Just a little documentation here to demonstrate an example of the ongoing ridiculous actions of a social media platform known as Facebook by Meta. The same social media platform with an algorithm that apparently misinterpreted a photo of a Portillo’s hot dog for a photo of a male sexual organ a few years ago — and suspended CARDINAL NEWS Facebook activities for about an hour — has now taken down a “matter of fact” article about another restaurant that closed in Arlington Heights.
Just to be facetious, and just to play it on the safe side, CARDINAL NEWS is using care not to mention the restaurant name in this article, or maybe ever, ever again. Let’s just say the name of the restaurant is now on our internal list of forbidden speech.
CARDINAL NEWS — published on March 14, 2022 — news of the restaurant closure at 407 South Arlington Heights Road in Arlington Heights.
By March 16, 2022 the severely unintelligent social platform known as Facebook took down the news article from a group timeline known as the Arlington High School Alumni Group. Occasionally old-time memories are shared on the timeline, and the news of the old restaurant’s closure made the cut. The restaurant was a favorite of many who grew up and lived in Arlington Heights in the 1970s and 1980s. During the two days prior to being taken down by Facebook, the article had already run its popularity course, gaining about 380 Shares and 200 Likes.
However, the article didn’t make the cut on Facebook because it “violates ‘Our standards on spam.'” Regarding the article, Facebook claimed, “We don’t allow people to get likes, follows, shares or video views in a way that’s misleading to others. We define spam as things like: repeating the same comment; getting fake likes, follows, shares or video views; or coordinating likes and shares to mislead others about the popularity of something.”
Is your head spinning yet? There is nothing about the shared article that matches any of the spam criteria. Additionally, there was nothing divisive or obscene about the article.
After the passage of another two days, Facebook sent a spam/ad message to CARDINAL NEWS about another unrelated post, “You could reach up to 355 people daily by boosting your post for $14.” Facebook periodically sends spam messages encouraging CARDINAL NEWS to pay Facebook money to have the social media platform share posts to a wider audience that apparently doesn’t normally follow CARDINAL NEWS.
Just asking, Facebook (ahem), “Isn’t paying to boost a post kind of like getting fake likes or coordinating likes and shares to mislead others about the popularity of something?”
Here are the ridiculous messages about the takedown that were sent to CARDINAL NEWS …
MESSAGE #1
MESSAGE #2
MESSAGE #3
MESSAGE #4
PROMOTIONAL MESSAGE
No this is no April Fool’s joke.
For those of you who are fortunate not to be entangled with the social media platform known as Facebook, the company known as Meta has no customer service department for users, yet advises users on what speech is allowed, and prohibits or controls posts and comments based on capricious standards according to some media analysts.
Rules for the Elite
“For a select few members of our community, we are not enforcing our policies and standards. Unlike the rest of our community, these people can violate our standards without any consequences.”
— Internal Facebook Document obtained by The Wall Street Journal from a whistleblower
In September 2021, multiple news sources reported that Facebook secretly maintained an elite tier of users known as “XCheck” (meaning “Cross Check”) which exempted millions of VIP users, including athletes, musicians, and politicians from the standard content moderation rules that affected less-famous and less-wealthy users. The original investigation regarding XCheck was published by The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, September 13, 2022.
Facebook has claimed the same rules apply to all users.
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