Who gets your vote? Facebook wants to help you decide.

Who gets your vote? Facebook wants to help you decide.

The company is rolling out a new election product less than two weeks before ballots are due.

BY KURT WAGNER  OCT 28, 2016, 2:00P

You know who's running for president. How could you not?

But do you know where they stand on the issues? Do you know who's running for Congress in your district? Or which propositions are on your ballot?

Facebook thinks it can teach you — or at least point you to info so you can teach yourself. The social giant rolled out a new election product Friday that lets you browse the issues and races from your specific ballot, then share with friends who and what you're voting for.

Discussing politics on social media can be stressful; few people believe social platforms like Facebook actually improve political discourse. The hope is that this new election page will provide an alternative to your News Feed as a place to learn about the issues.

“The problem with News Feed is that there’s often a lot of controversial or vitriolic discussion around politics. People in the comments may be less than polite,” Jeremy Galen, a product marketing manager at Facebook who helped launch the new feature, told Recode. “So what we’re building here is this kind of utility ... that gives you the chance to ask questions and get better informed for [election day].”

Facebook wants you to know it’s not presenting anything biased. It’s pulling info from candidate pages and the Center for Technology and Civic Life, a non-partisan, nonprofit organization hoping to “increase civic participation.” So there you go.

Worth noting about the new product is that it requires users to offer up their home address in order for Facebook to determine which issues and races are on your ballot. That obviously won’t sit well with all users, but Galen says your address won’t be visible on your public profile. It will live on Facebook’s servers, though, which means the company could use that information down the line for “other civic engagement products,” Galen said.

Galen wouldn’t disclose what those products will be, but mentioned things like “connecting with elected officials” and mid-term elections.

The new feature is live starting Friday, and exists here or as a separate election tab in the Facebook toolbar.

http://www.recode.net/2016/10/28/13456980/facebook-election-ballot-trump-hillary


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

BMW traps alleged thief by remotely locking him in car

BMW traps alleged thief by remotely locking him in car Stealer's Wheel? Seattle police department quotes "Watchmen" movie in a recap of the recent arrest. Tech Culture by Gael Fashingbauer Cooper December 4, 2016 5:00 PM PST It's maybe the most satisfying arrest we can imagine. Seattle police caught an alleged car thief by enlisting the help of car maker BMW to both track and then remotely lock the luckless criminal in the very car he was trying to steal. Jonah Spangenthal-Lee, deputy director of communications for the Seattle Police Department, posted a witty summary of the event on the SPD's blog on Wednesday. Turns out if you're inside a stolen car, it's perhaps not the best time to take a nap. "A car thief awoke from a sound slumber Sunday morning (Nov. 27) to find he had been remotely locked inside a stolen BMW, just as Seattle police officers were bearing down on him," Spangenthal-Lee wrote. The suspect found a ke...
Read more

Report: World’s 1st remote brain surgery via 5G network performed in China

World’s 1st remote brain surgery via 5G network performed in China Published time: 17 Mar, 2019 13:12 ·           A Chinese surgeon has performed the world’s first remote brain surgery using 5G technology, with the patient 3,000km away from the operating doctor. Dr. Ling Zhipei remotely implanted a neurostimulator into his patient’s brain on Saturday, Chinese state-run media  reports . The surgeon manipulated the instruments in the Beijing-based PLAGH hospital from a clinic subsidiary on the southern Hainan island, located 3,000km away. The surgery is said to have lasted three hours and ended successfully. The patient, suffering from Parkinson’s disease, is said to be feeling well after the pioneering operation. The doctor used a computer connected to the next-generation 5G network developed by Chinese tech giant Huawei. The new device enabled a near real-time connection, according to Dr. Ling.  “You barely feel that th...
Read more

New ATM's: withdraw money with veins in your finger

New cash machines: withdraw money with veins in your finger Cash machine technology that reads the pattern of finger veins is already available in Japan and Poland   By Telegraph Reporters 6:59PM BST 15 May 2014 Cash machines could soon be installed with devices that identify customers by reading the veins in their fingers. The technology is already being rolled out in Poland, where 1,730 cash machines will this year be installed with readers, negating the need for a debit card and Pin. Developed by Hitachi, the Japanese electronics firm, the machines read the patterns of the veins just below the surface of the skin on your finger using infra-red sensors. The light is partially absorbed by haemoglobin in the veins to capture a unique finger vein pattern profile, which is matched to a profile. The technology is used by Japanese banks and also in Turkey, offering “groundbreaking levels of accuracy and speed of authentication”, Hitachi said, which in t...
Read more