’s a lot of “alt” media under random names. This helps flag them.

For mainstream, you can easily make your own call. You should be exposed to enough of it.

RightHandOfIkaros ,

Lemmy users are super allergic to bots of any kind, so I would imagine most of them don’t look past the fact that its a bot and don’t care what it does or what it is about. Its a bot and bots are always bad in their eyes.

DrBob ,

I blocked that annoying piece of shit. It added nothing to discussion.

andyburke ,
@andyburke@fedia.io avatar

Comment sections are for comments.

This is the fediverse. I feel like these kinds of bots should be emitting something other than a comment, just a generic "metadata" might be good. Then work to get that adopted by the various platforms.

Because comment sections should be a place for people.

Aatube ,

to be fair, metadata would be hard to federate. here at mbin we have attached media with real alt text separate from the post body and lemmy still doesn't have that

andyburke ,
@andyburke@fedia.io avatar

FWIW, there's a reason I prefer mbin instances.

I feel like some amount of variation among fediverse software is exactly how we should try to suss all this out.

I just vote to keep comment sections for humans.

(I realize I can block and I do and I will, still want to shout my opinion into the storm for a second.)

BackOnMyBS ,
@BackOnMyBS@lemmy.autism.place avatar

I like that they get downvoted because it puts the comment at the bottom. Knowing it’s there, I can scroll down to check it if I want to see what it says. It’ snot like downvoting it hides it or affects some long-standing karma number.

Nougat ,

Because I don’t trust some internet rando’s bot to have my best interests in mind.

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