{"id":6,"date":"2024-08-15T13:53:18","date_gmt":"2024-08-15T13:53:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/?p=6"},"modified":"2024-08-15T13:53:40","modified_gmt":"2024-08-15T13:53:40","slug":"meta-axed-crowdtangle-a-tool-for-tracking-disinformation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/archives\/6","title":{"rendered":"Meta axed CrowdTangle, a tool for tracking disinformation."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Journalists, researchers<\/a>, and politicians<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

 are mourning <\/a>Meta\u2019s shutdown of CrowdTangle, which they used to track the spread of disinformation on Facebook and Instagram.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In CrowdTangle\u2019s place, Meta is offering its Content Library \u2013 but is limiting usage to people from \u201cqualified academic or nonprofit institutions who are pursuing scientific or public interest research.\u201d Many researchers and academics, and most journalists, are barred from accessing the tool. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those who have been using the Meta Content Library say it is less transparent and accessible, has fewer features, and has a worse user experience design. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many people in the community have written open letters to Meta in protest. They question why the company axed a useful tool for combating misinformation three months ahead of the most contentious U.S. election in history \u2013 an election that is already threatened by the proliferation of AI deep fakes and chatbot misinformation, some of which has come from Meta\u2019s own chatbot<\/a> \u2013 and replace it with a tool that academics say is simply not as effective?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In short, if it ain\u2019t broke, why fix it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meta hasn\u2019t provided many answers. At an MIT Technology Review conference<\/a> in May, Meta\u2019s president of global affairs Nick Clegg was asked why the company wouldn\u2019t wait to shut down CrowdTangle until after the election. He called CrowdTangle a \u201cdegrading tool\u201d that doesn\u2019t provide complete and accurate insights into what\u2019s happening on Facebook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt only measures a narrow cake slice of a cake slice, which is particular forms of engagement,\u201d said Clegg at the time. \u201cIt literally doesn\u2019t tell you what people are seeing online.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Journalists, researchers, and politicians  are mourning Meta\u2019s shutdown of CrowdTangle, which they used to track the spread of disinformation on Facebook and Instagram. In CrowdTangle\u2019s place, Meta is offering its Content Library \u2013 but is limiting usage to people from \u201cqualified academic or nonprofit institutions who are pursuing scientific or public interest research.\u201d Many researchers and academics, and most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6\/revisions\/8"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dineeasy.co\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}