Meta’s new crowd-sourcing feature to use open-source technology from Elon Musk's X

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and Threads, announced the launch of a testing period for community notes across its platforms for the monitoring of misinformation through crowdsourcing.

The social media giant has announced the new feature on March 13 via their official website, Caliber.Az reports.

Meta revealed in a blog post more details of its new content moderation tool, stating that it will use some technology developed by Elon Musk’s X (former Twitter) for its similar service. According to their statement, Meta plans to modify the algorithm over time to better serve its apps.

The new feature will start it's test run on March 18, with the statement noting that 200,000 potential contributors in the US have already signed up across all three apps. 

“As X’s algorithm and program information is open source — meaning free and available for anyone to use— we can build on what X has done, learn from the researchers who have studied it, and improve the system for our own platforms,” Meta said in the post. “As our own version develops, we may explore different or adjusted algorithms to support how Community Notes are ranked and rated,” the Meta blog post reads.

During the system testing phase, notes will not be publicly displayed, while later on A note will only be published if "people who normally disagree decide that it provides helpful context." Additionally, notes must be accompanied by a link verifying the information.

The company expects the system to provide more detailed context for various types of content but, according to a Meta spokesperson's remark to American media, emphasizes that the new feature will not be a replacement for content moderation.

Authors of such community notes must be over 18 years old and have been registered on the platform for at least six months.

By Nazrin Sadigova