Facebook has begun to test its new labels in the United States with which they seek to offer a better identification of the publications that appear on users’ walls so that, in this way, users themselves know better what to expect, according to the sources, following the labeling of the publications whose editorial control belongs totally or partially to the respective governments, which they began to carry out since last June.
The announcement has been carried out, curiously, in one of the profiles that Mark Zuckerberg’s company has on Twitter, his eternal rival.
To avoid confusion between satirical content and real content
The new labels, which are now in the testing and gradual expansion phase, are Public Official, Fan Page and Strip Page. This last tag is perhaps the most interesting to analyze, taking into account the existence of websites with satirical content, some of which use made-up news whose writing structure is similarly professional to those made in real news newsrooms.
This has caused many people to be outraged by news that is in practice invented, which had to be told that it came from websites with satirical content, the best known in Spain being the El Mundo Today website, which also It came to have its own space on free-to-air television, although over time other satirical websites have also joined, including local ones, which can also be followed on social networks such as Facebook.
The most curious thing is that the information on the satirical websites has even confused more than one politician.
For now, the specific reasons why Facebook is now beginning to test these new tags for publications is unknown, although everything indicates that it is part of its fight against disinformation.
It seems that, at least for the moment, it will be the satric publications themselves that will decide whether or not to use the stira page tag in the publications that appear on the users’ news walls.
It will be a matter of time for the social media company to gradually expand the availability of the new labels in international markets, thus avoiding unnecessary evils in the face of publications that only seek to make readers laugh rather than get angry.
