Newton uncovers how moderators viewing such traumatic content have been diagnosed with PTSD(post-traumatic stress disorder)-like symptoms or abuse drugs at work to cope with what they encounter online. Cognizant employees average salaries ($28,800) are significantly less than what an average Facebook employee makes ($240,000 including salary, stock, and bonuses), according to Newton’s piece. Instead they are contract employees provided by Cognizant, a vendor Facebook pays to moderate content. Moderators work long hours in keeping Facebook free of these flagged posts, while technically not even being actual employees of the company. Moderators then do the dirty work to keep the platform clean, by ensuring the content violates Facebook’s policies which often involved viewing said content, from videos of people being stabbed and murdered to 9/11 conspiracy theory videos to racist language filled posts and ensuring it is deleted. His non-objective viewpoints show a brand of advocacy journalism that takes all sides into account seen in his reporting on these Facebook moderators.įacebook users will constantly flag posts for violating its community standards, often on content deemed offensive or disturbing. Newton, Silicon Valley Editor for Vox Media’s The Verge, is an advocate for the Facebook moderators, detailed in his piece, by unearthing ugly, harsh truths these individuals live with in monitoring the largest social media network in the world. Any person in the world would have the ability to post disturbing images of violence or use offensive, hateful language, without having the post flagged for offensive behavior and deleted.Ĭasey Newton’s February piece for The Verge “ The Trauma Floor: The secret lives of Facebook moderators in America ”, highlights the importance for monitoring disturbing content for the social media giant, Facebook, while also bringing forth the jarring working conditions moderators deal with in their day to day. – Imagine if social media was raw, obscene, and absolutely unfiltered.
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