Twitter needs your help

[Bloomberg]( Follow Us [Get the newsletter]( Hey all, it’s Kurt. I spent a lot of my time in 2020 writing about misinformation on social media, and between the coronavirus outbreak and the U.S. election there was plenty to write about. That’s why I was interested earlier this year when Twitter Inc. formally [announced an effort called “Birdwatch,”]( or what it refers to as a “community-based approach to misinformation.” The concept is this: Users will add notes to tweets that are misleading or inaccurate, and then the most useful of those notes will “travel with” the tweet so that other people can see them side by side. In theory, Twitter staff won’t need to tell people when something is inaccurate on the platform—users will do this for them. I have always operated under the assumption that fact-checking on social media services is primarily complicated by scale. It’s just too hard to check billions of posts per day, especially when you consider the subtle complexities that can come with determining “true” vs. “false.” Birdwatch, it seems, is a possible solution to that scale problem. If everyone on the service is part of the neighborhood watch, it’s hard to slip something by. But solving the scale problem is just one of Twitter’s motivations, according to Keith Coleman, the product executive in charge of Birdwatch. An even bigger reason Twitter started work on this project has to do with “trust,” he says. More specifically: the fact that a lot of people don’t trust technology companies like Twitter or Facebook Inc. to get things right when it comes to fact-checking. They want people other than tech staffers or executives to have a say as well. “Trust in the process and the way this is done is the biggest motivator behind Birdwatch,” he says. “We very consistently heard across the political spectrum people saying that they felt like they would value a community-driven approach, in many cases more than what Twitter does today.” Trust has been hard to come by for tech giants lately. Regulators want to [update Section 230]( of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which protects internet companies from legal liability for many of the things their users post. And while companies have worked to show they can police themselves, many people don’t believe tech bosses should be responsible for determining “truth.” Facebook’s approach has been to work with outside fact-checking organizations. Twitter, up until now, hasn’t done a lot of fact-checking at all, with the exception of censure for a few influential users (see: @realDonaldTrump). If Birdwatch works, maybe this “community-based” approach could serve as a more trustworthy blueprint for an entire industry to follow. But there are lots of things that need to go right for Birdwatch before that happens. For starters, people need to participate, and actually contribute well-researched notes when they see tweets that need added context. History tells us social media is more about consumption than contribution. More importantly, Twitter’s technology then needs to identify the most useful of those notes to append to the tweet, while simultaneously making sure groups of users don’t try and game the system. It’s not hard to imagine what an angry Twitter mob could do with the power to fact-check other users on the service. Like many projects Twitter and Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey undertake, Birdwatch is ambitious and idealistic. If it works, it could change the internet. Until then, be careful what you read. —[Kurt Wagner](mailto:kwagner71@bloomberg.net) If you read one thing Executive recruiters are trying out a new pitch in the war for tech talent: [work from home forever](. Says one recruiter: “Not one of my clients requires an HQ-based executive anymore." Paid Post Juniper Networks knows that experience is the first and most important requirement for networking in the cloud era. This enables network users—employees, students, patients, customers and guests—to be as happy and productive as possible. See what the top influencers and experts have to say [here](. Juniper Networks And here’s what you need to know in global technology news Google is moving forward with a plan to phase out third-party [cookies that help advertisers track customers]( around the web, a move that could have a huge impact on most peoples' browsing experience and many companies' business models. One merchant who was kicked off Amazon spent 18 months and $200,000 in legal fees [trying to get justice](.  SpaceX’s newest and biggest rocket managed an impressive landing on Wednesday—[before it exploded](. Facebook will lift its ban on political ads [on Thursday](. Okta, maker of identity verification software, will buy rival Auth0 [for $6.5 billion](. In earnings news Wednesday: Splunk [shares jumped]( after the company beat analysts' revenue estimates. And Snowflake [shares fell]( after a slower product growth forecast. NFL games could be coming to [Amazon's Prime Video platform](.  Like Fully Charged? | [Get unlimited access to Bloomberg.com](, where you'll find trusted, data-based journalism in 120 countries around the world and expert analysis from exclusive daily newsletters.  You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Fully Charged newsletter. [Unsubscribe]( | [Bloomberg.com]( | [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington, New York, NY, 10022