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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…

BestTestInTheWest ,

I blocked it because bots are stupid. I hated on reddit that every post always had junk comments from the automod and hope that doesn’t carry over to here.

otp OP ,

That’s a great point. Why are the others downvoting when they can simply block it instead? Lol

Raffster ,

So that bot claims fact already in it’s name. I learned to check facts myself. I will never trust automation to do that for me. Also bias and fact are two things that don’t go well together. One is measurable the other not at all. And the downvote is for anything I want to see less of.

otp OP ,

Hmm. I’m not sure if you understand what it is.

MediaBiasFactCheck is a website run by human beings who fact check and bias check various media sources. They assign separate ratings for each source’s bias and credibility.

The bot just checks the website and shares the results for the source of a given post.

I’m not defending it, just explaining what it is since your argument seems to be against something that it’s not.

laughterlaughter ,

To me, bots are just noise if not summoned directly. Like when you’re having a conversation with your friend, then a loud roomba comes in and tries to clean the very space you’re sitting at.

“Hey bot, tell me facts about the article OP posted.”

“Sure! [etc, etc]”

Versus:

“HEY I KNOW YOU HAVEN’T ADDRESSED ME DIRECTLY BUT YOU SAID THE WORD ‘BUTT’ 17 TIMES TODAY!”

Swedneck ,
@Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

i’d appreciate a “butt” counter bot way more

Corkyskog ,

It’s annoying when they are the first comment.

otp OP ,

That’s fair. I like having this bot as a sort of “auto-tag” thing, even if it’s not being summoned manually each time.

andrew_bidlaw ,
@andrew_bidlaw@sh.itjust.works avatar

Too long, doesn’t work right in most apps, makes me think someone commented on the article while there’s only this bot’s post.

WarlockLawyer ,

That last part is the biggest annoyance for me. Gives me false hope a conversation has started

MataVatnik ,
@MataVatnik@lemmy.world avatar

Same

otp OP ,

It bothers me too, but often I’ll see the bot at -5 and there’s still no comments. So I guess most of us just come in, see just the bot, and don’t actually have anything to say and don’t want to comment first, lol

gigachad ,

Because it doesn’t support their agenda. People don’t want news from credible sources but opinions that confirm their world views.

Maalus ,

Bullshit. It has been proven multiple times to be biased with explanations like “this source has never posted untrue things, but we still give it a mixed reliability rating”. It’s an opinion of one dude and it shows.

Hegar ,
@Hegar@fedia.io avatar

I downvoted then blocked it because:

  • I don't trust its specific analysis of sites. Others detail some examples.
  • I don't think whole-site analysis is very useful in combatting misinformation. The reliability and fullness of facts presented by any single site varies a lot depending on the topic or type of story.
  • Other than identifying blatant disinformation sites I don't see what useful information it provides. But even that's rare here and rarely needs a bot to spot.
  • Why is an open-source, de-centralized platform giving free space to a private company?
  • Giving permission for a private trust-assesing company to be operating in an open public forum makes it look as if these assessments reflect a neutral reality that most or all readers would agree on or want to be aware of. It's a service that people can seek out of they decide they trust it.

Presenting this company's assessment on each or most articles gives them undue authority that is especially inappropriate on the fediverse.

scrion ,

Thank you, those are the precise point that summarize my gripes with it. In particular, I feel it encourages people to perceive it as an authoritative source and to form their opinions on sites it rates (often wrongly) without additional thinking / fact checking.

It’s basically a company propaganda tool that can change its own option and ratings any time, influencing others in the process.

Aurenkin ,

Good summary. I think the first point is the most concerning because it’s actively spreading misinformation and giving the appearance of credibility.

otp OP ,

Those are some great points. I do wish we had something better. But I find it to be “good enough” for when it’s a source I’m unfamiliar with.

Can’t quite say I have the time or motivation to start reading a bunch of other articles from a given source when I’m concerned about its credibility.

Hegar ,
@Hegar@fedia.io avatar

TBH, I just don't think something better is possible - I suspect that there are no valid shortcuts to trust.

Unless something is just obviously bullshit, it will always take some time to develop a sense of how the different sources are treating a new story. Even a trusted source can prove unreliable on a particular topic.

It's uncomfortable living with that uncertainty until you've seen a story from enough angles that you can judge for yourself. But either the story is important enough to me to spend that time, or I just accept that I can't really know.

otp OP ,

TBH, I just don’t think something better is possible - I suspect that there are no valid shortcuts to trust.

That’s why I like MBFC. I understand it’s impossible for them to be perfect and unbiased. But no one else is doing that work, so I’ll take what I can get.

Even a trusted source can prove unreliable on a particular topic.

I like the rule of thumb that good sources are more likely to be biased when reporting things internal to their own country. I usually look for the BBC, but if it’s about the UK, I’ll find another source. Al Jazeera is similar.

morphballganon , (edited )

Because it’s biased, takes up too much space, provides nothing of value, and its posts are by definition low effort.

For me to like a bot requires it provides something of value, be unbiased, and not take up too much space.

mashbooq ,

I lost all confidence in it when it rated Jerusalem Post and Euronews (associated with Viktor Orban) as “highly reliable”. Both push the pro-fascist narratives of their associated governments. It’s better to have no labeling than to label fascist propaganda as “highly reliable”

PrivateNoob ,

Fucking hell even Euronews is controlled by Orbán? Ffs there is truly no free media here other than RTL on TVs.

PolyLlamaRous ,

Any thoughts on TLDR (Youtube channel)?

gravitas_deficiency ,

I think they’re pretty decent. Some More News is good too.

PrivateNoob ,

I consistently watch them. Although sometimes they commit some mistakes, but they output pretty decent and easy to digest videos.

FundMECFSResearch ,

Any the branding of anything that is impartial as left center?? Like BBC News, Axios, Yahoo News, Sports Illustrated, left center??

And then the fucking economist which supported the UK conservatives not long ago and supported Bush is branded as left center

zazo ,

Same reason I don’t trust it - imagine rating fking BBC (the literal pro-state violence, austerity supporting, anti-immigration governmental mouth piece as “left-center”)

It just distorts people’s perception of what political biases are and makes them complacent by relying on an automated bot to do the important work of using your own judgment for what constitutes as moral or justified.

By letting it platform itself on lemmy, it’s basically inserting itself as the de facto expert on the topic - so for example, people overseas might see BBC rated as left-center and highly factual and start believing that wanting to “secure your borders” is a thing that UK leftist want. Well excuse me if I don’t want a privately owned (even if open source) US company deciding what political views others should have.

otp OP ,

imagine rating fking BBC (the literal pro-state violence, austerity supporting, anti-immigration governmental mouth piece as “left-center”)

I believe it uses the American standard where anything based in reality is left of “center”, lol

MindTraveller ,

Because fuck Ground News and fuck that spambot

DampSquid ,

Why fuck Ground News?

MindTraveller ,

Their judgement of what’s left, what’s right, and what’s center is arbitrary and misleading.

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

I hate bots

otp OP ,

You can block them

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

I didn’t say I don’t like seeing them, I said I hate them. they represent nothing but spam as far as my emotional response

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

I agree with op, It seems to be in your best interest to block them if they are effecting you that badly.

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

I feel like I really shouldn’t have to. if people genuinely wanted to use your bot, they would opt in

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

they would need to know about it is my only issue with that. It’s better to know and opt out, that way you know that it exists. Otherwise there was resources that nobody would know existed otherwise. A users personal opinion shouldn’t impact other users, and forcing bots to be opt in would impact the people who would want to use them just are unaware they exist.

No other major platform does bots as opt in, and that’s generally the reason for it

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

lol so people’s personal opinions should only affect others so long as the effect is one you agree with? just make it one option for all bots. right when you sign up: do you want to see bots? check yes or no.

this isn’t supposed to be like other major platforms. most sites are concerned with driving engagement and retention, and user-made bots is a really cheap and lazy way to do that.

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

No it would be stupid to think that, however if there is an argument between two ideologies, the side that gives the most Freedom should be the side that’s represented I would have thought the fediverse of all places would agree with that principle.

Secondly that option already exists on at least the three instances I’ve signed up. I figured it was a universal setting, Whether that option actually works or not I’m not sure because I’ve never actually checked it because I don’t mind Bots if there’s one that’s annoying I just block it.

As for your last part, I wouldn’t agree that Bots are a cheap way to drive engagement, most Developers won’t make a bot with the expectation of bringing more users to the platform or drive engagement, they make a bot to fill a gap in utility that the platform is not currently giving, Beit entertainment, moderation, informational. The only platform that I can think actively creates Bots with the intention of increasing monetary value and engagement would be Discord and even then that’s more of a stretch because it’s more Discord forcing the monetary features on the Developers

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

you’re acting like I’m the person who made the argument. that entire first paragraph is an argument against what you said the first time.

I suggested a toggle feature, and you said they already exist and you don’t have a problem with them. so what’s left?

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

I might have not been clear, all my comments have been pro opt-out, not opt-in. I’m not sure where I was confusing in that so I will attempt to clarify

I responded to your comment of if “people genuinely wanted to use your bot, they would opt in” with my statement that that type of system is counterproductive to the freedom of choice that the Fediverse is built off, many people would never know the bot existed in the first place if it just doesn’t show. If you don’t like bots, fine, block them (or disable bot posts in settings if that button works, ive never personally tested it) and move on. Removing the choice from the users is not a fair option because it doesn’t preserve the freedom of the platform, which is giving everyone the choice.

It seemed like you have an actual hatred of bots in general, which is fine, to each their own, so I recommended that rather than subject yourself to having to deal with them, just turn them off. I don’t understand why you would want to subject yourself to seeing something you dislike.

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

I suggested opt in. you stated why you thought that was a bad idea, and mentioned the toggle option. I agreed that the toggle option was good. we have arrived at the same page as far as I can tell

tilefan ,
@tilefan@lemm.ee avatar

also I see this a lot, don’t assume that everybody you meet on here is somehow a part of this monolithic fediverse. constantly I see people surprised to meet someone on this site with a differing opinion from them and they go, “I never thought I’d meet somebody like that HERE”. we are all individuals, and using a site doesn’t mean that you agree with, or even care about, the platform’s core principles.

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

I agree, everyone will have their own opinions of things, I do think there is a good reason to re-enforce the core values of the platform though, as that is the thing that separates this platform from the others. To revoke that would be to fall back against the same values that a lot of people on this platform joined it for, which is a decentralized freedom of choice platform. It was the main advertisement point of the fediverse, the ability to be free of a corporation or “superuser” choice. A lot of the people on the platform are a triage of “refugees” that fled to this platform from various sources either by limitation of speech or by their host site becoming toxic/unusable. As much as I hate “drinking the koolaid” I do have to agree that this the entire point of the freedom of federation is what makes this style of sites better than the other alternatives.

TalesOfTrees ,

I hate it because I also hate pretty much all the bots. Automatic postings, pedantic auto-correction bots… all of them absolutely fucking suck and have contributed directly to how shitty the internet has become.

So fuck bots, and double fuck bot creators.

otp OP ,

You can block them.

I love the autocorrect bots though…There’s a difference between “everyday” and “every day”!! Lol

cdf12345 ,

The text needs to be better formatted . I skipped by it a lot at first because it looks like spam.

Make a cleaner way to display the info

HootinNHollerin , (edited )

Yep. I’m not against it at all in theory but had to block as it’s just taking up way too much space. Should be collapsed to a single line then can expand if want any more

otp OP ,

That might depend on your client. It’s a lot better than it used to be with spoiler tags now

leftzero ,

It labels anything left of outright fascism as “left biased”.

It’s disinformation malware intended to shift the overton window even further right than it already is in the US.

And it’s spam.

otp OP ,

That’s the website, not the bot. I don’t think the website is malware…lol

I think the problem is that the website uses the American standard, where reality is anything left of center

leftzero , (edited )

Malware is ill intentioned software.

The bot is a bot, i.e., software.

It’s intended to drive the overton window right until fascism is perceived as mainstream, and probably beyond, either as a means of imposing fascism on society or to cause chaos and destabilisation, which is evidently ill intentioned in any case.

It’s ill intentioned software, i.e., malware.

It’s also pushing its ill intentioned disinformation onto the community’s users against our will, so it’s also spam, if being malware wasn’t enough.

(As for the website, it’s clearly a disinformation psy-op with the same ill intentions; whether a website counts enough as software to count as malware is open to debate, though, even if its ill intentions are not.)

Pika ,
@Pika@sh.itjust.works avatar

I agree with your statement here, the person who is calling it malware is misusing the term.

In order for it to be classified as malware you need to prove that it’s intentionally being malicious, which from the provided evidence is unable to be done. in fact every step of evidence has been in the opposite direction, just because it gives potentially invalid information from its source doesn’t mean that the bot is malware, the intent is noble, regardless if the information is fully valid or not. You can call the website malware if you like(although that’s still a hard stretch) but the bot wouldn’t be malware, it’s working as intended and doing the job exactly as it described it would be,which is using the website to determine credibility of articles.

Aatube ,

It hides the most important stuff behind accordions and there are some sources for bias & reliability checking the community favors.

Nougat ,

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

otp OP ,

The opinions don’t come from the bot or its creator though

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