Facebook is copying Nextdoor with new community moderator features - Vox.com

Facebook says the new tools are meant to help “admins play a key role in helping maintain a safe and healthy culture.” The changes are part of Facebook’s broader shift toward relying more on unpaid community admins, who get special privileges in exchange for managing the conversation in individual groups.

But the new approach to moderation isn’t the only example of Facebook trying to be more like Nextdoor.

Facebook is also preparing to launch a Nextdoor-style group feature in the US called Neighborhoods — the feature is already available in Canada — that will allow users to create and join groups that are limited to geographic areas, which is what Nextdoor does.

Facebook will also rely on unpaid community moderators to enforce its guidelines for the Neighborhoods feature, which are meant to keep content “relevant and kind.” Nextdoor also does this.

In recent years, Nextdoor has encountered many of the same moderation issues as Facebook, including the distribution of hate speech, conspiracy theories, and political misinformation.

Nextdoor faced criticism last year when unpaid community moderators censored and removed posts in support of Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd.

As Recode reported last year, Nextdoor groups can be overrun with tense political arguments that its unpaid moderators are either unequipped or unmotivated to resolve.