Breaking down Meta’s community notes: innovation or a digital wild west?

Community notes on Meta: a game-changer for free speech, or just a hot mess in the making?

Meta has recently overhauled its policy regarding free speech by removing fact-checking and its moderation policies. It has, in effect, pulled back on fact-checking, as community notes take precedence, basically allowing users to make corrections or add context to content where they see fit.

So what will happen to the platforms, will they be smoother and more democratic to use, or will we be getting caught in the crossfire of a digital free-for-all?

Loose lips sink ships

Of course, the first thing that springs to mind is the right wing claiming a victory for freedom of speech. An end to the delicate, woke guardrails where you can’t say this and you better not say that.

And, in a perfect world, where we respectfully listen to our opponent and have healthy discourse, then community notes would make smart strategic sense.

But instead it feels like the pinball machine will be frozen into tilt mode after enough shaking of the system.

When one media leader goes into freefall, another has followed suit. From Musk to Zuckerberg, then, it's like a domino effect of deregulation.

When Elon Musk rebranded Twitter to X and loosened content moderation, it brought about an entropic chaos to how the company was run.

The value of the platform fell from $44 billion when he bought it in 2022 to $9.4 billion, as of October 2024, reported Fidelity.

After the dust settled on X, and Musk buddied up to Trump, Zuckerberg has followed suit in letting users self-regulate. Of course, there’s no guarantee the same fate will follow with Meta.

However, Damian Rollison, Director of Market Insights at SOCi, an AI Agents provider, sees a strong parallel between the two strategies:

“Meta’s approach mirrors Elon Musk’s X, where looser moderation led to more political speech and controversy – but also declining ad revenue,”

Rollison told Cybernews.

Advertisers prefer brand safety. Safety creates a haven of healthy discourse among users. Users may simply jump ship. And then ships can sink.

It seems absurd to expect a healthy thread of discourse as per a Reddit forum or a Substack discussion, but nevertheless we are going to find dehumanising rhetoric, ripping, flaming and bullying.

However, it can’t all be bad can it? It might not be such a jump into the unknown and may bring some benefits all-round.

Breaking the silence: users take charge

A standard situation nowadays would be posting a link to content such as a music blog, or band's song; the post doesn’t even see the light of day because it “goes against our community standards.”

Or, in this incredible story about a genuine musician being impersonated and scammed, in three years, Meta’s support team did sweet nothing and let it go on unabated, and that is a mockery of a shambles. Who was there to police the channel? Nobody.

If fellow users were able to call out such a deed via a community note, would that help in eradicating such scum?

Not only will there be specifically targeted identity frauds but also as Meta becomes infiltrated with more AI bots across all platforms, it could piece by piece dismantle the humanity of their platforms.

The truth is that it’s hard to envisage how community notes can be measured and implemented whatsoever. It feels like the platforms could become a smorgasbord of random comments on Facebook and Instagram as it is on X. It sounds pessimistic but only time will tell.

“Less moderation may seem more authentic,” Irina Raicu, Director of Internet Ethics of the Markkula Center at Santa Clara University, told Cybernews, “but social media platforms amplify outrage and trolling, not healthy debate.”

It could be that the online landscape is already a cesspit of toxicity as it is, and that Meta’s decision to end fact-checking and implement community notes will lead to this demise further.

If someone were to make a crazy claim that Zuckerberg was dead, or that abortion is the work of the devil, what would happen to the post? Most likely it would appear less viral, but still remain in the thick of the platform.

This is a bold and risky move from Meta, and with the incoming inauguration of you-know-who in the White House, and political turbulence ratcheting up a notch, a lot could go wrong – and a lot could go right.

Rogue voices, ruined spaces

As a user of social media– not an addict – my biggest concern would be the fake accounts, scams, phishing, and the like. But my door hasn't been smashed down (yet) with flaming, cyberbullying, and abusive messages.

What would I do in such a situation? Probably leave the platform. Will there be a mass exodus? There’ll probably be a cementing of Gen Z on TikTok and the elders on Facebook, with Instagram as a kind of middle-ground scenario.

“Expressions of hatred and bullying lead many people to abandon the conversation completely. So 'free' expression for some can greatly limit the freedom of expression of others,”

observes Raicu.

So, someone shuts you down completely and calls you an ______ – you simply wouldn’t want to talk to that person.

If someone is flaming you about your sexual identity, political beliefs, disability, or religion, would you fight back, do nothing, or abandon ship? A mass exodus could indeed be on the cards.

Truth or trolling: the fine line

It’s essential to approach Meta’s announcement with a clear head, resisting the urge to get swept up in speculation.

Community Notes are crowdsourced annotations that aim to add context to posts. The name and idea sound promising, but will it actually play out that way? Let’s take a closer look:

“If done right, Community Notes could inspire critical thinking and foster a more thoughtful, engaged user base. But without diverse voices, the platform could spiral into chaos,” Cyndee Harrison, Principal of Synaptic, a branding and public relations company, told Cybernews.

Absolutely, we could see factions stoking each other’s flames, leading to a heightened mob mentality. Remember Capitol Hill? Could groups become so toxic that an online civil war begins to brew?

Without human oversight, Community Notes could become a breeding ground for misinformation, where debates are overtaken by the loudest and most vitriolic voices.