Page 19 - TrumpsEconEra_Flat

Trump's Economic Era

preferential treatment over news publishers. This stance
by Facebook is similar to that of Google who also
discriminates against what it considers low-quality
content.

German lawmakers have passed a controversial
law under which Facebook, Twitter, and other social
media companies could face fines of up to 50 million
euros ($57 million) for failing to remove hate speech
within 24 hours. Social networks also have to publish a
report every six months detailing how many complaints
they received and how they dealt with them. German
police have raided people’s homes over social media
posts that allegedly contained hateful content. The
European Council approved a set of proposals that
would require web companies to block any hate speech
videos. The problem with these laws is that they fail to
provide sufficient safeguards for freedom of expression.
YouTube, has developed a spell check for what it
considers hate speech and algorithms to filter the news.
Viewpoints contrary to their own or their largest
advertisers are discouraged. Consequently, it has
removed advertising in some YouTube programs; a
practice called demonetization, and it has delisted
others. Advertisers do not want their brands associated
with what they consider objectionable content and take
offense if their advertising money goes to support the
videos’ creators. Advertisers pay about $7 to $12 for
1,000 views, and creators split that revenue with
YouTube. Facebook has partnered with Politifact and
Snopes to mark what they consider false information,
lowering offenders prominence in the news feed. This
shift in news prioritization would be Facebook’s most

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