13 hours Ago By Andy Meek
Say what you will about X under the reign of Elon Musk, but there’s one particular feature of X, formerly Twitter, that I’ve found myself surprisingly a big fan of: , those clarifications you see appended to tweets from users who add valuable context in response to errors or misinformation. And no, it’s not that I love them because I enjoy watching hall monitors get the last word in after some misanthrope has made an error or stirred up drama. Quite simply, I find Community Notes to be supremely entertaining and, more often than not, utterly hilarious.
I bring all this up, of course, because CEO just dropped a bombshell on — well, on everyone. His company’s family of apps is making some pretty big changes to its content moderation practices, primarily by getting out of the third-party fact-checker game. In its stead, Meta will be moving to an X-style Community Notes effort.
It’s a major pivot for the social media giant, given that Facebook and Instagram, alone, have billions of users. “We’re going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies, and restoring free expression on our platforms,” Zuckerberg . Sign up for the most interesting tech & entertainment news out there.
By signing up, I agree to the and have reviewed the Score one for the good guys, if you ask me. It was always a terrible idea to have giant social media platforms act as arbiters of truth. And while we’re on the subject, I likewise always found bizarre the degree to which large swaths of people cling to a peculiar bit of doublethink — declaring, on the one hand, that Zuckerberg is some kind of creepy overlord who’s spying on his users, while at the same time demanding that he track and zap every individual post or message that offends someone.
Get out of my business, in other words, but be sure you’re watching whatever that guy over there posts. He’s a live wire, that one! Come on. As for the thesis in the headline of this post, let me just say: The details from Meta are still to come, but I feel confident in asserting that there’s no way its Community Notes program will be even remotely as brutal or as consistently funny as X’s.
Which shouldn’t really come as a surprise, when you think about it. When’s the last time Meta did something edgy? For that matter, when’s the last time you actually a new Meta feature on any of its apps? Just peruse these gems from X below, and tell me I’m wrong (also, follow the account on X for more laughs like these). A reminder that slavery is illegal, and that walnuts and lungs aren’t the same thing.
6. Your 1 millionth reminder not to believe everything you read on the Internet. The community note is hilarious 😭 That time a Community Note writer confirmed Pornhub is still active in their state (“Source: I’m on it right now”).
this might be the funniest community note ever That time someone tried to pass off a Taylor Swift concert as a Kamala Harris rally. Community Notes ftw 😂 One more: A matter-of-fact reminder about what counts as a star. The sun is a star.
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