Notes about Community Notes on Facebook
I'm active on Facebook in a number of special interest groups. Mostly I answer technical questions and offer whatever expertise on a subject that i can. Not long ago, I got asked if I wanted to volunteer to write community notes and rate them as well. Just to see how that worked, I volunteered.
I don't see a lot of posts that need a community note. Most of the groups I frequent don't get political or anything like that. So, I haven't had a lot of opportunity to write community notes about Facebook posts.
However, I do get asked to rate the community notes others write, and I have been doing that on a regular basis. Mostly, such notes are political in nature or involve some sort of prejudice. It's interesting to see what people write as potential community notes.
Those notes don't appear publicly until enough people rate them as useful or helpful. The ratings also ask raters to check boxes that indicate why htey are rating the note as helpful or unhelpful. It takes some time and care to rate a community note and you have to read everything carefully.
In some ways, it reminds me of the jury system here on DU. I'm glad to see that FB is trying to use community feedback to judge posts on its platform.
Often, a particular post will have multiple proposed community notes. Only the one that has the best rating by others ends up appearing. The process seems pretty even and fair to me, looking at it as a rater.
So, I'm participating. So far, it seems pretty useful and the notes that make it to public view do seem fair and well thought-out. I'll continue participating as long as that is the case.