Just some thoughts and personal experience:
I think that misinformation isn’t necessarily a problem on Facebook alone; my interactions with locals has shown me that so many people are really just completely clueless when it comes to plants, trees, and garden/landscape care (which is a shame, but in today’s world, getting the right information out to people is—in some ways—much harder than it has ever been before, in the sense that it’s harder to reach the general population as a whole. People seem to be isolated, separated, and divided, not connected, by technology and the internet). If not Facebook, then where will those people go? And if people stop going anywhere, is it a good thing that more and more people are getting disconnected from fruit growing, gardening, and/or landscaping in general?
On the whole, Facebook does have more than its fair share of problems. But, I think that whether on Facebook, in forums (including this one!), other websites, etc., that any group will only be as good as how it is set up—e.g. what rules are in place—as well as how it is run. I also think that any group needs to be able to adapt to possible changes that might occur—including influxes of new people.
The region-specific FB group I’ve helped moderate, “Utah Gardeners” (a group for anything garden, landscape, or plant-related—including fruit trees) has been better than many others. The founders were wise in how they set it up. Only real, sincere people who actually live locally have been allowed entry, and were required to agree to the rules to join, with bots and bad actors being easily sifted out.
The rules themselves also established a good foundation. Besides Respect being #1, another key rule was that they rely on Science to establish facts, and that any "illegal, questionable, disproven, or questionable ‘advice’ " doesn’t have a place there.
Also, having the right people on there has been another key to success, with knowledgeable admins and moderators—many of whom are local experts or professionals—having really helped to keep discussion focused, on-topic, and enforced the rules well. Their expertise on topics that are particular to our region is also very helpful.
We haven’t had many problems that can be endemic to some other groups; no issues with people selling things, very few fights (those that do pop up are usually quenched pretty quickly), etc. I also wouldn’t say that it’s necessarily been older-folks-only on there; there are plenty of people of all [adult] ages on there (though, perhaps a number of them use Facebook very little except for group participation; I know I do).
With that being said, I will also admit that the group isn’t without its problems. Its success has begun to lead to a little bit of “undoing;” the number of members has tripled in size over the past four years, now reaching almost 30,000. There are indeed problems with the format of Facebook, not the least of which is that at least for that group, it’s getting increasingly difficult for moderators/admins to sift through all the posts, which keep going up in numbers. Though they were able to keep discussion focused in the past, it has been more challenging for people, especially newcomers, to separate the recognized voices of authority and reason from the John/Jane Does that speak the first thing on their mind without realizing how little they know about it. It is becoming more and more taxing to moderate the group as it gets bigger and busier, to correct misinformation, to direct others to good information, etc… But, I don’t think all of these problems are only endemic to Facebook; some of them are problems that simply come from people.
(One thing I wonder about is this: Is it better to try to separate oneself from the “dummies” and stick to groups where they’re are only people that have the same understanding as myself, or is it better to educate those who aren’t as fortunate to know what I do, and help them learn things and do things they wouldn’t otherwise? I partly ask that to myself as I try to contemplate what to do next with my life; I am near the end of my undergraduate studies and hope to use what I’ve studied about plant- and landscaping-related world to do something useful with it and to make a difference in the problems that I see where I live, but it’s hard to know what will really make the best or biggest difference.)
