Version 2.226

The Atlantic has a very interesting piece on Facebook, in which the author calls it a Doomsday Machine. I agree that it is quite powerful, too powerful, even, and anything that is too powerful can be too dangerous under the right conditions. Call me naïve, but I had never thought about the dark side of Facebook in the terms that this article describes it. To protect us from all this, Facebook employs moderators:

"Facebook has enlisted a corps of approximately 15,000 moderators, people paid to watch unspeakable things—murder, gang rape, and other depictions of graphic violence that wind up on the platform." ~ Adrienne LaFrance, The Atlantic

I have trouble understanding what leads someone to have such a job, but I suppose that everything has a shitty side, if you search in the right spot. Maybe these people think they are protecting someone. And yet, we, the protected ones are always complating about how the service is lousy. Maybe it censored the picture with a piece of art thinking it was pornography. It is hard to teach an algorithm to know the difference, but people can. Hence the Facebook moderators. But, still, it is so disturbing.