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8 Nov, 6 tweets, 2 min read
This is the second straight day that Facebook's top posts are mostly from large news outlets versus right-wing Facebook pages.

It could reflect something about the election. But given how sharp and sudden the change has been, I bet Facebook changed its algorithm.
This was the top 10 a week ago:
And let me be clear: I am merely speculating about an algorithm change.

We don't know what happened here because the Facebook computer code that governs which posts and news more than a billion people see is a black box.
And kudos to @kevinroose for keeping track of this each day so we can actually have shot at deciphering the algorithm!
This is also a smart and probably more likely explanation:
Yesterday I suggested that Facebook might have changed its algorithm because news outlets had replaced right-wing Facebook pages on this daily list of top posts.

I think I spoke too soon. Here's today's update:

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More from @jacknicas

Jack Nicas Profile picture
7 Nov
Let's fact check the latest big voter-fraud claim: Software glitches misreported votes in Michigan.

Facts: One county caught and fixed an error in its unofficial tallies. This came even before a 2nd layer of thorough checks designed to catch such issues.
freep.com/story/news/pol…
So: Yes, there was an error in the unofficial vote tally for one Michigan county.

And then county workers checked the numbers, discovered the error and fixed it. This was all before the official vote-count verification, which is more thorough & is designed to catch such issues.
We know this because of reporting by @paulegan4 at the Detroit Free Press.

State officials said the error occurred because Antrim County didn't update its election-management software.

The vote count was accurate. The problem came when the unofficial tally went to the state. Image
Read 12 tweets
Jack Nicas Profile picture
6 Nov
NEW: Conservative Twitter exploded yesterday with claims of proof that dead people voted in Michigan.

We looked into it. The evidence indicates that this was not fraud, but rather something much less salacious: Run-of-the-mill clerical errors.
nytimes.com/2020/11/06/tec…
It began Wednesday night with tweets from @fleccas, an Ivy League offensive lineman turned right-wing internet journalist.

He had indeed found some bizarre voter files on the state of Michigan website. It appeared people born between 1900 and 1902 had sent in absentee ballots.
By Thursday morning, his posts were the talk of the Republican internet. Candace Owens, James Woods, Jack Posobiec were all sharing them, reaching millions of people. The Gateway Pundit put up a story. This was clear proof of election fraud, many said.
Read 16 tweets
Jack Nicas Profile picture
4 Nov
President Trump just tweeted again about claims of "secretly dumped ballots" for Biden in Michigan.

This is false.

These claims are based on screenshots of a mistaken unofficial tally on one site's election map that was caused by a typo that was corrected in about 30 minutes.
I know this because I just spent all day reporting it out.

I spoke to the election official in Shiawassee County who made the mistake; the election-data provider that reported it; and even the Republican consultant who tweeted the images that went viral. nytimes.com/live/2020/2020…
Here is that Republican consultant, @MattMackowiak, owning up to the fact that his screenshots did NOT show election fraud but rather an honest mistake that was quickly corrected.

“I certainly wasn’t intending to make a typo appear fraudulent,” he said.
Read 10 tweets
Jack Nicas Profile picture
3 Nov
New data shows that YouTube has cut its recommendations of fringe channels, helping reduce its spread of disinformation.

The changes have also had a knock-on effect: Fox News is now YouTube's most recommended channel alongside election-related videos. nytimes.com/2020/11/03/tec…
In several recent analyses by @gchaslot & @MarcFaddoul of recommendations on popular news videos, YouTube consistently steered people toward Fox News more than any other channel, sometimes by a wide margin.

The most promoted clips were largely of @seanhannity & @TuckerCarlson.
Fox News also far outperforms other news outlets on Facebook.

Here are the top Facebook pages ranked by their share of total interactions with posts that mentioned the election, Biden or Trump over the past week. (Interactions are the only such data FB makes available.) Image
Read 6 tweets
Jack Nicas Profile picture
18 Oct
NEW: A network of 1,300 websites targeting small towns and cities across the U.S. is built not on traditional journalism, but rather propaganda ordered up by Republican groups and P.R. firms.

A nearly yearlong investigation by @daveyalba and me:
nytimes.com/2020/10/18/tec…
The Sioux City Times, Muskegon Sun and Pine State News might look like ordinary local-news outlets, but behind the scenes, many stories are directed by political groups & P.R. firms to promote Republican candidates & companies, or smear their rivals. pinestatenews.com
Here's an example from the hotly contested Senate race in Maine.

This story on Maine Business Daily quotes the @SenatorCollins campaign that her
opponent, @SaraGideon, is a hypocrite. It doesn't include comment from the Gideon campaign.
mainebusinessdaily.com/stories/513151…
Read 10 tweets
Jack Nicas Profile picture
30 Jul
Today's economic news:

The U.S. GDP collapsed and the four Big Tech companies reported blowout earnings.

It's rare that the story tells itself this well.
Amazon sales were up 40% and its profit doubled (!) to $5.2 billion, blowing away Wall Street expectations in a way that makes you wonder whether Wall Street knows what it's talking about.

Here's @KYWeise:
nytimes.com/live/2020/07/3…
Facebook surely is hurting given the ad boycotts, right?

Nah. Profits nearly doubled to $5.2 billion.

@MikeIsaac explains:
nytimes.com/live/2020/07/3…
Read 7 tweets

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