Re: Why has CredWeb been silent when it is now needed more than ever?

Wikipedia has some good rules, we could start there

thx ..Tom (mobile)

On Sat, Jan 23, 2021, 3:03 PM Sandro Hawke <sandro@w3.org> wrote:

> I agree chain of custody / provenance is a great tool.  My sense is CAI is
> approaching that well, although I haven't seen anything since their
> presentation to us nearly a year ago (see Feb 26 meeting records). May be
> worth (1) checking in on their status, and (2) seeing if there are use case
> not addressed by their focus on images & video.
>
>      -- Sandro
>
> On 1/23/21 5:24 PM, Mark Chipman wrote:
>
> Hello All:
>
> Interesting discussion.  Lot's of good points made.
>
> After reflecting on an extraordinarily dishonest world in so many respects
> over this general topic, during the last several years, one of the top
> things that comes to mind in this subject is the old phrase "*truth is in
> the eyes of the beholder*".
>
> Technology probably will never resolve the primary problem that *biases
> will mostly trump facts* for most people (pun wasn't intended there).
> Depending on one's own circles of influence (those where individuals own
> truths are going to be sought) is how information is going to be determined
> or deemed as "credible"; heavily drawn upon from one's own resources.  Thus
> true or pure facts will vary from source to source and remain fluid based
> on situations, wealth, social environments, age, regional and national
> politics in play, religious views, one's own emotional state, etc.
>
> Might I make the suggestion that the focus of CredibleWeb not be
> establishing truthiness of sources by means of weeding out disinformation
> (besides, who decides this)... but rather to focus on information's *chain
> of custody*, where the primary focus is now on tracking sources...
> similar to a timeline, but not based solely on time, but rather on who
> establishes what will be considered factual and when each of this happens.
>
> This angle resides in the need to know where does information come from;
> to establish one's own levels of believability of inclusive facts whose
> relevance is based on who or what entities are involved along the way with
> the chain of custody of said information.  I generally find myself
> believing some sources way more than others, within the global information
> cesspool, a place where someone's always going to take the opposite side of
> an issue.
>
> Thoughts?
>
> -Mark Chipman
>
> On Fri, Jan 22, 2021 at 11:55 AM Sandro Hawke <sandro@w3.org> wrote:
>
>> This topic is quite relevant and current for the SocialCG,  as Sebastian
>> said.
>>
>> I suggest people interested in cross-platform social media moderation
>> attend their meeting tomorrow
>> <https://www.w3.org/wiki/SocialCG#Next_meeting>.  Members of CredWeb are
>> welcome to attend, I'm told. It's using a platform called BBB which you may
>> want to get familiar with before the meeting.
>>
>> Related, folks might want to check out eunomia <https://eunomia.social>,
>> which includes modifying mastodon for better handling of misinformation.
>> Sebastian and I were at a talk they gave a couple days ago.
>>
>>       - Sandro
>>
>>
>>
>> On 1/22/21 12:54 PM, Christopher Guess wrote:
>>
>> Hello everyone, it’s been awhile since I last commented on this channel,
>> but now that the tone is turning down a bit on the fact checking side I
>> wanted to say a few words and share a thought or two in response to the
>> ideas on this thread.
>>
>> First, around moderation: The first thing to remember, as we’ve been
>> reminded here, is that the W3C is a global organization, so any talk of
>> what is acceptable to moderate should be looked at in a global context.
>> This of course presents difficulties due to the fact that morality and
>> cultural standards vary wildly between different countries, regions, and
>> communities.
>>
>> It’s been mentioned that a user-based voting and self-regulation protocol
>> system could be a remedy here, but what’s being proposed, to my ears,
>> actually sounds exactly like the system that Parler had implemented. In
>> their system any flagged post would have five random accounts assigned to
>> vote on if it was appropriate. This, as we’ve seen, did not work out in the
>> long run for them. It would instead lead to the most active users (those
>> most radical in my experience) being the lone voices of “reason” in the
>> forums. Even Reddit, which at least has a somewhat heavier, but still
>> distributed hand, eventually had to step in and shut down the most vile
>> subreddits due to the moderators condoning the actions of the users.
>>
>> Second: When it comes to protocols over platforms, I have to ask, if I
>> was working at a social media organization: how does adopting a protocol in
>> any way limit my liability? Agreeing on standards to share information does
>> nothing to prevent someone in a country where Section 230 doesn’t exist
>> from suing me for allowing the information on my system in the first place.
>> Though I am not a lawyer, I imagine saying, “Well, someone else said it was
>> ok,” is almost certainly not going to hold up in UK or German court. Given
>> a lack of liability shielding I can’t imagine any for-profit
>> (non-Fediverse) social network giving up their information via a global
>> protocol unless they get something out of it.
>>
>> OK, so, what do we do about this? The honest answer from my perspective
>> is: I find more problems with a standards-based approach than solutions. In
>> the end we are at best preaching to the choir, and at worst screaming into
>> the void. Those people that use platforms that would follow such standards
>> are the least likely to actually need the moderation in the first place. I
>> can’t imagine StormFront or the successor to Parler or Gab caring even a
>> little about a white paper and what Twitter does. If anything, it gives
>> them more followers. The real way forward, as I see it, is beyond the scope
>> of this chain, but involves sociologists, economists and a severe change to
>> 1st amendment interpretation in the United States.
>>
>> Instead, because this group does care, perhaps we scope this down and bit
>> of a smaller piece of the pie? While the W3C scope is global, perhaps this
>> group can focus locally. Instead of claiming to be a panacea for all
>> moderation issues, focus on just getting the Mastodon system on board. The
>> system already shares data by default, and gives the runners of each
>> instance full moderation control. Essentially, by putting in a sharable
>> moderation system we’re piggybacking on what has already been built and
>> standardizing that while expanding on it. It may not be the perfect system,
>> but it’s a starting point at least and 1.) Already has buy-in by
>> programmers and 2.) is something actively in use at scale already and 3.)
>> is open source, so the whole process can happen in the open without the
>> smoke and mirrors of dealing with the large tech companies.
>>
>> We make it a point to not even mention we want to be an example to the
>> large social media orgs, or part of a wider solution, but that instead,
>> we’re partnering with groups that we share values with to do just a bit of
>> good in the world. If it works, perhaps we can move forward from there, but
>> even getting some solution into the Mastodon protocol and standards written
>> for that single use case would be a huge leap forward.
>>
>> Thanks for reading, and I hope you all stay safe, sane, and have a
>> wonderful weekend.
>>
>> -Chris
>>
>> -Christopher Guess
>> cguess@gmail.com
>> US/WhatsApp/Signal: +1 262.893.1037
>> PGP: AAE7 5171 0D81 B45B – https://keybase.io/cguess
>> On Jan 22, 2021, 10:51 AM -0500, Tom Jones <thomasclinganjones@gmail.com>
>> <thomasclinganjones@gmail.com>, wrote:
>>
>> Question - I assumed that this group was responsible for CredMan - is
>> that correct or does that live somewhere else?
>>
>> Be the change you want to see in the world ..tom
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Jan 22, 2021 at 7:26 AM Dan Brickley <danbri@google.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Fri, 22 Jan 2021 at 14:54, Sandro Hawke <sandro@w3.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 1/21/21 8:53 PM, Bob Wyman wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I could go on at length, but first I'd like to ask if you think that
>>>> this kind of protocol-based solution, as an alternative and complement to
>>>> platform-based systems or standards, is something that could or should be
>>>> explored in this group. Is this the right context in which to explore and
>>>> develop such protocol-based approaches?
>>>>
>>>> I think that's more or less the group's mission.
>>>>
>>>> The problem is, we don't have people participating in the group who are
>>>> building such systems. It's generally a mistake to try to create a standard
>>>> without participation from people developing viable products which will use
>>>> the standard. I've helped people make that mistake several times in the
>>>> past and it's not good.  It's somewhat related to the architecture
>>>> astronaut problem.
>>>> <https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/04/21/dont-let-architecture-astronauts-scare-you/>
>>>>
>>>> I am, myself, building such a system. Unfortunately, I don't currently
>>>> know anyone else who is. I also don't know if it can become a viable
>>>> product.  Until there are several other people who are independently
>>>> building this stuff, I don't see a way for standards-type work to proceed.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> That sounds about right.
>>>
>>> I still believe a big part of the difficulty here is also that online
>>> credibility is kind of an arms race, so those seeking to be recognized as
>>> credible will be paying close attention to any putative standard or
>>> protocol, which makes developing such things collaboratively in an open way
>>> problematic.
>>>
>>>
>>>> The CG has at times been an interesting forum for discussion, though,
>>>> and some good has come out of that. Maybe there's value to re-starting
>>>> meetings like that.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Even just as a meeting place for folks who want to find like-minded
>>> collaborators, a community group has value...
>>>
>>> All the best,
>>>
>>> Dan
>>>
>>>
>>>> Most recently, I was imagining us having presentations by folks
>>>> developing credibility products, and maybe coming up with a review process.
>>>> In particular, I was thinking about how we could push every project on the
>>>> "why should people trust you?" question.  A proper architecture (like CAI)
>>>> can answer this question in a way that closed apps can't. Crunchbase has
>>>> 500+ companies with the keyword "credibility", 9000+ with the keyword
>>>> "trust", and 59 with the keyword "misinformation". [I haven't gone through
>>>> the 59. Clearly some like snopes and blackbird are about combating misinfo;
>>>> others, like Natalist, are just making reference to how there is
>>>> misinformation in their target market.]
>>>>
>>>> Is there a story that would get, say, 20 of those 59 to be interested
>>>> in interoperating? I've only talked to a few of them, and I wasn't able to
>>>> think of a serious argument for how their business would benefit from going
>>>> open-data. It might be worth trying some more.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>         -- Sandro
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>
>
> --
> - Mark
>
>
>