Sunday, October 4, 2020

Facebook critics form their own oversight board [Facebook objects]

Some of Facebook's most vocal critics are tired of waiting for its independent oversight board — so they're starting their own.

A group of about 25 experts from academia, civil rights, politics and journalism announced Friday that they have formed a group to analyze and critique Facebook's content moderation decisions, policies and other platform issues in the run-up to the presidential election and beyond.

The group, which calls itself the Real Facebook Oversight Board, plans to hold its first meeting via Facebook Live on Oct. 1. It will be hosted by Recode founder Kara Swisher, a New York Times contributing opinion writer.

Facebook is still working on creating its own oversight board, first described in April 2018 by CEO Mark Zuckerberg as an independent "Supreme Court" for content moderation decisions. Facebook's board won't launch in time to make any decisions during the presidential race. Its panel of 20 experts is scheduled to start reviewing cases in October, but it will have up to 90 days to make decisions.

The new board started by the critics is a project developed by The Citizens, a U.K.-based advocacy group founded by Guardian and Observer journalist Carole Cadwalladr, whose March 2018 investigation into Facebook's data sharing practices made Cambridge Analytica a household name.

"This is an emergency response," Cadwalladr said. "We know there are going to be a series of incidents leading up to the election and beyond in which Facebook is crucial. This is a real-time response from an authoritative group of experts to counter the spin Facebook is putting out."
Who's on it?
The board is made up of about 25 experts, among them Shoshana Zuboff, author of "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power"; Maria Ressa, a co-founder of the Filipino independent news site Rappler; Rashad Robinson, president of the civil rights nonprofit Color of Change; Derrick Johnson, president of the NAACP; Reed Galen, a co-founder of the conservative anti-Trump super PAC The Lincoln Project; Ruha Benjamin, an associate professor of African American studies at Princeton University; Marietje Schaake, a Dutch politician who is international policy director at Stanford University's Cyber Policy Center; Toomas Hendrik Ilves, the former president of Estonia; Safiya Noble, an associate professor of information studies and African American studies at UCLA; Damian Collins, a member of the British Parliament; tech investor Roger McNamee, a frequent Facebook critic; and ex-CIA officer Yael Eisenstat, former head of election integrity operations for political ads at Facebook.
Guess what? Facebook isn't happy:
When the company learned of it, a representative tracked down the people who funded The Citizens at philanthropic investment firm Luminate, part of Pierre Omidyar's Omidyar Group to express the company's disappointment, said two people familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe private matters.

Those people said Brent Harris, Facebook's director of governance and global affairs, contacted three people involved in funding the project to tell them that they were undermining the company's own effort and playing into the hands of conservative critics of its planned board, including some people in Facebook's Washington, D.C., policy unit, who want to see the effort fail.
Posts on Facebook's oversight board:  Facebook announces new 'values', and Facebook Oversight Board.

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