TikTok explains its ban on political advertising • Hacker News Board

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#51

Post by Nasrudith » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:08 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #48

tu7001 wrote: post #47

Censoring information about Hong Kong protests may be taken as a bad thing. But it seems obvious to me, that banning pro LGBT content in app for kids is very desirable.

Disagree. Kids can learn about all sorts of people. Not sure where that comment was supposed to be going. Should images of black people be banned from apps for kids?

Yeah it is effectively normism deciding "respectability" and "morals" which are actively antimoral. I see no difference between that and banning depictions of mixed races families to "discourage miscegenation".

It is the category of "stop interfering with my indoctrination of my kids with that pesky reality"!

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#52

Post by loceng » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:12 PM UTC

Aperocky wrote: post #39

loceng wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Advertising allows relatively cheap, very low effort, access to mass manipulation of a population. If people had to actually effort to share knowledge - as we evolved to having to do, to excel at story telling to pass on knowledge through generations - then that cost would prevent the kind of rapid indoctrination and rallying people based on hate, emotional and irrational thinking - thought that hasn't been checked w…

This. All ads present a very one sided story, for products this is fine as you would need to pay for it, hence the negative consideration. For a political opinion it’s just there to influence and appeal to inherent bias in the direction of the ad.

It's one reason I love the spirit of Tesla and Elon Musk: Tesla doesn't advertise. This means only once a product is good enough that it starts getting talked about, word of mouth - and that is the perfect mechanism, counterpoint, for a company to only gain attention when deserved vs. paying for it; the VC-finance industrial complex of course has allowed products, organizations, to bypass this most important mechanism of friction for "knowledge" propagation via pumping out select advertising messages, and only in last decade via highly targeted ads - allowing relative precision.

The convergence of these different factors in the last decade, including automation taking away jobs from Americans who want to work - along with regulatory capture that has allow bad policy and ability to pay $0 in taxes like Amazon - leading to societal unrest, increased suffering, allowing for a democracy that can be easily destabilized.

We see this now though - so we can steer the ship, leading to America once again becoming strong - an economic powerhouse, recapturing and rerealizing the rhetoric of American patriotism. Once these systems rebound with new guidance, the innovation of free minds directing resources efficiently toward health - toward being free and standing strong for our brothers and sisters, local and global - will lead to an unstoppable force - which hopefully will not require conflict to hold or expand the line of peace as different nations choose to adopt these systems for themselves - with our support and guidance.

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#53

Post by beager » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:18 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #46

beager wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ideals are unfortunately insignificant here. Companies are all about doing the legal minimum, especially if that is in line with profit maximum. Right, wrong, or indifferent. Also, I believe they have absolute editorial latitude. They’re not a utility. Don’t want to wet-blanket your post because I do think companies should be idealistic, bold, and consistent with their policies, notwithstanding what laws or constitut…

Doesn't mean the public should let them get away with it, or whitewash it. Ideals mean something to the public (I hope). We should make that plain. Its about the only leverage we have.

Definitely. You vote with your attention, your pageviews, your own voice. And you vote with your vote, as does everyone else who is legal to vote.

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#54

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:19 PM UTC

liotier wrote: post #10

chrisseaton wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a lack of informed political discussion Was TikTok was an appropriate place for informed political discussion?

The forum is the right place for political discussion, regardless of what the forum is. As for the political discussion being "informed", that is subjective.

[deleted]

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#55

Post by chrisseaton » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:22 PM UTC

liotier wrote: post #10

chrisseaton wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a lack of informed political discussion Was TikTok was an appropriate place for informed political discussion?

The forum is the right place for political discussion, regardless of what the forum is. As for the political discussion being "informed", that is subjective.

What are you using the definite article to mean there?

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#56

Post by mAEStro-paNDa » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

loceng wrote: post #52

Aperocky wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. All ads present a very one sided story, for products this is fine as you would need to pay for it, hence the negative consideration. For a political opinion it’s just there to influence and appeal to inherent bias in the direction of the ad.

It's one reason I love the spirit of Tesla and Elon Musk: Tesla doesn't advertise. This means only once a product is good enough that it starts getting talked about, word of mouth - and that is the perfect mechanism, counterpoint, for a company to only gain attention when deserved vs. paying for it; the VC-finance industrial complex of course has allowed products, organizations, to bypass this most important mechanis…

> including automation taking away jobs from Americans

What about the explicit intentional policy?

> along with regulatory capture that has allow bad policy and ability to pay $0 in taxes like Amazon

Don't you mean the lack of?

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#57

Post by mAEStro-paNDa » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 3:29 PM UTC

Why not ban all advertising? Isn't that the discussion we should be having?

If we're going to accept that advertising is an ever-existing industry in our lives, then shouldn't the conversation be not about what kinds of advertising we should ban, but media awareness in general?

Bans should be reserved for the most egregious, such as products that kill (tobacco) or explicit incitements to violence, for example.

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#58

Post by JoeAltmaier » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 4:34 PM UTC

beager wrote: post #53

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't mean the public should let them get away with it, or whitewash it. Ideals mean something to the public (I hope). We should make that plain. Its about the only leverage we have.

Definitely. You vote with your attention, your pageviews, your own voice. And you vote with your vote, as does everyone else who is legal to vote.

And your dollars. The Big Vote.

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#59

Post by tu7001 » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 5:10 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #48

tu7001 wrote: post #47

Censoring information about Hong Kong protests may be taken as a bad thing. But it seems obvious to me, that banning pro LGBT content in app for kids is very desirable.

Disagree. Kids can learn about all sorts of people. Not sure where that comment was supposed to be going. Should images of black people be banned from apps for kids?

In my opinion it's bad. Anyway my kids don't know and I have constitutional rights to bring them up according to my views.

Re: TikTok explains its ban on political advertising

#60

Post by loceng » Mon, Oct 14, 2019, 7:45 PM UTC

mAEStro-paNDa wrote: post #56

loceng wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's one reason I love the spirit of Tesla and Elon Musk: Tesla doesn't advertise. This means only once a product is good enough that it starts getting talked about, word of mouth - and that is the perfect mechanism, counterpoint, for a company to only gain attention when deserved vs. paying for it; the VC-finance industrial complex of course has allowed products, organizations, to bypass this most important mechanis…

> including automation taking away jobs from Americans What about the explicit intentional policy? > along with regulatory capture that has allow bad policy and ability to pay $0 in taxes like Amazon Don't you mean the lack of?

Not sure what you're referencing re: explicit intentional policy?

Re: Bad policy - certainly there is policy that was crafted to benefit industry at the cost of society, the environment, surely lacking good policy. Like why is VAT in existence in ~160 countries around the world but not in the US? Do you consider that lacking of policy? That's more regulatory capture leading to politicians being elected who protect the interests of those who helped pay to get them voted in.