N E WS Screencaps from various conservative Facebook pages following the Rittenhouse verdict COURTESY OF RAW STORY
Right-Wing Town Square Three hours after the Rittenhouse verdict, conservative pages ruled Facebook’s engagement algorithms by a factor of nine to one. BY JOHN BYRNE backtalk@indyweek.com
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ast Friday, Cristiano Ronaldo’s Facebook page had the most interactions in the world. “Let’s chase what we are trying to achieve this season!” he exclaimed. The Portuguese soccer star’s post, however, was an island in a partisan sea. The next six most engaged posts came from outspoken American conservatives cheering the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse for the murder of two men at a Wisconsin protest. Looking at shared links, conservatives’ Facebook dominance was even more stark—18 of the top 20 most engaged page links in the world originated from conservative Facebook pages. Facebook’s largest leak in history focused on the company’s past. Missing, however, from the coverage of a Facebook whistle-blower has been a focus on Facebook’s present. To look at Facebook’s data about user interactions— which reflects the engagement of its users with content worldwide—is to find oneself in a universe where American conservative voices dominate. While Facebook claims to host a diverse spectrum of 2 billion users, its daily engagement ranking exposes how right-wing actors eclipse all other media conversations atop its algorithm. Three hours after 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of the murder of two men at a Wisconsin protest, Facebook lit up with a panoply of conservative 4
November 24, 2021
INDYweek.com
pages cheering the teen’s exoneration. Even a cursory glance at the scoreboard—the top 20 most engaged link shares by pages in the world—suggests that Facebook has become a town square for right-wing American voices. Ninety percent of Facebook’s most engaged pages linking out to other websites were conservative pages, with just two mainstream sources—NPR and NBC News—eking out a place on the list. Twenty-four hours after the verdict, conservative pages gave up some ground. But while link posts from Myanmar, Great Britain, and Qatar joined the list (at 17, 18, and 19), conservative American pages still held 15 of the top 20 posts, and 90 percent of the top 10—worldwide. Even though Facebook banned former president Donald Trump after the January 6 riot at the Capitol, a Donald Trump for President page beat out all mainstream news outlets, twice, in the three hours after the verdict. NPR and NBC came in at 14 and 17, behind Donald Trump for President at positions seven and eight. “Kyle should spend the next year suing the absolute pants off of every news outlet that defamed him,” one Trump for President post read. There is no indication former president Trump is involved with the page. Also trumping NPR and NBC—three different times— was Dan Bongino, a three-time failed congressional candi-
date, former police officer, and Secret Service agent, who is now a conservative radio host. Bongino had also captured five of the top ten most engaged slots the prior day. Facebook reveals daily user engagement data through CrowdTangle, a tool publishers use to get insight into what’s trending. For the past several years, New York Times reporter Kevin Roose has tweeted “Facebook’s Top 10,” a daily list of pages atop Facebook’s engagement algorithm. Roose’s list reveals how often conservative pages win in Facebook’s interaction metrics. Facebook has repeatedly said engagement data does not reflect how often content appears in users’ news feeds. In August, Facebook released a report showing that recipes and cute animals ranked among the most viewed items on the platform. The report was undermined by The New York Times, which revealed the company had shelved an earlier analysis showing the most viewed link was “a news article with a headline suggesting that the coronavirus vaccine was at fault for the death of a Florida doctor.” Facebook then released the earlier report. Facebook’s third-quarter report appeared to support the company’s claims that the most viewed content isn’t partisan. The most widely viewed domains included YouTube, GoFundMe, and Amazon, and the most popular posts were memes. Only the anti-China page, Epoch Times, which spreads right-wing conspiracy theories, stood out among the top 20 most seen U.S. pages. A former Facebook executive who spoke to Raw Story criticized the company’s transparency reports. The executive noted that Facebook had only released a tiny amount of data; the reports only show the top 20 in any category. Better reporting, the executive said, would include not simply what was popular—but where, including different geographic areas of the United States. Facebook should also reveal what content gets distributed to which demographics, the executive said, as well as more current data to allow analysis of “trends and pockets of trends” on Facebook. Facebook’s most engaged link shared by a page after Rittenhouse’s acquittal was posted by Bongino, the conservative talk show host. Bongino’s Facebook post linked to a video where a crowd outside the courthouse cheered to a chant of “Freedom wins! Freedom wins! Freedom wins!” followed by another man screaming, “Second Amendment stays!” Bongino has more monthly Facebook engagement than The New York Times, The Washington Post, and CNN combined. Asked why he’s so popular on Facebook, he said, “I think people just love the message.” Bongino has promoted conspiracy theories, including allegations that Democrats spied on former president Trump’s 2016 campaign, and falsely asserted that masks are “largely
