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Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
when a rule consists of a number
noise should be reduced.
they reduce the role of judgment.
Standards are altogether different.
Those who devise standards effectively export decision-making authority to others. They delegate power.
When guidelines are tightened so as to eliminate that discretion, they turn into rules. Algorithms work as rules, not standards.
it might be far easier to generate standards than rules.
Setting standards without specifying details can lead to noise,
Standards might be the best that such leaders can do.
attempts to devise rules, on the other hand, might cause intractable disagreement.
Sometimes, the real problem is that people lack the information that would enable them to produce sensible rules.
rely on trusted experts to specify its meaning,
Rules can be biased
Even if they create a large bias, rules will sharply reduce noise
standards invite noise.
To see why such variability was inevitable, consider these words from Facebook’s Community Standards in 2020: