Meta to Add Labels for State-Run Media Outlets

Facts

• Facebook parent Meta's head of public policy for Australia, Josh Machin, on Tuesday told an Australian Senate inquiry on foreign interference that the social media company plans to label government-affiliated accounts on its new Twitter competitor, Threads.¹
• This comes as he was asked if state-affiliated media RT and Xinhua News Agency, respectively linked to Russia and China, would be tagged on Threads as its rival microblogging platform has removed such labels since Elon Musk took it private last year.¹
• Facebook and Instagram already have tags on the RT and Xinhua accounts, but RT's account on Threads lacked such a label as of Tuesday, while Xinhua apparently didn't have an account on the Twitter-like platform.²
• Threads, which launched last week, reportedly doesn’t yet have the capacity to tag these accounts, but Machin said that type of functionality and other ways to provide context for posts are “top priorities.”³
• Machin’s testimony comes days after Instagram’s chief Adam Mosseri stated that Threads won’t encourage “politics and hard news” on the platform, claiming that risks and scrutiny outweigh any incremental engagement or revenue.⁴
• The Australian Senate inquiry on Tuesday asked Meta, Google, TikTok, and Twitter how they are addressing the alleged threat to the country's democracy posed by foreign interference on social media. Lawmakers are due to present a final report by August 1.⁵

Sources: ¹Reuters, ²Al Jazeera, ³1 News, ⁴Forbes, and ⁵VOA.

Narratives

• Right narrative, as provided by Washington Examiner. Threads is going to be another social media platform, just like Meta’s Instagram, that censors its political enemies under the guise of labeling and fact-checking. Any users who care about First Amendment rights will stick to Twitter and avoid being censored by liberal social media overlords.
• Left narrative, as provided by Analytics Insight. Threads isn’t going on a censorship campaign; it’s labeling and fact-checking posts to prevent the spread of misinformation and provide a safe social media environment for people to engage with each other. Meta is committed to being nonpartisan as long as users adhere to the terms of service.

Predictions