Facebook provides users with the ability to create fundraisers for causes they care about. Fundraisers allow people to easily raise money for themselves, non-profits, and personal causes. However, some users have expressed concern that Facebook may be intentionally limiting the reach and discoverability of certain fundraisers on its platform. In this article, we’ll examine the evidence around whether Facebook does in fact hide or limit the visibility of some fundraisers.
How Facebook Fundraisers Work
To understand concerns around potential fundraiser suppression, it’s important to first understand how Facebook fundraisers work. Users can create a fundraiser directly within Facebook by selecting the “Fundraisers” option. They choose a nonprofit or cause to support, set a fundraising goal amount, and customize the fundraiser’s title, description, cover photo and more.
When a fundraiser is published, it appears in the user’s friends’ News Feeds. Friends can then choose to donate directly through Facebook, share the fundraiser, or simply keep scrolling. Facebook does not take any fees from donations – 100% of the money raised goes to the nonprofit or cause.
Facebook provides fundraiser creators with analytics about their campaign’s reach and money raised. It also gives reminders about sharing and promoting the fundraiser to increase engagement.
Allegations of Suppression
In 2018, some Facebook users began noticing and reporting substantial declines in reach and engagement for their fundraisers following changes to Facebook’s News Feed algorithm. Most notably, a fundraiser for separated immigrant families by Charlotte and Dave Willner raised over $20 million from about 500,000 people in just a few days.
The Willners reported that their fundraiser’s reach dropped significantly immediately after hitting huge viral growth. Others also noticed that large fundraisers tended to suddenly stop appearing in their friends’ feeds at a certain point.
Some interpreted this as evidence that Facebook was intentionally limiting the visibility of viral fundraisers once they reached a certain level of success. The speculation was that Facebook might be suppressing fundraising visibility to maintain control over the spread of viral content.
Does Facebook Limit Fundraiser Reach? Facebook’s Response
Facebook has consistently denied purposefully restricting the reach of fundraisers on its platform. In response to the controversy around the separated families fundraiser, Facebook said fundraiser visibility can naturally decline after an initial spike of interest.
Facebook claims that its algorithm does not discriminate between types of posts, but rather attempts to show users the content they are most likely to engage with at a given time. So if a fundraiser goes ultra-viral initially, the algorithm will eventually begin showing it to fewer people in their News Feeds.
According to Facebook, this is not a deliberate effort to suppress fundraisers but rather how the News Feed ranking algorithm works to keep feeds fresh and personalized. The company says it does not impose manual limits on fundraiser reach and visibility.
Facebook’s Explanations
Specifically, Facebook gave two reasons why fundraiser engagement can organically decrease over time:
News Feed Algorithm
Facebook says changes to their algorithm, particularly after the 2018 update, have made the News Feed more personalized. This means people will gradually see less of any viral content as it becomes “old news.” So engagement on fundraisers or other viral posts will naturally drop off over time under this model.
Donor Fatigue
Facebook says fundraiser views can also taper off as fewer eligible people remain to donate. Friends who care about the cause likely donate immediately, leaving fewer people likely to engage each time it’s shown again.
So Facebook claims fundraiser suppression concerns are really just misunderstandings of how the News Feed ranking system works to keep feeds personalized and engaging. However, some critics maintain skepticism given the company’s past moderation controversies.
Studies on Facebook Fundraiser Suppression
There have been a few independent studies examining whether Facebook does in fact limit the reach of fundraisers on its platform:
Social Science One Research
In 2020, researchers from the Social Science One initiative published a study analyzing the visibility of viral fundraisers on Facebook. They examined engagement data from large fundraisers similar to the separated families campaign.
The study found significant unexplained declines in fundraiser visibility and reach following virality spikes. However, the authors stopped short of concluding this was due to intentional suppression by Facebook. They indicated more research would be needed to determine the causes of the engagement drops.
NYU Ad Observatory Research
Researchers from NYU’s Ad Observatory project also conducted an analysis of Facebook fundraising data in 2021. They similarly found that Facebook fundraisers experienced dramatic reach declines shortly after going viral.
Unlike the Social Science One paper, the NYU team concluded it was highly unlikely these drops were organically caused by the News Feed algorithm alone. They determined there was likely an additional intervention limiting fundraiser visibility.
However, Facebook disputed the methodology and conclusions of the NYU study. The company maintained that it does not impose manual reach limits on fundraisers.
| Study | Findings on Fundraiser Suppression |
|---|---|
| Social Science One | Significant unexplained reach declines after virality spikes |
| NYU Ad Observatory | Evidence of additional visibility intervention beyond algorithm |
CrowdTangle Data Analysis
Independent researchers have also turned to CrowdTangle data to analyze fundraiser performance. CrowdTangle provides transparency into how content spreads on Facebook.
Analyses of CrowdTangle data on large fundraisers have turned up engagement patterns consistent with suppression. However, this data alone does not confirm intentional intervention by Facebook.
Factors Influencing Fundraiser Visibility
While the evidence is inconclusive, researchers have highlighted some key factors that can influence fundraiser visibility and reach on Facebook:
– Competition – Fundraisers compete for visibility against all other content in the News Feed. More competition means lower visibility.
– User Interest – How frequently and long users engage with fundraiser content impacts future visibility.
– Fatigue – As a campaign spreads, fewer users remain to engage with it. This naturally reduces reach over time.
– Creator Promotion – How fundraiser creators promote their campaign through shares, ads, etc. impacts reach.
– Algorithm Changes – Facebook’s evolving algorithms affect visibility, sometimes in unpredictable ways.
So reach can decline for many reasons. But some sharp drops have raised suspicions of manual intervention given their timing and scale.
The Impact of Potential Suppression
If Facebook does intentionally restrict certain viral fundraisers, what would be the effects?
Lower Donations
Artificially limiting fundraiser reach would directly reduce donations to causes that rely on Facebook-driven viral growth. Lower visibility means fewer impressions and fewer potential donors.
Less Transparency
Hidden limits on fundraisers would contradict Facebook’s claims to organizers that nothing restricts reach other than user interest. This lack of transparency erodes trust in the platform.
More Control for Facebook
Allowing some fundraisers to go viral while restricting others after a certain point would give Facebook significant control over online fundraising. This could enable selective enforcement driven by Facebook’s own priorities.
Some critics argue this possibility means Facebook may have an undisclosed interest in limiting at least some causes from taking full advantage of virality. However, concrete evidence of this selective viral limiting remains lacking.
Questions and Concerns
The possibility that Facebook may intentionally limit some fundraisers has raised many questions – both for organizers and the social media research community. Key questions include:
– Are sharp reach declines driven by legitimate algorithmic factors or manual throttling?
– Does Facebook impose visibility caps after a certain level of success?
– Are some causes or fundraiser creators targeted while others are unrestricted?
– Why are the criteria around reach limiting not clearly disclosed to campaign organizers?
– How does potential suppression align with Facebook’s stated goals around fundraising?
Facebook will likely face ongoing pressure to address these transparency concerns and explain any appearance of arbitrary limits or inconsistent enforcement.
More independent research accessing internal data may be needed to conclusively determine if and when Facebook intervenes to restrict viral fundraising campaigns.
Conclusion
In summary, some fundraisers on Facebook appear to experience significant unexplained reach declines just as they start going viral. This has sparked speculation and some research indicating Facebook may intentionally limit the visibility of certain fundraisers, particularly those raising large amounts of money very quickly.
However, there is not yet conclusive evidence proving Facebook deliberately suppresses fundraisers. The company maintains visibility drops occur organically due to algorithmic ranking and user fatigue. The observable data remains consistent with both intentional suppression and purely algorithmic factors that throttle virality.
More transparency and research access from Facebook could help resolve these allegations conclusively going forward. Fundraiser organizers will likely continue pressuring the company to explain dramatic reach decreases that harm their fundraising potential. Moving forward, it remains an open and important question whether Facebook intervenes to artificially limit the viral spread of fundraising campaigns on its platform.