Meanwhile in Britain and northern Europe, Facebook users' displays of humor can be quite brutal. "But Facebook’s hands are tied around humor; they’re completely committed to freedom of speech," she said.
Controversial posters appreciate the feedback
Facebook used to offer empty message boxes to encourage private conversations among users over controversial posts. But only one in five users actually wrote a message. That's changed since Facebook began providing tailored messages such as "Hey, there’s something about this photo that bothers me. Would you mind taking it down? It's a little embarrassing to me."
With the help of these suggested messages, Facebook users were found to be more willing to remove photos when contacted (85 percent of requests are honored). Moreover, 63 percent reported feeling positive toward people who sent such a message, and around the same number said they felt fine about being asked to remove a post.
"We’ve found that the people who created status updates and shared links that annoyed or offended others are generally happy to hear feedback," Steinfeld said.
People, not an algorithm, used to screen complaints
In addition to improving online discourse among Facebook friends, the messaging tools can save the company time and labor because Facebook uses people, not an algorithm, to screen complaints about posts. This is because the social network is on the lookout for bullying, suicide threats and other matters that may require intervention.
Still, the bulk of complaints are not about overt breaches of the company’s community standards, but are grievances of a more subjective or personal nature, which is why it makes sense for Facebook users to work out their friend-to-friend conflicts without involving a third party, Simon-Thomas said,
"Facebook is no different from real life. You’re going to have conflicts with people that are not easy to resolve," Simon-Thomas said. "Facebook can’t take down a post just because you don’t like it, but it can provide the words and images to help you convey the way you feel in a sensitive way."
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