Facebook’ s mission statement has traditionally been to make “ the world more open and connected, ” but that’ s no longer the case. In an interview with CNN, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said his company has a new goal: “ To give people the power…
Facebook’s mission statement has traditionally been to make “the world more open and connected, ” but that’s no longer the case. In an interview with CNN, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said his company has a new goal: “To give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together. »
« I used to think that if we just gave people a voice and helped people connect, that would make the world a better place by itself, » said Zuckerberg at yesterday’s Facebook communities summit in Chicago. « Now I believe we have a responsibility to do even more. »
Facebook is no longer a place reserved for catching up with friends and sharing baby pictures/anecdotes/photos of food. With almost 2 billion users, it now has a huge influence on society as a whole. And through the ongoing problems of fake news, extremist material, and violence (on Facebook Live) , the company is facing more criticism than ever before.
« Our mission of connecting people, that was not supposed to be controversial, » Zuckerberg said in an interview with Bloomberg . « So now the question is, why is that a controversial thing, and how do you rebuild that? »
Zuckerberg and the Facebook team believe one of the ways to encourage community building is through the platform’s Groups feature. More than 1 billion people globally use Groups, and more than 100 million are part of what the company calls “meaningful groups.” Facebook wants to help 1 billion people join meaningful communities like these.
“An important part of delivering on our new mission is supporting group admins, who are real community leaders on Facebook, ” writes Kang-Xing Jin, Facebook’s vice president of engineering, in a blog post .
The updated Groups Utility lets admins see real-time metrics around growth, engagement, and membership, as well as introducing ways to sort membership requests and schedule posts. Importantly, admins can now remove toxic users and all their posts/comments from a group in one action.
Facebook highlights examples of what it considers a meaningful group, such as the Affected by Addiction Support Group.
« When enough of us feel a sense of support in our own lives, we can start to care about broader issues, too, » said Zuckerberg.
