Questions

Is there a mobile version?

No, because we're unclear on what people want out of a mobile version. Feedback welcome.

The Desktop Plugin works by going rogue on Facebook itself, modifying the HTML in your browser to inject fact-checks right into the headlines. This is possible because Chrome has a great Plugin/Extension feature, allowing any lowly web dev to write extensions that modify any webpage.

On Mobile, most people use the Facebook app, which has no Plugin functionality, so there's no way for us to modify it. That means we're not able to approach it as effectively and simply as Desktop. We do have options, and we welcome preferences on the below or ideas for alternatives:

  • Use the mobile website instead of the app, with a special mobile browser. If users were willing to use m.facebook.com, using the Dolphin browser (a mobile Browser for both iPhone and Android), we could use its Plugin support to do the same thing we do on Desktop. If you're wondering how Dolphin is as a browser, we found it did the basics you expect from a Browser - it opens webpages well, they render properly, it has tabs and bookmarks. However, it crashed more often than the Android built-in Chrome, its UI took up more space, and was less intuitive. But, you could avoid using it except for Facebook (and links you click in Facebook).
  • Write a mobile website that shows you your Facebook feed, or an app that does same. Our guess is this is illegal given Facebook's Terms of Service, but we're not lawyers. If you are a lawyer and have a legal opinion about how we can approach this, we welcome it.
  • Use something really clunky, like an app you can paste URLs into to find out their trustworthiness. This actually already exists - it's the homepage for whatstrue, which works the same on mobile as it does on desktop.
  • So far most feedback has been, people simply are not willing to switch away from the Facebook app. That would leave us with no way forward.