Zuckerberg slams 'sensationalist' media coverage, says users should make own choices on social media
Print Close
By Alexander Hall
Published April 28, 2025
Facebook and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg knocked critics and the media, arguing that people online have enough autonomy to decide for themselves what to believe.
Meta announced in January that it would be ending its controversial fact-checking practices and lifting restrictions on speech to "restore free expression" across Facebook, Instagram and its platforms, admitting its current content moderation practices have "gone too far."
The decision met swift backlash from groups who argue that social media needs a robust fact-checking and content moderation system to prevent misinformation or extreme ideology from going viral. Zuckerberg has faced critics who argue social media use is inherently harmful, criticizing "sensationalist" media coverage of social media's impact during his appearance on Theo Von's "This Past Weekend" podcast.
"There's a version of history that says that individual people are very powerful and have a lot of kind of autonomy and ability to kind of go in the direction that they think is right," Zuckerberg said. "And then there's like all these other narratives where people try to kind of diminish peoples' autonomy and authority."
INTERNET ROASTS NYT HEADLINE ABOUT FACT-CHECKERS RULING META CRITICISM OF FACT CHECKS 'FALSE:' 'BEYOND PARODY'
The Facebook founder suggested that if anybody is guilty of a misunderstanding, it is the media itself.
"I'm just like, I've always been a person who really kind of believes that people understand—people are smarter than people think, and I think in general are able to make good decisions for their lives, and when they do things that like the media or whatever thinks don't make sense; it's generally because the media doesn't understand their life, not because the people are stupid," he said.
Zuckerberg added, "If people are saying something that seems wrong, it's not usually misinformation, it's usually that you don't understand what's going on in that person's life, and I just think that there's like a certain kind of paternalism in some of the like mainstream narratives and some of the media narratives"
The Meta CEO did note there has been some change in the information landscape however, as "maybe some of those cultural or media elite people like are having a harder time predicting what's gonna happen in the world. Maybe there's a little more humility of like 'Maybe we don't understand all this."
CLICK HERE FOR MORE COVERAGE OF MEDIA AND CULTURE
Zuckerberg argued the best predictive metric to assess a system is whether people find it to be useful.
"If you're building something that is useful for them, then they will use it," he said, suggesting they will abandon it if other, better options become available.
The danger, Zuckerberg said, is when people's choices are made for them.
"Whenever we adopt the attitude of, 'Oh, we must know better than them because we're the ones building technology,' that's when you lose," he said. "If you have that attitude for long enough then you just, like, become a sh---y company, and you lose, and you lose, and you lose, and then you're irrelevant.
Zuckerberg reiterated his belief that people are smart enough to make their own choices and "ultimately drive the direction that society goes in."
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Print Close
URL
https://www.foxnews.com/media/zuckerberg-slams-sensationalist-media-coverage-says-users-should-make-own-choices-social-media
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang says he's waiting for Elon Musk's Neuralink before he has kids
Scale CEO Alexandr Wang, who's stepping into a new role at Meta, is not planning to have kids soon. On the Shawn Ryan Show, he said he's waiting until brain-computer interfaces are further along. Kids who are born with them will "learn how to use them in like crazy, crazy ways," he said. It's no surprise that wunderkinds want their children to be wunderkinds, too. As Alexandr Wang, the 28-year-old founder of Scale AI, prepares to take on a new role at Meta leading its superintelligence initiatives, he's also thinking about how to integrate superintelligence into the next generation. And that means he's not having kids anytime soon. On the Shawn Ryan Show on Thursday, Wang said he wants to wait to have kids until Neuralink or other brain-computer interfaces are available. Neuralink, one of Elon Musk's most futuristic endeavors, is developing coin-sized microchips that can be embedded into human brains. These chips will not only be able to record brain activity, but also stimulate it. Still in clinical trials, Neuralink has so far been embedded in three patients. One of those patients, Brad Smith, who has ALS, said he was able to edit a video using his Neuralink brain chip. While Neuralink has received a ton of buzz, it's not the only one developing these interfaces. Synchron, backed by Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos, is already working with Apple to help those with disabilities, like ALS patients, use their iPhones. Motif Neurotech is developing a neurostimulator system that works like a pacemaker for the brain and is now used for treating severe depression. Wang also believes these devices will have profound implications for child development. "In your first like seven years of life, your brain is more neuroplastic than at any other point in your life," he said. "When we get Neuralink and we get these other technologies, kids who are born with them are gonna learn how to use them in like crazy, crazy ways." Neuroplasticity refers to the brain's ability to adapt and change — whether that means rewiring its structure, shifting how it functions, or forming new connections — in response to things happening inside us or around us. It's often enhanced in children because the "organization of networks of neuronal synapses as well as white matter pathways remain 'under construction' well into adolescence and even later," according to a 2009 article published in the journal Brain Dev. This is why children are also able to learn new skills quickly and recover from injuries faster. Wang's theory is that early adoption of brain-computer interfaces will allow children to leverage them in ways that adults can't. Read the original article on Business Insider
Miami Herald
3 hours ago
- Miami Herald
Costco to make generous offer to frustrated phone customers
Costco (COST) , the largest warehouse club in the U.S., has been gaining a leg up on its competitors as its membership numbers continue to grow rapidly. During the first quarter of 2025, the number of Costco's paid household members increased to 78.4 million, up 6.8% compared to last year. Don't miss the move: Subscribe to TheStreet's free daily newsletter This comes at a time when Costco's products and deals continue to go viral on social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram. Related: Costco quietly plans to offer a convenient service for customers Costco's U.S. comparable sales also spiked by 8.3% year-over-year during the quarter. This contributed to its net income of $1.7 billion, which is 2% higher than what it earned during the same quarter a year ago. Costco even outperformed its competitors by drawing in higher levels of foot traffic during the quarter. While Costco's foot traffic climbed by 6% year-over-year, Sam's Club's only increased by 2.7% and BJ's spiked by 4%, according to recent data from Image source: VIEWpress/Getty Images As Costco welcomes new members to its warehouses, it reportedly plans to launch a generous new deal next week that targets members who are frustrated with their current phone plans. According to a recent report from Costco Insider, Costco's July 2025 Coupon Book will feature a deal that offers members $450 if they switch to T-Mobile (TMUS) and purchase/activate a new phone on either its Experience More or Experience Beyond plan. Related: Costco quietly limits customer purchases of a beloved product Members who switch from AT&T, Verizon, Xfinity, Spectrum, USCellular, Claro, or Liberty Puerto Rico will receive a $200 Costco Shop card and a $250 Virtual Visa prepaid card, equivalent to $450. Customers can even stack the deal, meaning they can receive up to 12 $200 Costco Shop cards and a maximum of four $250 Visa cards if they add 12 lines to the account. The promotion is valid between June 18 and July 20. Costco's upcoming deal comes amid an exodus of T-Mobile phone customers after the provider implemented a series of price hikes. The phone carrier revealed in its first-quarter earnings report for 2025 that the number of customers who cut their phone service increased by 5 basis points year-over-year. Also, while T-Mobile added 495,000 new postpaid phone customers during the quarter, that number is 6% lower than the amount it welcomed during the same time period last year. More Retail: Costco quietly plans to offer a convenient service for customersT-Mobile pulls the plug on generous offer, angering customersKellogg sounds alarm on unexpected shift in customer behavior During an earnings call in April, T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert said the recent spike in churn is mainly due to consumers becoming more nervous about the state of the economy. "So overall, you saw across the industry churn was just on the margin a little elevated, and I think there's a number of dynamics there," said Sievert during the call. "That probably has more to do with kind of macro questions than with competition. You know, I think there's a certain element out there where people are in a time of uncertainty about the future, grabbing what they can afford now. And so you're seeing [more customer] upgrades and switching." Amid this concerning trend, many consumers have been flocking to cable companies to sign up for phone plans. Spectrum, Comcast, and Altice USA have added 886,000 new phone customers during the first three months of 2025, which is up from the 804,000 it added during the same time period last year, according to a recent report from MoffettNathanson. Related: T-Mobile CEO has a harsh warning for customers The Arena Media Brands, LLC THESTREET is a registered trademark of TheStreet, Inc.
Forbes
3 hours ago
- Forbes
TikTokers Say They Trolled Trump's Birthday Parade By Reserving Tickets They Didn't Use
Associated Press In the middle of Donald Trump's birthday military parade on Saturday evening, an activist posted a video on the Meta platform, Threads, announcing that they had received more than a million views on a TikTok video advertising how to reserve tickets to the Trump parade event. The activist had no intention of attending the Trump rally, nor did many of the people that saw their video. But they were one of dozens of social media users across platforms who began circulating instructions in recent days for how to reserve tickets to the rally, even if you had no intention of attending it. TikTok On Saturday evening, amidst rain and a threat of thunderstorms, the crowds for Trump's parade appeared to be modest. (It is notoriously difficult to accurately assess crowd size, especially during the middle of an event.) On social media, though, users were gleeful, taking credit — as they did in a similar incident in 2020 — for impacting the rally's attendance. 'We're preparing for an enormous turnout — hundreds of thousands of attendees,' Matt McCool, the special agent-in-charge for the U.S. Secret Service's Washington, D.C., field office, said at a security briefing on Monday. 'We Europeans couldn't use our tickets here,' wrote one. 'Solidarity from Scotland!' TikTok In 2020, at the height of Trump's first (and failed) reelection campaign, he kicked off a rally tour with a large event planned for Juneteenth in Tulsa. Users across social media — including, notably, kpop stans, who command a large and organized following online — implored their followers to get involved, reserving tickets to the rally with the intent of leaving the stadium open and the president high and dry. When the president did, in fact, speak to a half-empty stadium in his comeback rally, online teens claimed credit for the paltry crowd (although COVID surges in a pre-vaccine era might have done as much or more to explain it). Now, social media denizens are claiming credit again for a muted response to Trump's heavily publicized birthday party and military parade. TikTok This incident comes at a particularly tricky moment for social media companies, and for TikTok especially, which is only online today because President Trump has chosen not to enforce a binding law that would ban it from the United States unless its parent company, ByteDance, sells it to a non-Chinese company.
