Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
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Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
1–10 of 29 posts
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#2Personally, I am concerned around this new mantra to eliminate fake news. Who are the gatekeepers of said truthfulness. Now I am not arguing that fake news does not abound on the Internet but a call to arms for companies to eliminate "Fake" news sounds too close to censorship for my fancy.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#3My very unscientific feeling: The constant influx of pieces like this since the election feels like the mainstream media redirecting calls of "echo chamber" elsewhere.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#4My very unscientific feeling: The constant influx of pieces like this since the election feels like the mainstream media redirecting calls of "echo chamber" elsewhere.
An echo chamber compared to what, though? Twitter's alt-right? They're not exactly honestly measuring the material problems of rural Americans: they're passing memes around about expelling the Muslims and gassing the Jews.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#5Thus is just the NYT throwing the dead cat into Silicon Valley while bringing you more Trump bad press. Move along.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#6We can't know whether fake news tilted the election towards Trump. There is no experiment or analysis that can conclusively dis/prove that hypothesis. NYT and others should be humble here. Sure, fake news is stupid, but so is claiming that it "helped elect Trump"
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#7My very unscientific feeling: The constant influx of pieces like this since the election feels like the mainstream media redirecting calls of "echo chamber" elsewhere.
Yeah, I don't think it's invalid to say that fake news is a serious problem (or even that it probably helped elect Trump), but I think there's a much deeper crisis of news, bias, and the nature of truth in the Internet age that needs to be addressed head-on.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#8Personally, I am concerned around this new mantra to eliminate fake news. Who are the gatekeepers of said truthfulness. Now I am not arguing that fake news does not abound on the Internet but a call to arms for companies to eliminate "Fake" news sounds too close to censorship for my fancy.
The obvious problem is the one created by sites which simply fabricate "news" for clicks. Those should be easy to tamp down because little they do is actual news in any way. It's all fabrication.
On the other hand, there is lots of biased media, for good and for ill, but that's not the same as fabricating news and I imagine these will not be the targets for "censorship" among the news platforms.
I think the NYT and others in this case are lashing out on seeing their influence wane and not being able to influence their readership with what they believe is the basis for a "righteous" political lifestyle as well as their apparent impotency in shaping political thought.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#9Personally, I am concerned around this new mantra to eliminate fake news. Who are the gatekeepers of said truthfulness. Now I am not arguing that fake news does not abound on the Internet but a call to arms for companies to eliminate "Fake" news sounds too close to censorship for my fancy.
The obvious problem is the one created by sites which simply fabricate "news" for clicks. Those should be easy to tamp down because little they do is actual news in any way. It's all fabrication. On the other hand, there is lots of biased media, for good and for ill, but that's not the same as fabricating news and I imagine these will not be the targets for "censorship" among the news platforms. I think the NYT and o…
this is probably how it will go for the first year or so before the public accepts it: obvious fake news sites are censored.
than they will start censoring articles which are maybe just editoralize their content a bit too much in a way that facebook doesn't like.
than they will start censoring full sites that they don't agree with.
its a slippery slope and they're playing for the long game.
Re: Silicon Valley Helped Create Trump, and That’s Bad for It
#10Personally, I am concerned around this new mantra to eliminate fake news. Who are the gatekeepers of said truthfulness. Now I am not arguing that fake news does not abound on the Internet but a call to arms for companies to eliminate "Fake" news sounds too close to censorship for my fancy.
Governments censor. Private institutions editorialize.
If the NYT chooses not to print an op-ed you send them, it is NOT censorship.
If the United States government forces the NYT not to print your op-ed, it IS censorship.
See the difference?