@pollar.news: On Friday 23 October, Brazilian headlines said Meta charged President Lula's campaign up to 43% more than Flávio Bolsonaro's to reach 1,000 people with ads on Facebook and Instagram. The study behind that number, IPIE Technical Paper TP2026.3 with NetLab at UFRJ, says the public data can't establish it. Its authors estimated prices for first-round ads in four versions of the comparison: 10, 33, 39 and 43% more for Lula's campaign. The 10% comes from the version the study says to use when asking whether Meta treated the campaigns differently. It was within the margin of error. An outside reviewer, Fabio Votta, allowed for ads run from the same Facebook page. After that, none of the four estimates showed a clear difference. That isn't the same as equal prices. Meta says it doesn't set ad prices by an advertiser's identity or political position, and that comparing the spending ranges it publishes can mislead. Meta reports each ad's spending only as a range. For 3,939 of the 7,625 eligible ads, it's R$0 to R$99. It doesn't publish what each campaign asked the ads to do, or how it bid. So the question stays open. The missing numbers sit with Meta and the campaigns, and the study says a test of the auction would need both to take part. On Sunday 25 October Lula won the runoff with 51.79% of valid votes. In his victory speech he said the election had to defeat "interference coming from outside, through digital platforms". He named no company. Sources: IPIE TP2026.3, Ads Without Accountability (with NetLab/UFRJ, 23 Oct); Meta's statement to SBT News (23 Oct) and its newsroom post (16 Oct); TSE (15, 20 and 25 Oct); Estado de Minas (23 Oct). Checked 27 Oct 2026, 16:50 CET. Narration: synthetic voice. Lula footage: Reuters; translation: Pollar. Cover photo (2019): Fachada do Congresso Nacional, Senado Federal, CC BY 2.0. #Brazil #Meta #Elections #Lula #Advertising

AldebaranAstro_ :

I love how Meta is losing credibility in the world

Noel Klintfors :

Publicly traded mega firms would never meddle in politics… oh wait

dedeautopsy :

SOCIAL MEDIA REGULATION NOW

SmokeWitch :

SOCIAL MEDIA REGULATION 🫵🏻

kaueferreira987 :

Don't trust in Meta

thatafer_ :

Interference was so obvious. One right wing congressman had way more reels views than Kylie Jenner, than Messi

SAN7O5 :

This will only change the day the rest of the world starts to make social media companies accountable, otherwise they will continue to do this

Isak :

If your ads are shit the CPM will be higher

Palheirosss :

—— :

Na rua não tem algoritmo

Glauber Lima :

it wasn't only the ads. Everything I've posted, shared or reported had only around 10% of the usual views of my personal pages.

mati :

my professor posted something supportive about lula’s campaign on instagram and as a result got every post of his account deleted with the reason of sharing cp

Martyn Archer :

I posted a Tictok template video after the election and there was a couple of pictures of the crowd in São Paulo and Tictok refused to show it

daiana :

Elo Ventura :

i

Mooly :

Rah

. :

why would meta ban a left winger

zerodoisMetal :

The interference was way broader than just ad prices. Right wing influencers were getting as many views as Messi with less than 1% of his follower count, within 1 hour from posting the videos.

Chris Wright :

Yeah 'mistakes', funny how these 'mistakes' always seem to be on one side hmmm 🤔

Felipe Ferreira :

it goes deeper than that. right wing politicians had visualizations greater than the Brazilian population itself, Nikolas Ferreira had faster and larger widespread than Kylie Jenner and Kim K combined. Not to mention the translation of “flavio futuro presidiario” to “flavio future president” when it should say “flavio future inmate”

Nana :

so meta isn't being transparent, I am not surprised. also the whole thing about about meta not taking into account who's posting things is bullshit, the algorithm is the way it is because meta has a preference its like someone who's a conventionally attractive person vs not and they both post at the same time then the ig page of the person who's not conventionally attractive won't be as out there as the one who is

Calis :

MILÍCIA DIGITAL

Jameson Torres :

There's also the anomaly of Nikolas Ferreira account. There's nothing organic about it.

aaaappwkeisnjwk :

SOCIAL MEDIA REGULATION

鬼ちゃん :

my timeline is STILL flooded by bolsonaro's ads!