## Content ### Meta Thoughts about Facebook and the Committee of Peace and Harmony [^1] On 18th November 2021, representatives from Facebook India testified in front of the Committee on Peach and Harmony of the Delhi Legislative Assembly. This post is not a summary, I'm just highlighting a few broad themes I noticed and concerns I had as I watched it. You can watch the proceedings [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0DKyEjzIVI). #### Incentives and Learning from others I remain optimistic about the idea of broadcasting/livestreaming such committee hearings. But, we should acknowledge that the broadcast/livestream dynamic introduces a greater incentive for ‘performance’. *(See [[Prevalence, Performance and Politics#So what]])* These interactions come to be shaped by the very same dynamics and platform logics they seek to govern. Also, in politics, transparency and perfomance can go hand-in-hand. For respondents, the objective is to evade/provide non-answers/reiterate already publicly available information as far as possible, yet claim participation and/or cooperation. This can make for a frustrating experience. The countless hours of Tech CEO testimony from the US on YouTube can probably attest to this. Over time, they seem to have devolved into a hunt for 'that-memeable-moment' being watched by people with ever-decreasing levels of patience and always-increasing demands on their time (journalists, researchers, etc.) (See 'finsta-gate' [^2] as the latest example of this dynamic). If we're going to push for more broadcast/livestreaming of such proceedings, we need to start thinking about how to avoid similar problems. #### Observations Now, I am not going to be overly critical given the committee was faced with a respondent that was determined not to say much. And it is also unfair to rush to judgements based on a single occurrence. So here are some observations. Apart from 1, all are neutral/concerns. 1. The question on a 'record of content' against which action was interesting (See [Poison Cabinets](https://knightcolumbia.org/content/platform-accountability-through-digital-poison-cabinets)) 2. The repeated questions about Facebook reporting directly to law enforcement may have made sense in within the remit of the committee. However, I am not sure it is something we want - it further erodes civil society's relative power. See [^3] 3. In response, Facebook's reference to arrangements with law enforcement that they don't address publicly also got my attention. See [^3] 4. The line of questioning for the most part, subscribed to the leave-up/take-down binary - something which people who have been actively studying content moderation are moving past. 5. Repeated references to 'lost immunity' indicated that members were not necessarily well aware of some of the regulatory context. See [^4] 6. The extended back-and-forth to get Facebook to explicitly say that they did not have an India-specific hate speech definition reminded me of the performative exchanges where the intention was to get 'gotcha' moment. *(I am not sure what that would have achieved, anyway)* 7. It would have been interesting to see specific questions on 'inflammatory speech/content' that was so heavily referenced in the Facebook Files/Papers/Documents reportage related to India and was directly connected to the remit of the committee. [![[Meta Thoughts Facebook Peace Harmony 1.png]]](https://twitter.com/prateekwaghre/status/1452271410307608599) [^1]: See what I did there? [^2]: [Why the “Instapinions” on “Finsta-gate”?](https://techpolicy.press/why-the-instapinions-on-finsta-gate/) [^3]: [Podcast on Internal Referral Units in Israel](https://www.lawfareblog.com/lawfare-podcast-israels-cyber-unit-and-extra-legal-content-take-downs) [^4]: [Tweet thread by Internet Freedom Foundation](https://twitter.com/internetfreedom/status/1405039411008442370) ## Colophon %% title:: Meta Thougts about Facebook and Peace and Harmony Committe type:: [[output]] %% tags:: [[transparency]] [[performative politics]] [[professional incentives]] %% url:: file:: %% status:: [[brewing]] created:: 2021-11-18 %% modified:: %%