Concerned conservatives leave Facebook summit reassured bias charge being taken seriously

CEO Zuckerberg's unusual conservative summit will not end suspicions of leftward tilt

Mark Zuckerberg hosted conservative summit (Reuters)

Facebook invited them to its headquarters in Menlo Park for a reassuring chat, but headlines along the lines of “conservatives put aside all suspicions” have yet to pop up on its homepage.

Like correspondents trying to read what happened at an international summit, media-watchers had little to go on after Wednesday’s “Facebook summit” attended by some of America’s best-known conservative standard-bearers and hosted by the top man himself, Mark Zuckerberg.

Stunt or genuine bridge-building attempt, the meeting was Facebook’s response to the furore that erupted earlier this month when reports emerged alleging that its employees quietly manipulate the list of “trending topics” that appears on the right of its homepage to favour content that hews to the liberal mindset of Silicon Valley and suppress conservative viewpoints.

Imagined or not, the suggestion of bias weighs heavily on the company and on those who feel victimised by it. Mr Zuckerberg cannot afford a narrative to take hold that threatens to alienate a large portion of the American market. And no peddler of political opinion or ideology can afford to ignore the singular influence that Facebook wields.

A Pew Centre study last year said almost two thirds of young Americans (from 18 to 33 years old) get some of their political news from Facebook in any given week. A new Pew report adds that “Facebook sends by far the most mobile readers to news sites of any social media site.”

While they went to Menlo Park to demand transparency from Facebook about how exactly it curates its trending list, once there the summiteers agreed that the specifics of their discussion would not be shared with the rest of the world afterwards.

Some, like Brent Bozell, president of conservative media watchdog the Media Research Center, did offer statements, suggesting that that when the notion of political bias was broached no glassware was thrown around the room at least.

“From the very top there is a genuine desire to resolve it,” Mr Bozell offered. “There were good exchanges and overall it was cordial. We’ll see how the investigation turns out. There has been a serious issue of trust within the conservative movement about this issue, but everyone in that room, on both sides, wants to see it restored.”

Others at the unusual Silicon Valley-meets-Neoconland confab included Glen Beck, the radio host and one-time Fox News anchor, Jim DeMint, president of the Heritage Foundation and former US Senator; American Enterprise Institute President Arthur Brooks and Mitt Romney’s former digital director, Zac Moffatt. Also at the table was CNN commentator S.E. Cupp.

Breaking the story of alleged bias earlier this month, Gizmodo, the tech news site, cited an unidentified former contractor at Facebook alleging that its editors routinely eliminated items with a conservative bent and also culled stories originating from conservative news sites like Breitbart unless they were simultaneously on other general news sites like the BBC.

The company denied the charge. As he readied to greet his guests on Wednesday, Mr Zuckerberg reinforced the point on his own Facebook page, vowing that the site would always be a “platform for all ideas”. He added: ”It doesn't make sense for our mission or our business to suppress political content or prevent anyone from seeing what matters most to them.”

“I know many conservatives don’t trust that our platform surfaces content without a political bias,” Mr. Zuckerberg wrote. “I wanted to hear their concerns personally and have an open conversation about how we can build trust. I want to do everything I can to make sure our teams uphold the integrity of our products.”

He added, for good measure, that certain conservative figures and organisations have recently had a good run on his site. “Donald Trump has more fans on Facebook than any other presidential candidate,” he noted. “And Fox News drives more interactions on its Facebook page than any other news outlet in the world. It's not even close.”

The company decided on inviting the conservative headliners to its headquarters after the US Congress threatened to weigh in, notably when the chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, John Thune, a South Dakota Republican, wrote to Mr Zuckerberg asking how the company chooses its trending topics and who is ultimately responsible for approving its content.

However eloquent Mr Zuckerberg might be, his guests were unlikely to be bamboozled. “No one is kidding themselves—everyone knows how left-wing Silicon Valley is. It is a world view that is completely contrary to the conservative world view,” Mr. Bozell said. “That said, it doesn’t mean that one can’t find any way to make this work.”

Offering her own post-summit assessment, Kristen Soltis Anderson, the Republican pollster, television personality and writer, told CNN it had been a “civil but frank” discussion.

“Most assumed Facebook is not operating in bad faith but wanted to raise the issue on unconscious bias where it can crop up,” she said. “Because Silicon Valley is largely left of center, the folks in the room wanted to convey that it's important to make sure there's a culture of respecting viewpoints of all types and preserving Facebook as a free marketplace of ideas.”