Everyone is, in short, currently asking for the wrong thing. Which makes it worth asking: Why? One reason is that this area is confusing, and the idea of making tech “responsible” does sound good. There are, as I discuss below, ways in which they should be. Also, as described below, the mere threat of 230… Read More »
Saudi-based Twitter accounts using fake profile pictures, repetitive wording and spammy tactics sought to undermine the conclusion by U.S. intelligence officials, made public Friday, that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman “approved” the operation that led to the killing of Washington Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018. Source: When U.S. blamed Saudi crown prince for… Read More »
Control is a game that came free with Playstation Plus. I had heard relatively good things about it, but I know that PS+ games are the B- games that have run their course commercially, so I took this move with a grain of salt. Turns out that, like Red Dead Redemption 2, Control has a… Read More »
As you can see, Facebook has to make decisions on a wide range of topics, from ethnic conflict to health information. Often, Facebook is forced to choose sides between deeply antagonistic groups—Democrats and Republicans, Armenians and Azerbaijanis, public health advocates and anti-vaxxers. One benefit of creating the Oversight Board is to give Facebook an external… Read More »
Robinhood was not the only broker to limit sales of GameStop. Interactive Brokers on Wednesday said it had placed restrictions on sales of the stock. Charles Schwab said Thursday that its customers could still trade GameStop but noted that it limited certain kinds of transactions involving more risk. Source: GameStop: Cruz, Ocasio-Cortez blast Robinhood over… Read More »
Do certain important people, defined here as people some subset of journalists find compelling, owe the professional media class a seat at their table? The question is interesting. Politicians and business leaders were once forced to travel through the establishment media’s gateway to reach the masses, and as I’ve been writing for months social media… Read More »
“Section 230 is a foundational law for free expression and human rights when it comes to digital speech,” the letter says. The law protects websites and apps from being sued over user-generated content — making it safer to operate social networks, comment sections, or hosting services. “Overly broad changes to Section 230 could disproportionately harm… Read More »
As with almost everything on the internet, misleading headlines are not a new phenomenon. What’s new, and notable, is the scale of our exposure to the phenomenon. Today, on Twitter, many of us now spend a significant portion of our lives inside a virtual world of headlines. Source: Dopamine Thirst Trap – Pirate Wires Well, not… Read More »
Repealing Section 230 or reforming it so platforms who profit via advertising are not covered, would reduce the incentive for social media to enable illegal behavior. If we did so, a whole range of legal claims, from incitement to intentional infliction of emotional distress to harassment to defamation to fraud to negligence, would hit the… Read More »
No speculation is needed. Those who wield power are demanding it. The only question is how much opposition they will encounter. Source: The New Domestic War on Terror is Coming – Glenn Greenwald Glenn wrote a long article about how all political speech is going to be painted as “inciting violence,” in order to stifle… Read More »