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evelyn douek Profile picture
evelyn douek
@evelyndouek
Aussie struggling with °F & online speech stuff. SJD @Harvard_Law Fellow @knightcolumbia Words @lawfareblog Affiliate @BKCHarvard
Oct 21, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
This chart from the @OversightBoard's first transparency report is interesting: appeals asking the Board to order fb to *restore* content VASTLY outnumbered requests to *remove* content

This is not what a lot of discourse around fb would have led you to assume, I think! Image This is despite the fact that for take-downs, only the user whose content was removed could appeal. In the latter, theoretically anyone that saw and flagged a piece of content that was left up could appeal...
Sep 16, 2021 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
This is a really imp policy update reflects cross-industry trends & something ppl have been calling for: looking at coordination between *real* people (not just fake accts) & looking at *off*-platform harms

Will raise a whole bunch of tricky qs tho...

reuters.com/technology/exc… When you're looking at real people ("authentic" behavior), where is the line between social mvmts and activist campaigns and problematic platform manipulation?
Sep 15, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The Facebook Files reporting is incredible, necessary & damning. And misleading the public about it is inexcusable. But this stuff must exist in other platforms too, right? Why are they less leaky? Will this disincentivize this kind of research in future? How do we stop that? Thinking a lot about Dave Pozen's work on transparency this week....

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…
Sep 14, 2021 • 17 tweets • 6 min read
The @OversightBoard was in the news again yesterday, but here's another decision that doesn't involve any celebrities or, you know, Trump so will get less attention but to my mind is substantively really important.

A quick thread 🧵 /1 @OversightBoard Facebook took down a post from a user in Egypt that was sharing a post from the verified Al Jazeera Arabic page about a threat from Al-Qassam Brigades, an armed group and militant wing of Hamas.

The user reposted it with a neutral caption. /2
Aug 2, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
She speaks!! tl;dr: "We're already awesome, but see the writing on the wall about regulation so here's some stuff we're happy for you to do"

Honestly, a lot of this could've been written by Zuckerberg, but I have always appreciated YT's candor on this point. It's not highfalutin principles:
Jul 19, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
This is such incredible and important reporting about a totally undercovered part of content moderation that is such a huge and underappreciated driver: ad tech.

@swodinsky followed the $$ @swodinsky No one is good at this Image
Jul 15, 2021 • 18 tweets • 5 min read
This is a good & useful document and I'm glad Fb is going to start releasing them. It's hard to read this document and not conclude that the @OversightBoard has had a beneficial impact on fb's operations well beyond individual cases (tho I'm sure some will manage it)

But ... /1 @OversightBoard It's hard to assess the extent of that impact bc a lot of the language here is very vague (and it's also hard to conclude that's not intentional)

Here's one that really bugs me, about the role of automation in fb's content moderation. /2
Jul 8, 2021 • 18 tweets • 6 min read
There is ... a lot in this decision and its recommendations that go far beyond the individual case. The Board continues to push for systemic change despite its limited remit (and steps up to provide the more specific guidance it didn't in the Trump case).

A few notes... Fb reversed the decision before the Board decided it noting it was in error. The Board, in keeping w the mootness doctrine it's developing (still weird to say that kinda thing about a private thingamajig) kept the case anyway to check why fb made the mistake in the 1st place
Jul 7, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Democrats have literally written letters to platforms naming individual accounts they should take down where the speech is protected speech and it strikes me as short-sighted that people don't care more about this...

vox.com/recode/2021/4/… this foreigner gets very confused about when there will or won't be cries about the first amendment
Jul 1, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
“GETTR holds freedom of speech as its core value and does not wish to censor your opinions. Nonetheless, you may not post … any… harmful … vulgar … profane, hateful … or otherwise objectionable material”

.... I... this... it's... is this trolling?
Jun 24, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
although not framed this way, i actually think this article is pretty good advertising for fb's efforts at fighting political group recommendations

themarkup.org/citizen-browse… 5 month period Image
Jun 2, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Honestly, pretty meta how many big journalist accounts are getting this wrong good engagement though
Jun 2, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Conversations about content moderation often feel like complaining that the food is terrible and the portions are too small: It’s bad and there should be more. But more content moderation is not always better moderation.

*ducks*

wired.com/story/more-con… It’s nice to think that we can content-moderate society to a happier & healthier information environment or the worst social disruptions of the past few yrs could have been prevented if more posts had been taken down. But fixing social & political problems will be much harder
May 26, 2021 • 18 tweets • 4 min read
Another example of the Board interpreting international human rights law to be more speech protective and fact-specific than fb, a private company applying content moderation rules at scale... /1 It's an easy case on its facts. Calling someone a "cowardly bot" doesn't seem a particularly offensive insult, especially in the context of a heated political protest /2
May 20, 2021 • 16 tweets • 4 min read
Another geopolitically fraught decision from the FOB. The bottom line is obviously important & may cause problems for Facebook in Turkey.

But there are important details in the opinion: it's fundamentally a decision abt which side of the line to err on in making mistakes. 🧵 /1 The question here was about the "two buttons" meme and what to do when it's not clear whether the user is intending to condemn/satirize or embrace the statements in the post. Here "The Armenians were terrorists that deserved it” /2
May 6, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
These are truly extraordinary statistics about the effectiveness of giving users the *gentlest possible* of nudges just asking them to pause & consider a potentially offensive reply tweet.

Imagine if platforms designed for thoughtfulness overall?

blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/p… Image This kind of thinking, outside the false take-down/leave-up binary of content moderation, is popping up more and more, is exciting, and is surely the way forward
Apr 29, 2021 • 19 tweets • 6 min read
This is a strong, important & timely decision, esp in light of Facebook's enforcement mistakes around #ResignModi yesterday.

There's some really important recommendations here. Facebook has 30 days to respond and that'll be worth watching.

A few things worth highlighting /1 The case concerned a video that was critical of Modi & the BJP. Facebook removed it under its Dangerous Orgs policy. It was a mistake, & when the Board selected the case, but before it decided, fb said it got it wrong and reversed the decision. /2
Apr 21, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
I wrote about something Facebook should break more often: the glass in front of its toxic content dial

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… Facebook can turn down the distribution on "borderline content" that approaches the line of breaking the rules. And it does, in emergency situations. But it's never explained why it doesn't do that all the time.
Mar 16, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Content Moderation in the stack watch

This is an incredibly useful article. The obvious fact that we need different approaches for different services/layers goes underappreciated.

We've been here before: a Universalizing approach does not work That's the easy part, though. Working out the different obligations in different contexts is the hard part, and we've barely started.
Feb 17, 2021 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
"Content-moderation decisions are momentous but they are as momentous as they are bc of fb’s engineering decisions & other choices that determine which speech proliferates... & in what context [users] see it"

Great op-ed by @JameelJaffer & @KGlennBass

nytimes.com/2021/02/17/opi… I think it's unlikely the @OversightBoard will take their recommendation to refuse to answer the question abt Trump's account until fb commissions & publishes a study abt the lead up to Jan. 6

(Altho I think it should and likely will recommend such a study in their decision)
Feb 11, 2021 • 17 tweets • 6 min read
It's quite remarkable to see the extent of serious engagement with the public comment process at the fb @OversightBoard re: Trump's account

Here's a strong letter from, amongst others, @rickhasen, @davidakaye and @alexstamos

politico.com/f/?id=00000177… Things I'm curious about:
1. If the decision goes against public comment, will that discourage future participation?
2. Level of intl engagement
3. If future overseas cases can also garner such considered engagement (I sure hope so!)