FACEBOOK will no longer recommend “political or civil” groups to users.
Billionaire chief Mark Zuckerberg vowed to halt these recommendations globally – after trialling it in the US during the presidential election.
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The company has repeatedly come under fire for its rogue recommendations over the years.
And Facebook has struggled when it comes to policing political content.
Now Facebook will simply blacklist all political groups from its recommendation algorithm.
“People don’t want politics and fighting to take over,” Zuckerberg told investors during a call.
Importantly, Facebook isn’t banning political groups outright.
Zuckerberg thinks there’s still a place for these groups – even if the content might be objectionable.
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“There are a lot of groups that we may not want to encourage people to join, even if they don’t violate our policies,” the Facebook founder explained.
“Now, we plan to keep civic and political groups out of recommendations for the long term.”
Zuckerberg also said that Facebook may soon reduce the quantity of political content appearing in user feeds.
During major news cycles like an election, news feeds can become swamped with political content.
But Facebook is looking to spin some of this content off.
In the US and UK, users can already access a dedicated Facebook News tab.
It’s free from photos of your pal’s new baby and your cousin’s weird memes – focusing entirely on journalism.
The section lives in a new tab, and will show you top headlines and stories of the day.
These will be personalised to your interests, based on your Facebook usage habits.
“Facebook News was built to bring people closer to the stories that impact their lives and the community around them,” said Facebook’s Jesper Doub.
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
