Author: Michelle N. Meyer
Publisher: Wired
Publication Year: 2014
Summary: The following article describes how for one week in 2012, Facebook data scientists tested the effect of making News Feeds both more positive and less positive. Although the statistically significant findings were of small order, they could matter given the number of daily active users on Facebook. The test found that when a user’s News Feed was more positive, they were more likely to post positive things themselves. Conversely, when a user’s News Feed was more negative, they were more likely to post negative things. The article calls into question the moral responsibility and power that data scientists have at companies like Facebook. In this instance, Facebook was forthright about its experimentation. That might not always be the case.
