Site icon Inside Croydon

CouLSDon gets cancelled by Facebook’s algorithm police

insidecroydon

Our south of the borough correspondent, PEARL LEE, on the seemingly random block on some harmless organisations that is forcing them to turn their backs on social media

Businesses, community groups, arts organisations and residents in a thriving town on the Croydon-Surrey border are in uproar because the automatic systems employed to police social media have silenced them on one of the world’s biggest digital platforms – all because Coulsdon has the letters L, S and D in its name.

Residents’ associations and businesses with “Coulsdon” in their titles have found themselves “cancelled”, with posts being removed from Facebook and warnings issued as to their future conduct under a set of rules so vague that any post, however innocent, might fall foul of them.

Each social media network has unique algorithm rules and signals determining which content is displayed on each user’s feeds. But these AI-powered content checkers are also on the look out for dubious content which might offend, or worse, be in breach of the legal constraints of each territory they operate in.

Since it was launched 20 years ago, Facebook’s algorithm has undergone many changes and updates for what the owners, Meta, claim is intended “to create a more personalised user experience”.

Banned: Coulsdon seems to have triggered Facebook in an entirely unexpected manner

The Facebook algorithm is a set of rules and systems that rely on machine learning to determine which content appears in each user’s feeds. The network takes user behaviours, interactions, engagements, even the model of mobile phone they use, to build each user’s unique feed.

Facebook uses thousands of “ranking signals” to predict what content users will find valuable. The main Facebook feed, the “News Feed”, contains content mostly shared from friends, Pages and Groups you follow. However, this also features recommendations based on your interests and previous engagements.

Meta says it also uses the ranking to assess whether a post is likely to be problematic or to “violate community standards”. That includes clickbait, unoriginal news stories and posts fact-checked as false.

“Our ranking system personalises the content for over a billion people and aims to show each of them content we hope is most valuable and meaningful, every time they come to Facebook or Instagram,” Meta said recently to an Australian government inquiry.

But with mounting concerns about the abuse of the interweb by racists and extremists, as well as sexualised content and grooming gangs operating online, and worries about the conduct of the US Presidential election, Meta’s algorithm has gone into overdrive over the past year or so. It is an effort that may be based on the best of intentions, but with minimal to no human checks conducted, it has become heavy-handed to the point where for some their platform has become all but unusable.

Certainly for the hard-working and honest people of Coulsdon, who appear to be being punished by Meta for nothing more sinister than the spelling of the ancient town’s name, which dates back to before the Domesday Book, and includes a combination of three letters.

LSD, for those too young or who were too stoned to remember the 1960s, is a potent psychedelic drug that can intensify emotions and induce hallucinations. Also known as “acid”, the good people of Coulsdon that we have spoken to maintain that they have neither used, nor traded, in the Class-A drug.

Banned: after a thousand years, locals might have to consider the spelling of their town’s name

According to several Coulsdon sources, the LSD issue has affected the Facebook pages including East Coulsdon Residents’ Association, Coulsdon West RA, Coulsdon History, the Coulsdon Oral History Project, Theatre Workshop Coulsdon, Coulsdon Home Hardware, Coulsdon Mums and Dads, Coulsdon Victoria Club…

The list goes on: “As long as it has ‘Coulsdon’ in the title, you get the drug reference that there’s no way around,” one source said.

And any efforts to reassure the owners of Facebook that everything is innocent and sober is met with… nothingness. Contacting Meta to ask them to somehow tweak their Artificial “Intelligence” just hits a brick wall.

Coulsdon business owners, who preferred not to be named, told Inside Croydon that any attempts to alert Meta to the problem have met with a pathetic non-response. “There’s a problem, it undoubtedly impacts on businesses and other community ventures in Coulsdon, and Meta can’t even be bothered to respond,” they said.

“A multi-billion dollar multi-national can do what it damn well likes with no accountability.

“There’s no help desk, no human face, just an automated system that clearly doesn’t function, and no one at Facebook cares.”

When the place’s existence was logged in the Domesday Book, the town name was spelled “Colesdone”. So after a thousand years, some locals are pondering whether to change the name back, just to get around the 21st Century bots at Meta.

Last week, Inside Croydon, had a history article about Croydon men who fought in the Spanish Civil War removed by Facebook, seemingly because it included a photograph of Hitler with Franco, throwing Nazi salutes.

We will now attempt to post this plaintive plea on behalf of the good people of Coulsdon on Facebook.

Don’t be surprised if you never see it.

Inside Croydon – If you want real journalism, delivering real news, from a publication that is actually based in the borough, please consider paying for it. Sign up today: click here for more details


Exit mobile version