Which means that the hypothesis for the company, for politicians and for regulators is very simple. Is it damaging to the public interest to provide a broadcast platform for extremists, for murderers, for the vulnerable, for the suicidal? And, assuming so, if you can’t categorically prevent such incidents (of any scale) from being broadcast live in a way that would be prohibited on mainstream media then what’s the public interest in leaving the system as is?
There was always a likelihood that enabling the population of the world to broadcast live, whatever and whenever they wanted, to Facebook’s global audience might need a rethink. And whilst Christchurch has amplified concerns many times over, there have been other reports of live murders, suicides and violence on the platform. The issue for Facebook is that this now coincides with escalating pressure on their core business from the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the alleged corporate cover-up. Something will have to give to appease politicians and an increasingly skeptical public, and, given the choice, Facebook Live in its current guise might well be it.
When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg published a blog post entitled ‘a Privacy-Focused Vision for Social Networking’ earlier this month, its intent was to ease concerns about the company’s focus on integrated messaging. ”I believe the future of communication will increasingly shift to private, encrypted services,” he said, “where people can be confident what they say to each other stays secure and their messages and content won’t stick around forever.”
Three weeks later, Zuckerberg’s “simpler platform that’s focused on privacy first” seems entirely at odds with an unregulated live-broadcasting service that cannot cope with its (moral if not legal) obligation to censor what is being transmitted and viewed. The pivotal moment came at 1.40pm on Friday 16 March, at the Christchurch city mosque. According to Facebook, the events streamed over Facebook Live were viewed less than 200 times in real-time and then by a further 4,000 people afterward, before the company pulled some 1.5 million uploads from the site.
Facebook's challenge is that this has taken the debate around social media content regulation to a vastly different level. The company has all but admitted that every fail-safe system failed. the content was neither spotted nor reported. Worse, the argument can be made that the availability of a live broadcast medium will become a core focus of future attacks. And that cannot be allowed to happen. If the fail-safes don’t work, something else needs to be done instead.
The end of the age of sharing?
“People should be comfortable being themselves,” Zuckerberg had written thirteen days before Christchurch, “and should not have to worry about what they share coming back to hurt them later.”
Ironically, five years ago Zuckerberg had said that “in five years most of [Facebook] will be video”. And Facebook Live’s webpage still entreats users to “broadcast to the largest audience in the world with the camera in your pocket.” There’s a contradiction here with the shift in strategy, and so decisions need to be made. Facebook may well have to start debating the ‘least worst’ option for what it can sacrifice as calls for the material regulation or even the break-up of social media gather a tailwind.
Until now, the company has fended off such pressure. But in recent days their integrity has been questioned yet again following revelations that staff knew about Cambridge Analytica well ahead of when they ‘officially’ found out. With more than an eye on business KPIs and its core data trading revenue streams, Facebook Live with its ‘uncensored’ broadcasts, its inherent risk of reputational damage, and its playing into the hands of regulators may well have to fundamentally change or even go altogether.
Facebook was approached for any comments on calls for live streaming to now cease – there was no response at the time of writing.“We understand there are a lot of tradeoffs to get right,” Zuckerberg said in his blog, “and we’re committed to consulting with experts and discussing the best way forward.” Fortunately, the company has now been presented with an opportunity to do the right thing. So what happens next?
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