Unlock Editor’s Digest for free
FT editor Roula Khalaf has chosen her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Thanks to powerful network effects, social networks are difficult to remove once established. Even if a new service breaks out (think TikTok), older networks usually retain their place due to their large user base.
As political instability increases in the world of social networking, that certainty may no longer be so reliable. The risk of political retaliation, on the one hand, and the risk of audience defection, on the other, is creating greater instability than at any time in years. While the forces of centralization remain strong, changing audience habits and further fragmentation between networks are starting to look like a clear possibility.
Meta’s decision this week to end fact-checking on Facebook and Instagram is the latest sign of this political turmoil. After replacing the company’s global policy chief with a Republican and appointing a Trump ally to its board, CEO Mark Zuckerberg loosened content policies on Monday, saying his network is more left-wing. succumbed to Republican complaints that it was biased toward bias and censorship.
Mr. Zuckerberg has long been the great survivor of social networking. He is a follower of business and has managed to copy or buy new trends created by his industry. He is also a realist who is ready to change with the political winds. Now that Donald Trump is returning to the White House, if making Facebook and Instagram look like Elon Musk’s X is the price of peace, so be it.
At a time when strong political winds threaten to upend other parts of social media, Meta is showing a willingness to overhaul the network to keep up with the times. TikTok hopes a final hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday will save it from a possible ban starting Jan. 19. Meanwhile, some liberals are appalled by Musk’s management of X, and political polarization is also fueling expectations for the emerging network. They defected to Blue Sky, and President Trump’s Truth Social amassed a stock market value of more than $7 billion.
It is unclear whether established networks will be able to survive these turbulent times, or whether a more fundamental realignment in social media is in store.
Mr. Mehta’s attempts to course-correct have brought to light an uncomfortable truth. It may simply not be possible to operate a completely open and uncensored network while providing a safe and welcoming environment for everyone.
Efforts to resolve this underlying tension have failed. For example, outsourcing fact-checking to independent experts was one way Meta tried to counter the spread of misinformation while distancing itself from accusations that it was politically oriented. . This failed to appease Republicans.
Mr. Mehta’s bet now seems to be that the best way to keep the majority of people happy is through pesky freebies, similar to how he has ruled X under Musk. . But if, as is the case with X, this leads to a more hostile environment, then many Facebook and Instagram users may rebel. Advertisers, for whom brand safety is a persistent concern on Meta’s network, are also likely to reevaluate.
Recommended
One aspect of this potential rift is geographical. Zuckerberg has threatened that his latest changes to his company’s content policies, while affecting only the United States for now, could have global implications, forcing more “censorship” on American companies. criticized the countries where However, such invocation of the American ideal of free speech may go against cultural preferences in other regions and may conflict with local laws.
Higher degrees of personalization will help resolve some of the tensions, allowing networks to offer each user a more customized experience while maintaining their claim of complete openness. That’s what Meta promised this week. However, each person’s experience is still completely determined by Meta’s proprietary algorithms. Deeper forms of personalization give users a more direct say in the content they see, for example by allowing them to filter it through independent algorithms of their own choosing. But Meta resisted abandoning it.
If Mr. Zuckerberg had correctly judged the political winds and his users’ tolerance for change, he could have breathed new life into Mr. Meta. But the risk of getting it wrong has never been higher.
richard.waters@ft.com
