CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A number of West Virginians who have outdoor related social media sites got an unexpected alert on Sunday. Without warning, numerous Facebook pages were informed by Meta their content violated the rules and their site would no longer be recommended to others.
The common thread of those sites was all had outdoor content and pictures of outdoor pursuits like hunting or fishing.
“Your recommendations are suspended. Your page is not eligible to be be suggested to new people right now,” read the alert at the page of Longspur Tracking and Outfitting.
Owner Shon Butler said it was out of nowhere and a lot of people he knew were affected.
Walt Allen’s site for BBD Recovery was hit as well with the notification.
“They sent me a notification that said they were no longer recommending my page to any new followers or people. I follow Hunter Nation, a Ted Nugent Page. He posted about skinning deer in school. I shared that post and it showed a deer being skinned. That’s the reason they suspended my page,” said Allen.
“They said that it was gory content, I guess, but it didn’t show guts or blood. It showed kids skinning a deer in a classroom. I thought it was an excellent post, that’s what we need to be posting. It said all I had to do is delete the post and they would start recommending me. I deleted it yesterday and they started recommending it again,” Allen added.
Chad See of Mountain Critters Taxidermy got the same kind of notification, but he hasn’t posted anything of late.
“I haven’t even posted any taxidermy pics in forever because I’ve been sick. The last taxidermy I posted was replica fish,” he explained.
See said he didn’t remove anything, but when he logged into his business account Monday, the notification was gone.
Although there has been no word from Meta about any change in their policy or a restriction regarding the posting of hunting and fishing related content, some national organizations suspect Facebook has installed a new A-I bot to police content and it triggered numerous warnings and temporary halts on sharing.
“A lot of Outdoor pages like ours has gotten flagged, suspended, or not being recommended to anybody for NO REASON! Yall we are still here! I’ve seen my page TANK in the last 3 days!! All we can do it help one another! Share, comment, and follow these kind of pages! We need to help each other right now!!” was a post on Michigan Boneheads Outdoors Facebook page.
Another, post from Tails on Trails Deer Tracking seemed to also blame it on A-I from Meta.
“Folks, Facebook AI review bots are out in force. They have decided me sharing posts by Brian Johnson, The Anatomy Hunter, somehow does not follow their rules and they are restricting recommending my page to others. I have deleted the posts hoping they will remove their restrictions, but I strongly encourage everyone to follow Brian and the Anatomy Hunter. Brian’s work is the best in the industry and my only trusted source for anatomy. Please give him a follow!” read the post.
There has been nothing noted publicly by Facebook personnel or anyone from Meta.