A recent report highlighted how the Twitter app had once mistakenly allowed conspiracy theorists into its community via an invite.
And this news is certainly disturbing for obvious reasons. But wait, it seems the app is keen to get things back to normal. And it’s poised to do so by making some changes to Birdwatch just before the US midterm elections begin.
today, Twitter went public about how it will make its fact-checking program available to so many others in the country, not to mention a number of changes that will be in the spotlight.
This special presentation will include around 1,000 contributors every week, right before the election begins. But if you think it will work around the same rules as described before, well, you are wrong.
In the past, contributors were given the option to include fact checks to add more context to their posts. However, this will not happen again. Instead, you’ll have to earn that privilege if you want it.
To actually be a contributor who can produce annotations on the app’s tweets, you must first provide evidence that you are able to understand the useful annotations added by others. And for this, the application will allow each contributor a score that determines their ratings.
The scale starts at 0 and must reach 5 to be a contributor to Birdwatch. And it’s not as difficult as the experts claim, after a week of hard work, you can get there. Users can get such points if they rate the notes based on whether it is useful or not.
Points are lost when they finish in contrast to what is mentioned in the final status. Once unlocked, they start adding contributions as well as fact-checking and must maintain that quality or eliminate face.
Twitter is looking at all of its contributors very carefully, so it’s a tricky step to maintain that status.
Another important part of the system has to do with another term called bridge algorithms. This is definitely worlds apart from other algorithms seen on social media.
While most others relate to posts getting more views or targeting the target audience effectively, this one has nothing like that. Instead, it is about finding consensus between different groups when clashes arise on controversial topics. This is done immediately before fact checks are carried out by users of the platform.
Twitter’s VP of Product says these changes are new and haven’t been seen or done by others on different platforms. But the app certainly can’t take credit for this idea, because it actually originates from the world of academic research.
Twitter adds that they have received a positive response after conducting a series of pilot tests using this mechanism.
In addition, this new system will work hard to find agreements across party lines. But many critics fear how this mechanism will work in reality.
There are never two truths. There is a truth and a side that people want to make the truth, but they can’t. So we will have to see how far this goes in presenting the truth going forward.
Read more: Twitter begins public testing of editable tweets, but comes with limitations
