6 perspectives on social media's hate problem

The smartest insight and analysis, from all perspectives, rounded up from around the web

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The smartest insight and analysis, from all perspectives, rounded up from around the web:

The massacre at two New Zealand mosques last week was a first, said Kevin Roose at The New York Times: "an ­internet-native mass shooting." The accused gunman, Brenton Tarrant, broadcast the killings live on Facebook, with video designed to pander to the internet's white supremacist subcultures. It was shared on all the major internet platforms, and in the hours following the shooting, not only Facebook but also YouTube, Twitter, and Reddit scrambled to take it down. The shooter's actions beforehand suggest an acute awareness of his audience — he even paused in his broadcast to say "Subscribe to PewDiePie," a reference to a popular right-wing YouTube influencer. The heinous acts were carried out with the knowledge that the platforms "create and reinforce extremist beliefs." They have algorithms that "steer users toward edgier content" and weak policies to contain hate speech, and they've barely addressed how to remove graphic videos. Extremists are exploiting this with increasing skill, said Joan Donovan at The Atlantic. The New Zealand attacker "knew that others would be recording and archiving" his video so that it could be re-uploaded in the wake of removals. In the first 24 hours after the attack, "Facebook alone removed 1.5 million postings of the video" and was still working around the clock days later.

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