Listen Up: The Black Geeks Podcast

The Black Geeks website has a companion podcast and it works in concert with the website to report on news geek culture art large from a Black perspective. The Black Geeks lend collective decades' worth of knowledge and passion for all things geeky with the mission to "uplift diverse voices and perspectives into everyday conversations".

Follow along on iOS via iTunes or on soundcloud.

Listen Up is an ongoing series devoted to shining a spotlight on podcasts by diverse creators. You can check out all the podcasts previously featured here. If you have a podcast you'd like to recommend, post it in the comments or email me at shawnstruck at gmail dot com.

Facebook Employees Meeting In Secret In Hopes of Busting FB B.S.

Description: A hand making a thumbs-down gesture next to the word hoax as a
parody of Facebook's thumbs-up next to the word Like icon. 

Facebook is used by over 150 million Americans. According to a Pew Research Center for Journalism & Media report, two thirds of Facebook's users get their news via that platform. Unfortunately it's been plagued with a flood of flat out hoax news articles. While late last year, Facebook announced it was rolling out new tools for users to report hoax news sites and articles, it's been unclear how effective it's been in action-- and management isn't releasing any details.

Earlier this year amid accusations of Facebook's Trending Topics team in charge of the way the Facebook News Feed worked having a bias towards liberal sites, the entire trending topics team was fired and replaced with an algorithm. The trending topics news feed was then immediately flooded with hoaxes, parody articles presented as fact and puff-piece press releases.

In the wake of an increasingly loud debate across the country over fake news online in general, and on social media in particular, top management have dismissed the idea of having any culpability in leading to the recent election of Donal Trump-- CEO Mark Zuckerberg calling the notion a "crazy idea". Not surprisingly, a number of outlets disagree with him-- including his own employees. Buzz feed reports that they have learned of a group of Facebook employees that are meeting in secret to try and figure out ways to combat the flood of fake news plaguing the social media platform:

“One employee said “more than dozens” of employees were involved, and that they had met twice in the last six days. At the moment, they are meeting in secret, to allow members of the group to speak freely and without fear of condemnation from senior management... Another Facebook employee said while the task force remained small, “hundreds” of Facebook employees had expressed dissatisfaction with the company’s stance on fake news in private online chats, and wanted to support efforts to challenge that position...

'If someone is right-wing, and all their friends are right-wing, and that is the news they share on Facebook, then that is the bubble they have created for themselves and that is their right,' said the longtime Facebook engineer. 'But to highlight fake news articles in the [news] feed, to promote them so they get millions of shares by people who think they are real, that’s not something we should allow to happen. Facebook is getting played by people using us to spread their bullshit.'”

Those sentiments have been echoed by former Facebook designer Booby Goodlatte, who said in a November 8th post:

"News Feed optimizes for engagement. As we've learned in this election, bullshit is highly engaging. These outlets, and Donald Trump, have no concern for the truth, and really only care for engagement. A bias towards truth isn't an impossible goal. Wikipedia, for instance, still bends towards the truth despite a massive audience. But it's now clear that democracy suffers if our news environment incentivizes bullshit."

Pixar Exec At Heart Of Industry-Wide Pay Scandal

Photo illustration via Cartoon Brew

Cartoon Brew explains:

Pixar and Disney Animation president Ed Catmull has always had a reputation as a decent person, but newly revealed court documents show that he’s been working against the interests of Pixar’s employees for years, as well as trying to hurt other animation studios who didn’t play by his rules... Catmull’s deposition and emails from the lawsuit confirm that he was instrumental in operating a secret wage-theft cartel that violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. But it’s even worse than you think. The cartel orchestrated in large part by Catmull robbed potential wages and job opportunities from thousands of animation industry workers at other studios, including DreamWorks, Lucasfilm, Robert Zemeckis’ ImageMovers, the now-defunct Orphanage, and Walt Disney Animation Studios... 

...As Catmull and other Pixar honchos and Disney got richer and richer during the CG feature animation boom, the employees’ salaries at Pixar and beyond were being artificially controlled through illegal means. With these documents, we now know that DreamWorks and Disney also undermined free market principles by colluding to restrict their employees’ wages and job opportunities. These revelations extend beyond the scope of the class-action suit, which is in the process of being settled with a paltry $9 million slap on the wrist for Pixar and Lucasfilm.

Interestingly enough, the comments section of the article has exploded with anonymous industry members coming forward and contributing a number of horror stories. They've been screen-capped, just in case they later "disappear mysteriously":